Page 51 of Forgive Me, Father (Don #1)

CHAPTER ONE

The first evening in the dungeon was a brutal descent into shadows and silence.

Cold iron clamped around my wrist, the shackle biting into my skin as he fastened it to the overhead beam.

I dangled there, suspended like a marionette in some twisted theater, my body stretched and trembling.

It was just as Kai had once done, his hands rough, deliberate, the memory of his touch now a phantom that burned colder than the chains.

The air was damp, thick with the scent of old stone and something darker, something like him.

It became impossible to tell where reality ended and the nightmare began. Shadows bled into each other, blurring time, thought, even pain. I broke sooner than I wanted, sooner than I ever thought I would. My voice, raw and trembling, cracked through the silence as I begged Alfonso to stop.

He did stop. Without a word, he unfastened the shackle, and I collapsed into his arms, weightless with exhaustion.

He didn’t leave. Instead, he sat beside me on the cold stone floor of his dungeon, silent and still, his presence as steady as the walls around us.

I wept until the sobs stole my breath, until the darkness behind my eyes pulled me under. And even then, he stayed.

He wanted the truth, the whole, ugly truth of what that bastard had done to me. Not to punish me with it, but to carry it with me, to unravel the damage together in this dark sanctuary of his. We’ll face it here, he said, our way. The Pontisello way. Just like he once promised my mother.

But dragging those memories into the light felt like tearing old wounds open with my bare hands.

Still, I gave him fragments, fractured, hesitant confessions that spilled out between long silences and shaking breaths.

And he never pushed. He took every broken piece I offered, held them gently in those dangerous hands of his, and waited for more.

Patient, relentless, and terrifyingly tender, only my loving monster could do that.

I started running with him each morning, our footsteps echoing through the misty quiet before the world woke.

He never rushed me, just matched my pace, slowing when my breath became ragged, stopping without a word when my legs gave out.

One morning, when my body refused to go any farther, he scooped me up without hesitation, slinging me over his shoulder like I weighed nothing.

I should’ve been embarrassed. Instead, I laughed, really laughed, for the first time in what felt like forever. The sound startled us both.

Every night, we returned to the dungeon, our grim ritual beneath the surface. And every day, I pushed a little further, chipped away a little more of the fear that lived under my skin. It wasn’t just survival anymore. It was reclamation. One painful, deliberate step at a time.

My mother stayed, but fear clung to her like a second skin.

She watched me with wide, haunted eyes, as if she knew something I didn’t, or worse, suspected something she couldn’t bear to confirm.

Maybe she feared it would all unravel if she spoke too soon.

Whatever question weighed on her tongue, she swallowed it, too afraid of what my answer might be.

I began learning how to fight, really fight.

Nico, Bas, Milo, and my husband took turns working with me, each one pushing me in their own way.

They taught me how to move, how to strike, how to turn fear into focus.

Bruises bloomed like dark flowers across my skin, but I wore them like armor.

For the first time, I wasn’t just surviving, I was preparing.

Finally, it was Alfonso who placed the cold weight of a gun in my hands. His voice was steady, his eyes unreadable as he guided my fingers into position. There was no room for hesitation, only precision, control, and the quiet understanding that this was the last line I’d ever need to cross.

One week bled into two, and two into three.

By the end of the fourth week, I could say I felt better, though it was a strange kind of better.

There was progress, yes, but underneath it all, something was off.

A heavy, gnawing feeling in my stomach that I couldn’t shake.

It wasn’t just the past catching up with me, it was something else, something I couldn’t quite place.

Every morning, I emptied my stomach until it felt like I was coughing up my soul.

I tried to push the thought away, bury it deep under layers of denial.

But eventually, I couldn’t ignore it anymore.

I ordered a few pregnancy tests online, and one morning, before the sun had fully risen, I forced myself to face it.

I gathered every shred of courage I had left and watched, heart hammering, as I peed on each one, waiting for the truth to reveal itself.

Each one came back positive, the lines glaring up at me like a cruel revelation. And every single test marked eight weeks . Eight weeks. The numbers pressed down on me, heavy and suffocating, as if the truth was something I couldn’t escape, no matter how hard I tried.

It was the time I was with Kai. I was pregnant with Kai’s child.

I knew what I should do, the choice that made sense, the one that would end this.

But in the back of my mind, something held me back.

My faith, my religion, it didn’t allow for this.

The weight of those rules pressed down on me, twisting my gut, as the decision I could never fully make gnawed at my soul.

I would be branded for life, marked by a truth I couldn’t escape.

But what if it wasn’t Kai’s? What if this wasn’t the legacy of the man who’d taken me, but the man I called my husband?

I’d slept with him the night before Kai stole me away, and for days leading up to it.

This child, it could be his heir, not Kai’s.

The thought twisted like a knife, and I couldn’t decide which was worse.

For the next two days, the struggle consumed me. It twisted inside, gnawing at my every thought. Alfonso noticed my distance, misinterpreting it as a retreat. He fought for me, for us. His words were raw, desperate, he begged me not to walk away, to fight alongside him.

"We can get through this," he insisted, his voice trembling as though the weight of his plea was too much to bear. "Please, don't pull away from me. I need you."

But even as he reached for me, my chest tightened, and doubt clawed at my insides, unraveling everything.

Tears welled up and slipped quietly down my cheeks as he spoke, his words soft but desperate. "Please, stay with me... I can't lose you."

I didn’t respond. I couldn’t. His plea echoed in the silence, each word pulling at something deep within me. All I could do was cry—softly, helplessly—too broken to find the strength to answer.

He would insist on ending it—this child growing inside me.

He didn’t care that I couldn’t bear to raise it, couldn’t bring myself to face it.

But I knew, deep down, there was no way I could go through with an abortion.

No child ever asked for a father like him, and they didn’t get to choose how they were conceived.

This baby deserved something more—something better.

I could give it away, to another woman, to a family, to someone who could love it as their own.

A life this child would never have known with him.

I knew what needed to be done, but the path to it felt impossible to navigate. The clarity of the decision was there, but the how— how to make it happen—eluded me completely.

* * *

For the next month, I quietly withdrew small sums from the bank account Alfonso had given me, just enough to keep things moving without drawing attention. Each transaction felt like a delicate balance, a quiet preparation for something I wasn’t sure I was ready for.

I placed it under my bed.

My belly was beginning to swell, a constant reminder that time was slipping away. I knew I had to find a way back to the USA—away from the man who had become my personal dungeon. I pretended to give in, made him believe I was broken, that I couldn’t go on in this hell he had created.

We fought about what Kai had told me. What had Alfonso done to his sister?

That pushed us apart as Alfonso refused to speak about it., but he promised it wasn’t like that.

I knew it wasn’t like that. Kai was a sick man. Probably like his father.

But it kept Alfonso away from seeing the truth.

If he noticed my growing belly, if he knew, I feared his rage would be unstoppable. He would force me to end this life inside me, and I couldn’t let that happen.

He would never understand what I was doing.

But I had to do it. I found my chance, the perfect moment, when Alfonso’s darkness returned.

I recoiled at the words that slipped from his lips, he was going to see Sarah .

The very thought twisted something deep inside me.

I had to make him believe it, that I didn’t care anymore, that I was done.

I needed him to leave, to walk away, even if it shattered both of us.

I stood there, enduring as my husband fell apart, his heart breaking in front of me.

He kissed me gently on the temple, then walked away, leaving me alone in the heavy silence.

Tears welled up in my eyes, slipping down my nose in silent surrender.

All of this, all this pain, because I couldn’t end a life, a life that might belong to a monster, or it might belong to my beautiful demon.

I had given up everything for this baby.

It didn’t matter who the father was. This child was mine, and no matter the cost, I would protect it.

Kai was right. No other man would ever have me again.

An hour later, I slipped out of the house, careful not to make a sound. My heart pounded as I made my way to the airport, each step taking me closer to freedom. I was leaving it all behind. I was going home.