Page 235 of My Husband’s New Fiancée

“I promise to love you and protect you every day. To listen to you. To stay, even when I feel overwhelmed, powerless, or angry. I promise to speak before silence turns into resentment. To always find my way back to you.”

Emotion swells inside me.

“Because losing you is not an option.”

Emotion overwhelms me.

When the officiant asks us to exchange rings, Dante slides mine onto my finger with almost solemn slowness.

I do the same.

His wedding band returns to its place on his left hand—where it had already been for weeks, where it always should have stayed.

“I now pronounce you husband and wife.”

Someone starts clapping.

Andrea, obviously.

Everyone bursts out laughing and immediately joins in.

Dante leans down and kisses me.

A long kiss. Tender. Deep. As though he’s sealing far more than a marriage. As though he’s finally closing an old wound.

Outside, rain pours down in sheets.

And yet we’re all laughing together on the city hall steps—soaked, disheveled, beautifully chaotic.

This day looks nothing like a fairy-tale wedding.

And yet…

I have never felt more alive.

65. Prison Visit

Dante

Saturday, August 12

Wald’s trial lasted several weeks.

In the end, he was sentenced to twenty-five years in prison for attempted murder, corruption, money laundering, and industrial espionage.

When the verdict was announced, I closed my eyes for a second and, for the first time in a long while, I truly breathed.

My family was finally safe.

As for Gaspard, he received a reduced sentence thanks to his deal with the prosecution.

But losing his family destroyed him far more than the conviction ever did.

Too bad it took this for him to understand.

And Bianca…

The visitation room is filled with muffled voices, scraping chairs, lowered gazes.