While He Protected Her, I Stopped Loving Him

Earlier that day, I lost my baby in a hit by freelance shooters, the kind of men who answered to no Family and no name, who came and went like smoke off a gun barrel. And while it happened, while my body was failing on the cold stone of the courtyard, my husband, Lorenzo, was strolling the garden path with his capo at his shoulder.

Lorenzo was the Don of our Family, the Moretti Family, and Carla was the captain he had raised up beside him.

He saw my dress soaked through with blood, the dark stain blooming across the silk like something obscene, and he turned Carla's curious eyes away with…