Chapter 2

Collapsed from the cold?

All I had done was run the air conditioner for half an hour. When I walked out of Cassian's study, Serafina had still been smiling, whispering with the other courier girls about which club they'd hit that night.

I opened my mouth to explain. But Cassian's face went flat in a single breath, the way it did when a soldier had earned a bullet. His voice dropped several degrees colder.

"Somebody get in there and take her coat off her. She's supposed to be the Don's precious blood, isn't she? So delicate, so pampered. Let her learn how gutter-born kids like me survived."

He bent and picked up the fur.

With something almost gentle, he settled it over Serafina's shoulders, then turned his eyes on me with a contempt cold as the room itself.

"You come out when you understand what you did. The doctor said our son is perfectly healthy. Don't think you can hide behind that belly to skip your punishment."

With that he swept Serafina into his arms. His voice went soft, dripping with a tenderness he had never once spent on me.

"Serafina, you're bleeding this week. Your feet have to stay warm. Just stay right here against me. Let's see who has the nerve to complain now."

The moment he sat down with her across his lap, a knot of his crew came toward me, cruel amusement on every face.

I pressed myself into the corner, clutching the thin nightgown tight to my body. But no resistance I had could stand against several grown men who broke bones for a living.

Seconds later the flimsy fabric tore clean in two.

Cold air drove through my skin all at once, seeping into every pore.

Laughing, they stripped the rest away. When they walked back out, they were grinning at Cassian like men returning from a good night's card game at the social club.

"Dio, Cassian, you know how to live. Your wife's got a body on her, and no shame about it either."

"Appreciate you letting us take such good care of her."

I was left in my undergarments, curled on the freezing floor. The last warmth in my skin met the ice beneath me and tore at my flesh with every small shift.

Blistering pain ripped through me. Raw skin split open, and blood came slowly to the surface.

Bright red against the glowing white of the freezer floor.

Cassian saw it. He set Serafina down carefully and stepped forward, his eyes locked on the widening smear of blood crawling toward his feet.

Before he could speak, Serafina rushed over and pressed her hand flat to the glass, trembling as she stared at the blood.

"Please, Adriana... just say you were wrong," she begged, her voice shaking. "There are so many of Cassian's men watching... if you won't, he can't let you off. Not in front of all of them."

I stared daggers at her.

"Why should I apologize? I saw how comfortable you were under that vent. You even made plans with your girls to go out that night—"

Cassian's gaze flicked toward Serafina. Something uncertain moved behind his eyes.

But before I could finish, Serafina struck herself across the face with a loud crack, then dropped to her knees with a dramatic thud.

Seizing Cassian's hand, she sobbed, "Cassian, I can't stand to watch her suffer like this... If she still won't admit her mistake, then let me kneel out here beside her!"

The instant her knees hit the floor, every trace of doubt drained from Cassian's eyes. For half a heartbeat, before her tears had even finished falling, the corner of her mouth curved.

He bent quickly to lift her up, his face twisting with disgust as he turned it back on me. His thumb worked at the signet ring on his right hand, rubbing the face of it round and round.

"Adriana, you've been spoiled rotten your whole life. Serafina has swallowed your arrogance in silence for years. Now you're the one in the wrong, and she's still worried about saving my face. She's willing to suffer for you."

"You don't deserve her mercy."

"Tonight I'm going to break that pampered temper out of you for good. You don't admit you were wrong, you don't come out of that room."

He turned and gestured to the men behind him.

"Bring in more ice. Wall her in with it. And pour water over her too. I want her frozen to the walls."

He hadn't even finished speaking when—