Three Chances, Then I’m Gone

Nadia's POV

Once I'd tucked my daughter, Nina Salvatore, into bed, I went back to my own room, opened my laptop, and started typing out my resignation from the Salvatore family.

This was our seventh wedding anniversary. It was also the year I finally made up my mind to let Don Rafael Salvatore go.

A soft knock came at the door. I glanced up and found six-year-old Nina standing in the doorway, a small teddy bear clutched to her chest.

"Mommy, are we really leaving the family?" Her eyes were full of doubt. "But Daddy—I mean, the Don—he hugged me tonight."

She smoothed down the bear's fur with one finger. It was the only toy Rafael had ever given her.

"Do you think that means he's starting to like me?" she asked, so carefully, so hopefully.

I froze, caught off guard.

In all seven years of our marriage, Rafael had never once let our daughter call him "Daddy." To her, he was "Don Rafael," and nothing more.

When Nina was two, he'd been in a rare good mood and taken her to a family gathering for the first time. She spotted a cotton candy cart on the sidewalk, threw herself into his arms, and squealed in that tiny voice of hers, "Daddy! Daddy, can I have some cotton candy, please?"

A few of his associates were standing close enough to hear. Heads turned. Rafael's face went black as a storm cloud, all because a toddler had called him "Daddy."

He put her down right there on the pavement and walked off, making her trail after him all the way home on her own. She'd only just learned to run.

"I told you. You call me 'Don.' That's it."

Nina cried the whole way, stumbling after his footsteps. She fell again and again. By the time she made it home, her feet were scraped raw and her knees and elbows were bruised and bleeding.

He never looked back, not even once.

When she was four, she begged him for weeks until he finally agreed to take her to the amusement park. She skipped along beside him, her little hand in his.

Then, in the middle of the crowd, she slipped and said "Daddy" again. He dropped her hand on the spot.

"You broke the rule again. You don't call me that."

To a four-year-old, that park was enormous. She was swallowed up by the crowd in seconds. When I finally found her, she was curled up in the bushes behind the roller coaster, shaking and sobbing.

After that day, she never dared to say it again. And that was when the so-called "family" Rafael and I had built turned into a joke.

My eyes stung. I pulled Nina into my arms and held her tight.

"Nina, Jasmine Hale is back. She's the one the Don has been waiting for all these years. We can't stay here anymore."

Her face fell. Then, a heartbeat later, she held the bear up in front of me.

"But Mommy, he gave me this today."

She watched me with those big round eyes and kept right on defending him. "If the Don didn't like me, why would he give me a present?"

I looked at that hopeful little face, and I couldn't get a word out.

How could I tell her that Rafael had only hugged her and lifted her up today because Jasmine, his first love, had just come back with her daughter, Ally Hale?

How could I tell her that the bear had belonged to Ally first, and that he'd handed it over to Nina only because Ally was tired of it?

I couldn't. I didn't want to wreck the picture she had of her father. So I did what I'd always done and swallowed the truth.

I bent down and kissed her forehead. While she wasn't looking, I wiped the tears from the corners of my eyes.

That was the last scrap of dignity I had left as her mother, and the last illusion I could still protect for her. I forced down the lump in my throat and asked softly, "Nina, do you want to come away with me?"

She went still. It was a long time before she answered in a small voice, "Do we really have to? I haven't even…"

She dropped her eyes and hugged the bear tighter. "I haven't gotten to call him 'Daddy' out loud, in front of everyone. Not even once."

The tears finally spilled over. I bit down on my lip to keep from sobbing.

"Sweetheart, the Don doesn't want us here. Let me take you somewhere better, okay?"

She was quiet for a long time. Slowly she loosened her arms, then pulled the bear back against her chest.

At last she looked up at me, her eyes wet. "Then let's give him three more chances. If he still doesn't want us after that…"

She sniffled. "We'll leave him for good."

I closed my eyes. After a long while, I nodded.

"Okay."

Nina and I would give Rafael three last chances.