The priest’s words sounded distant, unintelligible. I couldn’t take my eyes off Enrico—off the ice in his gray irises, the unnatural tension in his jaw. I silently begged him to look at me, to explain what was happening.
“Enrico Ferrara,” the priest’s voice rang out, loud and firm, pulling my attention back. “Do you freely and willingly accept Valentina Muniz as your lawful wife?”
Absolute silence.
The air left my lungs when Enrico didn’t answer.
I felt movement ripple through the pews, restless bodies shifting as murmurs began to spread through the church.
Finally, he spoke.
And the words that left his mouth split my soul in two.
“No.”
His voice was firm. Merciless. As if he had just pronounced a death sentence.
“I will not marry this woman.”
The silence that followed was brutal, deafening—and brief.
In the next instant, hushed murmurs exploded among the guests, a cruel wave of voices judging me without mercy.
The floor seemed to give way beneath my feet. My heart plummeted, shattering along with every dream I had built over the past months. My skin turned cold as all eyes fixed on me.
But I couldn’t look anywhere else. At anyone else.
Only at the gray irises I once believed I knew so well—until they swallowed me whole.
In that moment, my entire world was Enrico Ferrara.
And as I looked at him, the man who used to hold me at night was gone. The man who whispered promises of love in my ear was gone. The man who spoke filthy, desperate words while he was inside me was gone.
What stood before me was a stranger—cold in a way I had never seen before. A darkness that froze me from the inside out, destroying the last fragile remnants of hope I still clung to.
Enrico held my gaze for long seconds, his expression filled with such intensity and contempt that I had to fight just to keep breathing. Each second felt like an eternity. Each heartbeat was another step toward a cliff I wasn’t sure I would survive falling from.
I desperately searched his face for something—anything—that contradicted this sudden cruelty. Some trace of the tenderness he had sworn he felt for me just hours earlier.
There was nothing.
Nothing at all.
All I saw was resentment and hatred, mixed with a pain so deep and silent I couldn’t begin to understand it. It felt like a promise—that this wasn’t the end. That this humiliation was only the beginning of the suffering he intended for me.
I will destroy you,his eyes seemed to say.
Every part of you. Every memory you have of me.
Hot tears streamed down my face, but I didn’t look away. I accepted every silent blow from that merciless stare, even without understanding why.
“Please,” I whispered, barely audible, knowing only he would hear. My soul shattered under his indifferent silence. I didn’t even know what I was begging for anymore—only that I needed my Enrico back. My love.Please, universe, give him back to me.
“Enrico… please.”
This woman.
That was how he had referred to me.
