My Runaway Groom Came Back I Became His Aunt! novel Chapter 9

Chapter 2

“What’s this?”

Ember picked up a woven bracelet from beside the counter.

It was made of green cord, the knot stiffened by dried blood, and a tiny spent bullet casing dangled from it.

I lifted my gaze and recognized it immediately. It was the “lucky charm” I had given Dominic years ago.

Back then he had not been the esteemed mayor of New York City. He had been a teenage boy abandoned in

an alley after his father’s corruption scandal, left to freeze or die.

I found him under a streetlamp on a winter night. He was curled in a pile of snow, bruised all over, and

suddenly reached out to clutch the hem of my coat.

Over the sharp, calculated protests of my mother and brother, I brought him home.

I spent my allowance to hire a doctor and wrestled him back from the brink of a delirium that smelled of

cheap gin and copper.

That was how sixteen-year-old Dominic stayed with the Ravello family and became my shadow.

I jumped the wall to skip class and he waited on the other side to catch me.

When I was grounded, he sat through the long hours with me so I would not be bored. When I was bullied, he

stood up first, taking blow after blow just to shield me.

As we grew older, feelings deepened. We hid in the camellia garden of the estate and kissed against the

flowered wall.

Then, when he turned nineteen, he insisted on joining my father’s mafia gang in Boston.

“Wait for me, Amelia. A crown is nothing if you aren’t the one wearing it beside me. When I make my name and clear my father’s, I will come back and marry you properly.”

He pressed me against the penthouse window glass and kissed my hair again and again. “I will come back. I only want you for the rest of my life.”

I cried while baking his favorite cheesecake through the night. I braided that bracelet and tucked it into his

suitcase.

Mother and Vincent never liked him, yet they yielded to my tears. In the end they used the Ravello family’s connections to lay his first path in Boston,

Within two years Dominic’s name began appearing in intelligence reports.

He earned merit after merit for the family’s organization, climbing higher and higher with a reputation that grew with every job he pulled off.

Chapter 2

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The day he transferred back to New York, my hands shook with excitement. But on that same day, my true

origins were exposed.

I had never been the Ravello family’s Principessa. I was not their biological daughter. I was a child switched

at birth by a malicious nanny.

My real parents were laborers working on construction sites. The true Principessa, Rhea, returned home, and my mother held my hand with a soft, trembling promise.

“Even if Rhea is back, you are still our daughter. You are still the Ravello family’s Principessa.”

Vincent ruffled my hair with the same carefree smile. “It’s just another chair at the Ravello table, Amelia.

Nothing will change.”

Dominic did not even attend the welcome party my father threw for him. Instead, he rushed straight to me, pulling me into a fierce embrace.

“I can protect you now. Even if the Ravello family does not want you, I want you.”

The leaden weight in my chest finally loosened its grip.

Out of guilt, I put Rhea first in everything. I took her shopping, taught her etiquette, let her choose anything good before I did, terrified she might feel even a trace of discomfort.

Rhea always clung to my arm, calling me sister in that sugary sweet voice. She joined my sleepovers and

movie nights.

I had truly believed I had found the world’s best family and the world’s best lover.

Even on my dates with Dominic, I brought Rhea along.

At first Dominic protested, convinced she was ruining our time alone. Rhea’s face went bright red as she accused him of having impure motives.

I stood between them constantly, smoothing things over until the tension eased and they maintained a

fragile peace.

Little by little, without my noticing, Dominic began remembering Rhea’s preferences, her cycle, her clothing

sizes.

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