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I sank to my knees, clutching the doorframe until my knuckles turned white. How could she just disappear without a trace? Didn't what we shared mean anything to her?
Deep down though, I understood Natalia's impossible choice. Her father's wrath was relentless - he would never stop hunting me, destroying anyone in his path until I was dead or broken. Natalia was selflessly sacrificing our love to try and protect me from that fate.
It was a noble but futile gesture. Nothing could protect me from this blistering anguish of losing her. Our love had awakened something in me too, a tenderness and vulnerability I neverallowed myself before Natalia. Now I was utterly lost without my guiding light.
I glanced up through blurred eyes at the empty hall. Even knowing she wouldn't be there, it was instinct to search for any sign of Natalia still lingering close by. But she was gone, disappeared like mist as silently as she had arrived in my dark world.
How could I go on alone, knowing the euphoric heights of passion we'd experienced together? Natalia had ruined me for anyone else. My heart would forever remain loyal to her, burning for the woman I couldn't have but who would haunt my soul eternally.
I staggered upright, stumbling over to my liquor cabinet. What I really needed was to drive straight to Don Moretti and beg him to end me if it relieved this crippling ache of loss even a fraction.
But I had made a promise to Natalia in return - to stay alive and find some way forward, even with my shattered heart. It was the only vow I could still keep to her now.
So instead I poured myself a glass of whiskey with unsteady hands, collapsing onto the couch. I downed the liquor hastily, craving the numbness. But no amount could dull this pain.
I dropped my head into my hands, finally allowing the tears to fall hotly. It seemed impossible I would ever feel whole againwith my other half missing. Natalia had awakened the man within me. Without her, he would surely die.
Natalia had sacrificed our love to selflessly try and protect me from her father's wrath. I was determined not to let that gesture be in vain, though it was bleeding me dry. Each moment felt like torment, being flayed alive.
I took comfort imagining Natalia starting over somewhere far away. Perhaps near the ocean like she had always dreamed, or tucked away in a mountain village. I prayed she had found some measure of peace, was fulfilling all our shared hopes in whatever new life she now lived. Natalia deserved that freedom and light. My angel, my only salvation. I will love you forever.
EPILOGUE
The crumpled letter lay abandoned on the floor, already worn from the countless times I had reread it like a lifeline over the endless empty days since discovering Natalia's goodbye. I could recite the elegantly scrawled words from memory now, though they never failed to slice my heart anew.
Sometimes, in weaker moments, I would forget and call out to her from the other room by habit. Or my treacherous hand would reach across the empty sheets for her warmth in the night.Those agonizing moments when reality came crashing back were the cruelest.
During the long nights spent pacing sleepless, mad schemes took root like going after her father, and then tracing and kidnapping Natalia away somewhere we could never be found. But I knew any rash action would only bring more misery upon her. I had to respect her choice and stay far away, however it gutted me.
There were still fleeting seconds between numbness and searing anguish when Natalia felt close again, our passion vibrant in my mind. Those memories were the only drops of water in this desert keeping my soul from withering fully.
Natalia, are you safe? Are you happy? Don't forget how deeply you were loved, are still loved always...
I existed now in that fitful space between dreaming and waking, Natalia's lingering ghost my sole companion.
So days blurred into weeks in monotonous misery. My empire turned to meaningless ash. But I honored my vow to Natalia not to let all-consuming hatred take root as her father's had. I tried to hold onto some flicker of my humanity, for her.
Some days that seemed impossible. Then I would reread the letter, tracing her elegant script, pressing it to my heart that still stubbornly beat despite unimaginable loss. Natalia hadloved deeply, fought for us against impossible odds. That alone sustained me.
As weeks passed, the acute pain ebbed ever so slightly until most days it was a dull persistent ache. Enough that I could appreciate brief distractions again - deep crimson sunsets, rainstorms pelting the windows, a forgotten favorite song. Natalia would want me to find those pockets of beauty again.
I withered without Natalia's light to sustain me. Food held no appeal, laughter no joy. Everything lost meaning when she walked out of my life.
I knew continuing on like a ghost was an insult to the life Natalia had gifted me so briefly. She would weep to see the empty shell of a man I'd become in her absence.
Finally one grey morning, I reached my breaking point. I couldn't exist for one more day without even trying to find the only woman who had ever truly seen and accepted me.
Throwing some essentials haphazardly into a bag, I stormed out to my car before I could lose momentum. Wallowing in misery would not bring Natalia back. It was time to take action, however futile. I had to try.
Peeling out, I drove recklessly toward the outskirts of town. Ever since discovering Natalia's goodbye letter, I'd had my men surreptitiously keeping tabs on Don Moretti and his innercircle movements. If anyone could provide clues to Natalia's whereabouts, it was them.
Outside a smoky downtown bar I knew was a regular Moretti haunt, I settled in to wait as evening gloom descended. The throaty rumble of a motorcycle eventually caught my ear over the bustle of nightlife. I peered through my cracked window as Enzo Moretti himself parked and headed inside alone.
Adrenaline spiked through me. I hadn't dared approach Enzo in all this time. But I was done sitting idly by without answers.
I slipped from my car, ballcap pulled low as I followed Enzo into the crowded bar. He had settled alone at a corner table with his back to the wall, ever vigilant despite the haze of cigarette smoke dulling the room.
Turning my shoulder to avoid recognition, I pretended to occupy myself at the bar while tracking Enzo's movements. His broad frame was visibly more weathered in recent years from the burdens of leading the Moretti empire. But he remained a commanding presence, dangerous to confront openly.
