He Thought I Was Finally Learning. I Was Already Leaving. novel Chapter 8

He still didn’t understand. 

Even after everything, he truly believed that if the offer was large enough, I was supposed to accept it gratefully. 

“That’s enough, Adriano,” I said, cutting him off. “We’re done. I don’t want your money, your apologies, or  your plans. The only thing I want from you is the divorce paperwork with your signature on it.” 

Pain flashed across his face so openly that, once, it might have shaken me. 

It didn’t now. 

He could not understand why, after he had come to me in person, after removing Viviana and offering me  everything he thought mattered, I was still standing there unmoved. 

“Serafina, I never wanted this to end,” he said. “You’re my wife.” 

His voice dropped, almost pleading. 

“What do you want me to do?” 

By then I was too tired for patience. 

“Adriano, you are always so certain that people should be grateful just because you decided to notice 

them. If you shelter someone, they owe you loyalty. If you get tired of them, they’re supposed to disappear quietly and call it fate.” 

He stood very still. 

“You thought that because I came from less than you did, because I married into your name, I could only survive by holding onto you. Taking care of me fed your pride. Letting Viviana humiliate me fed your control. And all this time, you expected me to orbit around you like that was the natural order of things.” 

My voice sharpened. 

“It wasn’t. And I’m done pretending it was.” 

He looked as though I had struck him. 

Then he caught my wrist, not hard, but desperately. 

“Can’t you give me one chance?” he asked. “You can’t decide a marriage is over like this and leave me no way to make it right.” 

I pulled my hand free. 

“You had chances, Adriano. Again and again. Every time, you decided it was easier not to believe me, and let someone else hurt me in your place.” 

I already knew how stubborn he was. I knew leaving him would not end with one conversation. 

What I hadn’t expected was for him to show up again the next morning smiling like a man with a plan. 

Just after sunrise, a Morelli truck rolled into the yard loaded with fresh supplies. Adriano stepped out in clean casual clothes, looking rested, composed, and almost charming again, as though the night before had only been a setback. 

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