Seven Days Before the Mafia Princess Died

The ninety-ninth thing my adopted sister Isabella took from me was a grave in the sun. I had already paid the deposit, but the cemetery didn’t dare sell the plot to me. Because the Moretti family’s principessa wanted that plot for her dead dog. But I loved that spot. So I called my mother, the Donna of the Moretti family. Her voice cooled the moment I mentioned the grave： “Adriana, are you still pretending you have gastric cancer?” “Isabella just lost her dog. She’s suffered enough. Stop trying to take something else from her.” My father rejected my call. My brother, Luca, answered while helping Isabella choose the dog’s headstone. “Stop buying graves to frighten us.Stop buying graves to frighten us. Why are you always so petty? Can't you stand to see your sister have anything good?” I looked at the oncologist’s report in my hand. Seven days. Maybe less. So even when I was truly dying, no one believed me. I chose the only plot left at the edge of the cemetery, where sunlight never reached, and signed the contract. Then I blocked my family one by one. They were right. I needed to stop begging them to care and remove myself from their lives for good. Seven days later, I died alone. That was when the Morettis finally believed me. And lost their minds with regret. Chapter 1 As soon as I paid the remaining balance on my burial plot, a photo from Isabella appeared on my phone. She stood at the burial plot beneath the old oak tree, the one I had wanted, cradling her dog’s silver urn against her chest. My parents flanked her like bodyguards. Behind them, my brother was speaking to a sculptor beside three slabs of imported Italian marble. Isabella followed the photo with a voice message. “Adriana, Caesar is already dead. Please don’t make me fight you for the place where I bury him too.” Her voice trembled beautifully. Anyone else might have believed she was the one being bullied. I deleted the message and blocked her. Then I left Saint Michael’s Cemetery and returned to the hospital. Dr. Bennett was waiting in his office with my latest scans pulled up on the screen. “How long do I have?” Dr. Bennett removed his glasses. “A week at most. Possibly less.” I nodded as if he had told me the weather. Dr. Bennett slid a folder across the desk. “Where is your family? They need to understand how serious this is.” A bitter smile touched my lips. I had told them about my diagnosis again and again. They had never believed me. To them, terminal cancer was just another lie I had invented to compete with Isabella for their love. Mother had accused me of using a forged report to punish her. Luca said anyone could download a cancer diagnosis and change the name. Father had not bothered to read it at all. The Morettis trusted Isabella’s tears more than an oncologist’s diagnosis. A knock interrupted us. A hospital administrator stepped inside, holding a document. “Miss Moretti, I’m sorry, but the Moretti family office withdrew authorization for your private palliative care. That includes the nursing service that was supposed to begin tonight.” I looked up. “Withdrawn by whom?” “The Moretti family office. Don Moretti is listed as the guarantor.” For a moment, I said nothing. My father was probably punishing me for trying to take Caesar’s burial plot. He truly believed I had forged the diagnosis, and saw no reason to waste family money on another performance. “I understand,” I said quietly. I returned to the two-bedroom Tribeca condo where I had lived for the past year. It belonged to one of the Morettis’ real-estate companies and came with a doorman, marble counters, and a view of the Hudson. It had everything except the feeling of home. My father had moved me there after Isabella said she could no longer breathe beneath the same roof as me. But it hadn’t always been this way. There was a time when Mother and Father were terrified of losing me. When I was twelve, I collapsed with a fever at a children’s home funded by the Moretti Foundation. Mother happened to be visiting that afternoon and noticed the crescent-shaped birthmark behind my ear. The mark matched the one in every missing-person notice the Morettis had quietly circulated for twelve years. A DNA test confirmed what she already knew. I was Adriana Moretti, the daughter of New York’s most feared Don. The child who had vanished from her crib. My mother stayed beside my hospital bed for two nights. When the results came back, she held me so tightly I could barely breathe. She said she had never stopped looking for me. She promised to spend the rest of her life making up for every year we had lost. And for a while, she kept that promise. Father added my name to the Moretti family trust and introduced me as his daughter to every capo in New York. Luca moved into the bedroom across from mine because I was afraid to sleep alone. Mother sat beside me through every nightmare until I stopped waking up convinced I was back at the children’s home. They loved me. I knew they did. Then Isabella began to fall apart. Isabella had been adopted a year after I disappeared. By the time I returned, she had already spent eleven years calling my parents Mama and Papa and treating my brother as her own. When I came home, she stopped eating.When she finally collapsed, the doctors found a note beneath her pillow. Now that Adriana is home, none of you need me anymore. My mother cried for three days. Luca asked me not to appear at family dinners until she felt safer. Father reminded me that Isabella was still their daughter and that my return did not make her less of one. Even my mother asked me to be patient. Give Isabella time to understand that I wasn’t there to replace her. At first, those requests seemed temporary. So I agreed. But every time Isabella cried, I was asked to give up something else. Eventually, they stopped asking. They simply expected me to step aside. I waited ten years for the family who had once loved me to choose me again. Now, I had seven days left. And still, they hadn’t chosen me. That evening, I called a funeral home Arranging my own death was easier than I expected. Direct cremation. No wake. No church service. A plain ivory urn. One photograph for the cemetery records and no obituary. For the headstone, I chose only my name. No beloved daughter. No cherished sister. The funeral director paused over the final section. “Who should we contact to receive your remains?” I stared at the blank line. The Morettis buried every member of the family with priests, roses, and armed men standing at the cemetery gates. But no one would come for me. “Send them directly to Saint Michael’s,” I said. “The burial has already been paid for.” “We’ll need a signed final-disposition directive.” “Send it to me.” The document arrived minutes later. It authorized the funeral home to cremate me and transfer my ashes directly to the cemetery without waiting for my family’s permission. I signed my name at the bottom. Adriana Moretti. For the first time in my life, I alone had decided where I belonged. Chapter 2 The next morning, I returned to the Moretti estate for my passport and birth certificate. My attorney needed them to finalize my will, health-care proxy, and final-disposition directive. The new guard at the gate did not recognize me. He checked my name twice, then rested one hand near the gun beneath his jacket. “You’re not on the approved list, ma’am.” I stared through the iron gates at the house where I had spent the past ten years. Before I could answer, Mr. Romano, the Morettis’ longtime house manager, hurried down the drive. His expression tightened when he saw me. “Miss Adriana. I apologize. Security was replaced last month, and the access list was recently updated.” Recently updated. Apparently, leaving this family required no formal goodbye. They only had to remove my name from a list. Mr. Romano ordered the gate opened and escorted me inside. White roses filled the foyer. Photographs of Caesar covered the walls, documenting the dog’s life from puppyhood to his final days. My mother was adjusting a silver frame above the mantel. The family portrait from my eighteenth birthday was gone. She turned at the sound of my footsteps and froze. “Adriana?” Her gaze moved over my pale skin and the coat hanging too loosely from my shoulders. “What are you doing here? Isabella barely slept last night. Please don’t upset her again.” “I only came for my passport and birth certificate. My lawyer needs them.” “What lawyer?” “It doesn’t matter. I’ll leave as soon as I have them.” Her eyes lingered on my face. I thought she might finally see that something was wrong. Instead, she sighed. “You’ve starved yourself thin over a cemetery plot?” “I’m not starving myself.” “Then stop making yourself sick to punish us. You know how much Isabella loved that dog.” I did not explain again. My old bedroom door stood open upstairs. The bed and desk were gone. The walls had been repainted a warm cream, and glass display cases now lined the room. Isabella was arranging Caesar’s collar, toys, and silver food bowl inside them. When she saw me, she clutched the box in her arms. “I know this used to be your room,” she said carefully. “But Caesar always slept in the sun by that window. Mama thought turning it into his memorial room might make me feel like he was still here.” My eyes fell on a black trash bag in the corner. One faded rabbit ear stuck out from the opening. The stuffed rabbit had been given to me by the director of the children’s home on my seventh birthday. It was the only possession I had brought with me when I became a Moretti again. I bent to retrieve it, but my mother stepped between us. “Those old things were covered in dust. I told the staff to throw them away.” “That rabbit is mine.” “You moved out a year ago, Adriana. You can’t leave this room untouched forever.” Her voice gentled, as if she were trying to reason with a difficult child. “Isabella is your younger sister. Try to understand what she’s going through.” Understand. When Isabella was rejected from the semester program in Rome, I gave up my own place so she would not be left behind. When the Moretti Foundation held its centennial gala, she was afraid the press would ask why Don Moretti suddenly had two daughters. I stayed away and let New York continue believing she was the family’s only principessa. Now my bedroom had become a memorial for her dog. A violent pain tore through my stomach. I grabbed the doorframe as nausea surged up my throat. Then I vomited. Dark blood splashed across the open memorial album, staining Caesar’s final photograph. Isabella screamed. “His picture!” My knees buckled. My mother caught my arm before I hit the floor. “Adriana!” Her face drained of color as she stared at the blood. “What happened?” “The tumor.” I struggled to breathe. “It’s bleeding.” For one suspended second, she looked terrified. Then Isabella threw herself into her arms, sobbing. “She’s lying.” Mother turned toward her. “What?” “It’s fake blood,” Isabella said, her voice beginning to shake. “She must have hidden one of those stage-blood capsules in her mouth.” She pointed at the ruined album. “She came straight into Caesar’s room and threw up on the last photograph I ever took of him. She planned this.” “I didn’t—” “Why would she do this here if it wasn’t deliberate?” Isabella cried. “She already forged a cancer report to make us feel guilty. Now she’s using fake blood because no one believed her.” My mother looked back at me. For one foolish moment, I thought she might finally believe me. Then the fear in her eyes gave way to suspicion. Her chest rose and fell with anger. She raised her hand and slapped me across the face. “Enough. The Moretti family has no daughter who lies as easily as she breathes.” How pathetic. After everything, one frightened look from her was still enough to make me imagine that my mother might choose me. Father and Luca entered moments later. Father took in the blood, the ruined album, and Isabella’s tear-streaked face. “This lie again?” “Adriana, I know you’ve suffered from stomach ulcers before. But cancer?” He turned to the staff. “Pack up whatever she still has here. If this house has made her so miserable, there’s no reason to keep a room for her.” My clothes, books, awards, and the rabbit were packed into two boxes. No one stopped me as I carried them downstairs. Rain had begun to fall outside. Mr. Romano reached for an umbrella, but Father’s voice stopped him. “Romano, Father Vitale is here for Caesar’s memorial. Isabella needs you inside.” Mr. Romano hesitated, then he murmured an apology and returned to the house. I had almost reached the gate when my mother ran after me. “Adriana.” I stopped. She looked at the rain soaking through the cardboard and then at the blood on my sleeve. For a moment, I thought she might ask me to stay. Instead, she said, “Send the Moretti document case back when you’re finished. They belong to the family.” I nodded. Back at the condo, I opened the leather case. Inside were my passport, my reissued birth certificate, and the court order that had restored my name ten years ago. Adriana Moretti. At twelve, I had believed that name meant I finally belonged somewhere. Now it was nothing more than ink on a legal document. I removed my passport and birth certificate, then placed everything back inside the case. A courier returned it to the estate that afternoon. The delivery note contained only one sentence. Everything that belongs to the Morettis has been returned. What they didn’t know was that the daughter who should have belonged to them had only seven days left to live. Soon, there would be no daughter left to return. Chapter 3 Three days after Father withdrew the payment for my treatment, he froze my access to the Moretti family medical account. I discovered it at the hospital pharmacy. The card was declined twice. After paying for my burial and cremation, my personal account held enough money for only four days of pain medication. The pharmacist studied the prescription. “Do you want me to hold the rest for you?” I shook my head. “Four days is enough.” I would not need it after that. A television mounted above the waiting area was showing an interview with my father. The caption identified him as Matteo Moretti, real-estate magnate and chairman of the Moretti Foundation. Standing before a wall of cameras, Father announced a three-million-dollar donation to build the Caesar Moretti Memorial Garden at Manhattan’s largest animal hospital. “Animals are family,” he told the reporters. “Their love deserves to be remembered with dignity.” A nurse beside me sighed. “Mr. Moretti must have a good heart.” Then she noticed the name on my pharmacy bag. “Moretti? Are you related to him?” My fingers tightened around the bag. “No.” Not anymore. Once, Father had searched an entire city for me. Now, he was willing to honor a dead dog more publicly than his dying daughter. Luca arrived at my condo that evening. Since the property belonged to a Moretti holding company, security let him upstairs without calling me. He frowned the moment he entered and waved a hand through the stale smell of medicine. Bloodstained tissues filled the trash can. My unfinished will lay open on the dining table beside the funeral contract. He glanced at neither. “Where’s the Saint Benedict medal Nonna gave you?” My hand rose instinctively to my throat. Before Nonna died, she had fastened the small gold medal around my neck herself. She said I had spent too many years lost and alone. Saint Benedict would protect me and lead me home, no matter how far I wandered. Nonna was the only Moretti who had never asked me to sacrifice something for Isabella. “Why do you want it?” “Isabella wants Nonna’s medal placed inside Caesar’s urn,” Luca said. “Nonna always said it would protect whoever carried it. Isabella wants Caesar to have that protection.” Of course. The medal Nonna had given to protect the daughter who had once been lost was now needed more by Isabella’s dead dog. Even in death, Caesar mattered more than I did. He held out his hand. “Give it to me.” “Nonna gave this to me.” “She gave Isabella one too.” That’s true. When I came home at twelve, Nonna had commissioned two identical medals and had them blessed—one for each granddaughter. Two weeks later, Isabella claimed she had lost hers. I had watched her throw it into the lake. She had not wanted anything that made us equal. “Hers is gone,” Luca snapped. “Caesar stayed by her side for ten years. All she wants is to know he’ll be protected.” His expression hardened. “How can you be so heartless? Do you really have to take this from her too?” Ten years. I had been home for ten years too. Once, Father had presented us both as his daughters. Somewhere along the way, Isabella became the only Moretti principessa, while I was pushed back into the shadows. Even my grave lay where the sunlight could not reach. I stepped back. “No.” His expression darkened. “First you tried to take Caesar’s burial plot. Now you’re fighting over a medal.” “I’m not fighting anymore.” My voice shook despite my effort to steady it. “You already chose her dog over me. What exactly is left for me to compete for?” Luca reached for the chain. I caught his wrist, but I no longer had the strength to stop him. During the struggle, my medication fell from the pharmacy bag. White tablets scattered across the floor. Luca looked down at the label. “Oxycodone?” “It’s for the pain.” “What pain?” “The cancer in my stomach.” His grip loosened for half a second. Then his mouth twisted into a cold smile. “Not this again.” His phone rang on the table. Isabella’s name lit the screen. Luca answered immediately. Her tearful voice carried through the room. “Did you find Nonna’s medal?” His tone softened. “I found it.” Before I could react, he yanked the chain. The clasp snapped. Metal scraped across my neck, leaving a thin line of blood. Luca slipped the medal into his pocket. “After Caesar’s funeral, I’ll arrange a full examination with the family doctor.” He looked at the medication covering the floor. “Until then, stop this.” The door slammed behind him. I knelt slowly and gathered the tablets one by one. They were the last medicine I could afford. Several had rolled beneath the sink and dissolved in the dirty water leaking from a pipe. I threw those away. That night, the pain dragged me out of bed. I hit the floor hard enough to knock the breath from my lungs. My phone lay on the nightstand, I stretched toward it. Heat rose through my throat. When I coughed, dark blood stained the tissue pressed to my mouth. The tumor was bleeding again. I searched my contacts anyway. Mama. Papa. Luca. But as I scrolled to the bottom, I realized there was no one I could call who would believe me. I stayed on the floor until the pain finally eased. Near dawn, a message arrived from Saint Michael’s Cemetery. My headstone had been installed. The photograph showed a simple slab of gray stone beneath bare branches. ADRIANA MORETTI. I stared at the headstone for a long time. It was painfully simple. There was no Moretti crest. No beloved daughter. No cherished sister. Nothing to suggest that I had ever belonged to anyone. For ten years, I had waited for the family who once loved me to come back. I was done waiting. Whether I had four days left or only four hours, I would never beg the Morettis to choose me again. Chapter 4 On the morning of Caesar’s funeral, Isabella posted an Instagram Reel. The burial plot beneath the old oak tree was surrounded by white roses and sunflowers. Father carried the silver urn. Mother’s eyes were red from crying, while Luca held an umbrella over Isabella. Nonna’s Saint Benedict medal—the one meant to protect me—had been tied around the center of Caesar’s urn. The headstone bore a single inscription. FOREVER A MEMBER OF OUR FAMILY. The comments praised the Morettis for honoring even the smallest member of their family. I watched for a few seconds, then turned off my phone. My pain medication was gone. The agony in my stomach had not stopped since the night before. I changed into the simple ivory dress I had chosen for my cremation and left my will and final-disposition directive on the dining table. Today, I needed to approve my headstone. Black Moretti cars filled the entrance to Saint Michael’s Cemetery. An employee told me the path near the old oak tree was closed for Caesar’s funeral and asked me to take the northern trail instead. Isabella’s sobs drifted from the other side of the hill. “Come back to me in your next life, Caesar. You’ll always be my family.” Mother held her and repeatedly whispered that Caesar had never truly left her. I did not look back. My grave lay half a mile away. Caesar had flowers, guests, and photographers. I had two cypress trees and a patch of earth the sun never reached. The cemetery director handed me the headstone approval form. “Please check everything carefully, Miss Moretti.” He hesitated before asking, “Are you certain you don’t want to leave a family contact?” I signed my name. “No. They’re busy today.” The pain struck before I could hand back the pen. Something tore deep inside my stomach. My knees hit the stone steps. Blood flooded my mouth and spilled down the front of my ivory dress. The director caught me before my head struck the ground. He called 911, then took my phone and dialed Mother’s number. “Your daughter has collapsed at Saint Michael’s Cemetery. She’s suffering severe blood loss. You need to come immediately.” Through the speaker, I heard Isabella crying and the priest reciting the burial prayer. Before Mother could say anthing, Isabella’s tearful voice came through the phone. “She used fake blood yesterday too. She’s trying to ruin Caesar’s funeral again.” “We’re in the middle of the burial,” Mother said at last. “We can’t come right now.” Then she ended the call. The director stared at my phone in disbelief before calling Father. “Don Moretti, your daughter has collapsed. She may be suffering a massive internal hemorrhage.” “Now she has convinced a cemetery employee to continue the performance?”Father’s voice turned cold. “Tell Adriana that disrupting Caesar’s funeral will not earn her anyone’s sympathy.” The call disconnected. By the time the director dialed Luca, I was in too much pain to speak. He put the call on speaker beside me. Luca answered impatiently. “Adriana, haven’t you done enough?” “She’s saying goodbye to Caesar,” he continued. “Do you really have to steal everyone’s attention, even today?” I heard someone shout that Isabella had fainted. “Isabella!” The call ended immediately. Less than a minute later, the ambulance arrived. The paramedics cut open my sleeve, started an IV, and lifted me onto a stretcher. My blood pressure was too low for the monitor to register. One of them searched my bag for identification and found Dr. Bennett’s report. “Stage-four gastric cancer,” he called out. “Active upper GI hemorrhage. Alert the ER and request blood.” A paramedic picked up my phone and called Luca again. The call was rejected before it rang twice. Seconds later, a message appeared on the screen. Stop lying, Adriana. If you ruin Caesar’s funeral, don’t ever call yourself my sister, or a daughter of the Moretti family again. At that moment, I heard the funeral cannon fire from the east lawn. The Morettis were giving a dog a grand farewell. I was leaving alone. Strangely, I did not hate them. Instead, memories flickered through my mind. Father canceling a meeting with the Chicago families to spend my thirteenth birthday with me. Mother sitting beside my bed after every nightmare, combing her fingers through my hair until I fell asleep. Luca sleeping outside my door with a gun across his lap because I was afraid someone would take me again. They had loved me once. Somewhere along the way, Isabella’s tears had erased everything we had found in one another. I wondered if they would regret it when they learned I had told the truth. It no longer mattered. My eyelids grew heavy. If another life was waiting for me, I had only one wish. Please, let us never meet again. The doctor finally stopped the resuscitation and spoke in a low voice. “Adriana Moretti. Time of death, 11:47 a.m.”