Layla and Damien never wanted this marriage. It was arranged by their families, a union that neither of them had asked for. They went through motions at first, distant and guarded, until a single conversation under the late summer sky changed everything. What started as a cold formality slowly grew into an undeniable connection. They talked, they laughed, they shared secrets. Over time, what had begun as duty turned into something real. Love, despite everything, had found a way in
However on the day of the wedding, Damien gets into a car accident and looses his memories, forgetting everything. Layla, in her white dress waited. She waited and waited, on their wedding day, waiting for him to show up, she knew he wouldn't just abandon her.
All of Damiens identification and the like was destroyed in the car accident, so the hospital couldn't even figure out his identity. His accident was also far away from the wedding since he had ended a business trip early to surprise Layla and to go and get married, and yet, fate had other plans.
She's heartbroken, it feels like he took her heart with her to wherever he went, and tore it to shreds. She can't help but keep looking, even long after the wedding, after everyone expresses their sorrow, she held hope. She believed in him, even when her own family told her to give up on him and move on, she persisted and kept looking for him, even when her husbands own family asked her to move on, she couldn't, she couldn't give up on him
…..
Two years passed, and stilll, nothing. she still couldn't find even a single hint about his whereabouts, eventually the weight of everyone telling her to move on, to face reality, began to crush any hope she had, so she …gave up and lived her life in sorrow and misery, drowning in alcohol and drugs, ruining her life.
Her family was so worried they made her see a therapist and yet, it did nothing, she couldn't get better, her days where lifeless and it felt like life was moving, but without her. One moment she was at home and the next she was at a bar. And that was all it was, that was it.
Meanwhile Damien had no memories of his life before the accident. The hospital released him once he was stable, but with no past, he was left adrift. He had to start from scratch, with no credentials, no memory and no identification, he couldn't even find work and he eventually drifted into the underground. His natural fighting instincts caught the eye of some mafia recruiters after he took part in a few underground boxing matches to survive. Desperate and skilled, he was the perfect candidate for their world.
Damien had always been strong and a impressively good fighter, he even had 94.5% accuracy when shooting with a gun. With these skills he tiredly worked for the mafia, moving his way up and gathering resources, forces, loyal men and when the time was right, he overthrew the mafia boss and became the new leader of the orginazation, the black hand.
Since he could only remember his name and nothing else, not even his last name, he took the former mafia boss's last name and called himself Damien Gennovese, in four years after he joined the mafia he took complete control over the group and expanded it without mercy, consuming other organizations without any exceptions and making his organization the most powerful in the country, …yet he always felt like something was …missing, like he had left a priceless treasure behind somewhere and with it, a piece of himself.
He never had time for women, yet the few times some approached him, he felt a unexplainable feeling of wrongness and unbearable guilt at a slightest touch, even just bumping into a woman or slightly touching her hand made him feel a strong sense of guilt, so strong that he never approached women and became known as "the man of no heart," someone so ruthless and distant that no one could get close to him. But Damien knew the truth—he didn't just have no heart, it was as if someone had taken it away from him.
One night, after another evening spent numbing her pain with alcohol, Layla walked home through dimly lit streets. Lost in her thoughts, she barely noticed when a car slowed down beside her. Two men got out, one of them holding white cloth. Realizing what was about to happen, she quickly pulled out her pepper spray, hitting the first man square in the eyes. She followed up with a taser, incapacitating the second. Both of the men fell to the ground, groaning in pain. Her heart raced, but she was too numb to feel anything beyond a dull sense of survival. She walked away, leaving the two men behind.
Damien was in his car, ridiculously expensive car and saw two men get out of a car and walk towards a woman, it didn't take a genius to figure out what was happening so he ordered his driver to go resolve the situation. Everyone in the mafia was a skilled fighter and asset, even the driver, so he was confident in his drivers skill to resolve the situation, he did, he beat the two men up …yes, this woman wasn't Layla, and yet something about her had peaked his interest, was it her hair, the same color as Layla's or was it her eyes, which had the same look that Layla held in her eyes, even though he couldn't remember, there was something familiar about this woman.
He didn't know her. He didn't remember anything about his past, but for a moment, something stirred inside him. He approached her and offered to take her to dinner, his curiosity piqued by the strange sense of recognition he felt. She reminded him of something he couldn't quite place—a memory just out of reach, a connection he couldn't quite grasp