Chapter 4

But I only smiled.

"Go on. Go keep your kept woman company."

"I'll clear out of here tonight."

Hearing me so gracious, Lorenzo felt that same lurch in his chest again.

He kept feeling like there was something different about me today.

He just couldn't say what.

Seeing him hesitate, his crew slung their arms across his shoulders and hauled him off toward the black cars idling at the clinic gate.

"Come on, quit staring, or your precious Gia Costa's going to get jealous. She's done with the sob-story act, now it's the playing-hard-to-get act. Isn't that just how women work? Only a sap like you falls for it."

"Right! Look what you did. You're a made man now, not some green kid, so how'd you manage to bleed her out like that? Lucky Gia's the bigger woman and won't hold it against you. Not like some people who give up a little blood and turn it into a marriage ultimatum before the whole famiglia..."

Salvatore said it loud on purpose, for me to hear, glancing sideways to see how Lorenzo took it before he committed to the smirk. But the pain I expected never came. I just felt cold all the way through.

The sun was out over the estate walls, warm and bright, and it couldn't touch the chill in my body.

I watched the cars pull away, then I went and settled the debt with the clinic.

While Lorenzo was gone from the safe house, I called in men to help me strip the place bare.

The woman who came took one look at the freshly appointed rooms meant for the union of two bloodlines and froze.

"Miss, these are all brand-new. Everything for the wedding feast. You're throwing it all out?"

"Yes. The groom's dead. No use for any of it now."

She apologized at once and tried to comfort me.

So I wouldn't have to keep looking at the things that hurt, she started with our betrothal portraits and the dozens of albums.

In half a day, the home I'd arranged so carefully didn't have a trace of celebration left in it.

A cold house. A cold me.

Looking at the ten-odd bags by the door, every one of them proof that two people had once loved each other, she couldn't help sighing and shaking her head.

"Miss, try to let it go."

I nodded and smiled.

After she left, I made sure there was nothing of mine left anywhere in the place, wiped my print from the door lock, and walked out pulling my suitcase behind me.

I didn't go to the apartment Lorenzo had leased for me. I checked into a quiet convalescent house instead, the kind the Family kept for women recovering out of sight.

When the girl at the desk learned I'd lost the baby, she went out of her way to find me a quiet floor, away from every other guest.

A few peaceful days passed, and then a security-camera alert lit up my phone.

Only then did I remember I'd forgotten to close the camera account tied to the safe house.

I opened it without thinking, and there it was. Lorenzo and his kept woman stumbling through the door, mouths locked together.

Except the moment he saw the state of the place, stripped down to bare walls, he shoved Gia away.

"What the hell happened here?"

He pulled out his phone to call me. It rang for one second before Gia snatched it from his hand.

"Ugh, you're with me and still thinking about your betrothed? Pay attention to me." Her free hand rose to her throat, fingers grasping at a necklace that wasn't there yet.

Gia looped her arms around his neck, one hand slipping deftly down inside his shirt.

Lorenzo couldn't hold back another second. He pinned her against the wall and kissed her like he wanted to devour her whole.

Even our first time, he'd never been this reckless, this wild.

In moments their clothes were scattered across the floor.

"Mel, baby, I just got out of the clinic, so you'd better go easy on me today."

Lorenzo, strung to the edge, begged her with red-rimmed eyes.

"Come on, you little minx, I've been holding back so long it hurts. How about you do the work this time?"

Gia's eyes went soft and coy. She hooked a finger under his chin and pouted.

"That depends on how well you behave."

"Between me and your betrothed, who do you love more?"

Lorenzo, breathing hard, turned cold-eyed in an instant. His thumb went still against the heavy signet on his finger, the ring no longer turning.

"Adriana is my betrothed of the alliance. You tell me who I love more."

"You and I agreed from the start. Each of us gets what we need, nothing more. If your body could actually take it, you wouldn't even get the chance to service me right now."

Gia climbed off him at once, lip trembling, tears pouring down, her hand flying back to that bare throat.

"I nearly died taking care of you, and this is what I get? Fine. If you've got the guts, go find somebody else right now!"