I Kept His Family's Secret for Eight Years, He Let His Mistress Kill Our Baby

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At the Moretti Family's gala, the kind of night when every old bloodline in the territory came to drink and measure each other across the room, Bianca Russo shoved me, and I went down hard onto the marble.

She crossed to me in those four-inch heels, the soldiers along the wall pretending not to see, and drove a heel straight into my swollen belly.

In an instant red bloomed across the white of my dress.

Lorenzo Moretti turned his head a fraction and looked at me, brow creasing.

'Pregnant, and you can't even keep to the house like a decent woman? You have to come out and put on a show? Trying to make trouble for my Bianca again? You've bled all over the floor now, you bad-luck thing. You're an embarrassment.'

He said it and turned away without looking back, one arm around Bianca's waist as he led her off.

Not even the shriek of the ambulance siren made him glance at me one more time.

Cold instruments turned inside me.

In the end, I couldn't keep the baby.

One hand pressed to my flat, empty belly, I'd barely come out of the operating room when I saw them on the television in the hall, Lorenzo kissing Bianca like he'd forgotten the world existed.

The pain in my abdomen shot straight to my heart.

I wiped the cold sweat from my forehead and looked at my mother-in-law beside the bed.

'Mom, it's been eight years. The Family pulled through the worst of it long ago. I really want out of this union. Please, let me go...'

Before she could answer, a phone rang and split the quiet of the room.

Lorenzo's voice came through, cold.

'Book a hotel room for me. And have someone bring that lace set I bought the other day from the house. You won't wear it. Plenty of women out there are lining up at my bed to put it on.'

He didn't raise his voice. A Don who raises his voice has already lost, and Lorenzo never lost.

But in the silent ward it carried with terrible clarity.

Anger flickered in my mother-in-law's eyes.

She reached for the phone, ready to say something.

Before she could take it, Lorenzo had already hung up on the other end.

She stood there holding the dead phone, her hand falling slack at her side, and looked at me with a long, broken sigh.

'Adriana Falcone, in the end it's the Morettis who've wronged you. I agree. Sever the union...'

Her tears struck the palm of my hand.

'But there's one thing I have to ask of you...'

'Mom, I know. You don't want Lorenzo to find out about what happened eight years ago. Don't worry. I'll take it to my grave.'

That broke her, and she couldn't hold the sobs back anymore.

Eight years ago, the Moretti Family was bled dry.

Lorenzo's father was hounded by the Russo collectors until he threw himself from a rooftop.

Overnight, the once-untouchable Moretti bloodline hung by a thread, scattered like a house with nothing left to its name.

Everyone in the territory knew I loved Lorenzo.

So the moment it happened, his mother came straight to my home and begged me to enter the union.

The old woman stood outside my bedroom door for three full days and nights.

In the end, after I kept insisting, my father agreed to let me marry into the Moretti Family.

And my father emptied his own coffers to pull them back from the edge of extinction.

But that same night, I learned the secret behind the Morettis' ruin.

The ones who destroyed them were the Russos.

Zachery Russo and Bianca both had a hand in it.

But Mavis Moretti didn't want Lorenzo dragged back into that cruel past.

So she pressed a trembling palm flat against her chest, then knelt on the floor and begged my father and me never to tell him.

I understood too well what a mother's love for her son could do.

So even today, with Lorenzo holding Bianca in his arms and taking her to his bed, since I had promised her I'd keep the secret, I would keep it...

She drew me against her and stroked my pale face, over and over.

'Child, that boy doesn't know what he has in you. It's his loss, not yours. In seven days it's your birthday. Spend it with me, and after that I'll let you leave the Morettis...'

I looked at the old woman in front of me, gray at both temples, and nodded.

Seven days, then.

I'd survived eight years already...

Worried she'd keep me from resting, she had my dinner brought up and left.

The door of the hospital room had barely sealed shut when my phone buzzed with a message from Lorenzo.

It was a video. He was naked, tangled up with a woman whose face I couldn't make out, and the sounds spilling out of the speaker turned my stomach.

I was shaking, my thumb already moving to kill the screen, when his call came through.

His voice came lazy and contemptuous down the line.

"Watched it? If the room number isn't on my phone by eight, more videos like that one go straight to yours. Consider it a lesson. You can see how other women take care of the man who carries your name."

"Lorenzo. I'll go."

When he heard me give in, he let out a satisfied little sigh.

"Adriana, get this through your head. You brought this on yourself. Eight years ago you took advantage of the Moretti ruin, you tore Bianca and me apart, and the day you were bound into this bloodline, you should have known. Not in this lifetime will you ever get even a scrap of real love from me."

Then he hung up, fast, the way he always did.

Two bitter lines of tears slid from the corners of my eyes.

Lorenzo was right.

This was a sin of my own making.

Eight years ago I'd believed that if I were only given enough time, I could thaw his heart.

It took me until today to understand how naive that girl had been.

In eight years, the women in his bed had numbered in the hundreds, if not the thousands.

Once, at least, he'd had the decency to keep it from me, to hide it behind closed doors and the quiet code every man in this life lived by.

Now he wanted me to book the room myself.

And I knew if I didn't go, that video might not stop at my phone. By tomorrow it could land in the hands of every gossip and informer in the territory, every man who traded in the ruin of old blood.

The Falcone name carried a century of respect behind it, the oldest bloodline anyone in these streets would name.

I wouldn't have my father dragged into the storm again over my own private wreckage.

It had been like this for years now.

To make my life miserable, to make me suffer, Lorenzo seemed willing to burn everything down with it.

Somewhere along the way, love down to the bone had curdled into a hatred that ate him alive.

Even thinking about it left me hollow.

A thick smear of crimson welled up below, and I braced myself against the wall and stumbled off to clean myself up.

Then, swallowing the pain that knifed through me, I left the room.

Ten minutes later I sent Lorenzo the room number.

I scrolled idly back up through the messages. A thousand of them sent to him, and all I'd ever gotten back was the odd word, here and there.

I gave a tired, crooked smile at the rearview mirror and tossed the phone onto the seat. My fingers found the thin gold band on my hand and closed around it without my deciding to.

Half an hour later I stood outside his hotel suite with the lingerie he'd bought. The hotel was one of the Family's legitimate fronts, marble and hushed money, bodyguards posted at the far end of the corridor who looked through me as if I were furniture.

The first time he'd brought a piece like this home, I'd been nervous and shy, but I hadn't refused him.

That night, after I put it on, Lorenzo lost himself in me and cried out Bianca's name, over and over.

Afterward I lay staring at the line of his back and cried until morning.

From that day on, I never wore anything like it again.

He had too many ways to torment me. If I wouldn't wear it, he made other women wear it. And every day, as regular as a good-morning and good-night, he sent me the photos.

"Well, look who's here. A minute late. I'll forgive you today. Don't be late next time."

He opened the door from inside, loosely belted into a robe, the heavy signet ring turning in slow half-circles on his finger as he watched me with mockery all over his face.

Maybe she'd heard my voice. Bianca stepped up behind him and slid her arms around his waist, pulling the door wider so she could look at me. She laughed, a beat too quick, and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, her voice sweet and cloying.

"Aren't you thoughtful, big sister. Delivering it yourself?"

Maybe she'd pulled the door too wide.

Lorenzo's brow creased as he looked at me, and he yanked my coat open in one motion.

He pointed at the hospital gown underneath, his voice cold.

"You take one little fall this afternoon and now you've got this thing back on? Adriana Falcone, you really do commit to the act, don't you?"

His eyes raked over me as he spoke, slow and contemptuous, the way a made man sizes up a debt he means to collect.

I didn't want the loss of the baby stirring up anything more.

So I snatched the coat off the floor, wrapped it around myself, and turned to go.

But the second I turned,

a pair of hands clamped around me from behind and held tight.

Lorenzo stepped closer, looking at me, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

"You've come all this way, so don't run off. Aren't you the considerate one? You'll stay right here tonight and take good care of me. Bianca and I take the bedroom. You get the sofa."

The thought of what was coming

set my stomach churning, and it wouldn't stop.

I fought with everything I had to break free of his grip,

but every time I struggled,

a piercing pain shot through my lower belly,

and in the end he dragged me into the room by brute force, the way the Family handled anyone who forgot their place.

Past midnight,

the sounds of a man and a woman came right on cue from the bedroom.

I covered my ears and turned on the television.

Heaven always loves picking one person and tormenting them without mercy.

The screen was playing footage from that day, Lorenzo and Bianca pressed close and sweet together, the camera flashes of the territory's gossip hounds catching every touch.

I went to lift my hand and shut it off,

and only then did I realize my hands were shaking too badly to hold anything.

The sounds drifting from the room layered over the sweetness on the screen,

and I couldn't hold it back any longer. I gripped the sofa and started to retch.

All night that sound circled me like a curse.

My nails had long since torn my palms raw,

but I think I could no longer feel the pain.

That was how I made it to morning, when Lorenzo came out of the bedroom with his arm around Bianca.

He pressed a lingering kiss to her forehead,

then looked at me, his voice as cold as ever.

"Home. You like playing the Don's wife, don't you? Today I'll let you play it to your heart's content."

When he'd finished, he stepped over and stroked Bianca's cheek a few times,

then hauled me out of the hotel.

Of course I knew Lorenzo wasn't being kind.

And sure enough, the moment we cleared the hotel doors,

the reporters swarmed me again.

I hadn't been at the sit-down he'd staged for the cameras the day before.

These reporters had to be carrying a full belly of knives, all of them aimed at me.

Lorenzo had brought me here to be humiliated...

Sure enough, the instant the pack of them saw me,

they came at me like wolves starved through a whole winter spotting prey,

surging forward in a frenzy,

and in a heartbeat the lenses and microphones were jammed in my face.

"Signora Moretti, at the Moretti gathering yesterday, did you see the coverage of how affectionate the Don and Miss Russo were?"

"Signora Moretti, are you and the Don going through a marriage crisis?"

"Signora Moretti, Miss Russo explained that what she shares with the Don is only a brother-sister kind of bond. Do you believe that?"

"Signora Moretti, last night we photographed Miss Russo checking into this same hotel, and it looked like she went into the room with the Don. So why is it the two of you coming out together this morning?"

Every question started with Signora Moretti,

and every one of them turned that title into an insult.

Out of the corner of my eye I caught Lorenzo standing off to the side,

and the burn-the-boats hatred in his eyes sent a chill down my spine.

What kind of hatred was it,

that he'd sink himself into the mire just to drag me down with him?

A whole night without sleep, and my head pounded like it might split open.

I pulled together the last thread of strength, my thumb finding the thin gold band on my finger and closing around it, then shoved past the reporters in front of me, and stumbled away on unsteady feet.

When I reached the first intersection past the hotel,

Lorenzo pulled the car up beside me.

"Get in, unless you want those reporters tailing you all the way back to the estate."

I glanced back at the cameras still flashing behind me, the men with their lenses hungry for the next morning's scandal, then climbed in anyway.

It was only once I was seated that I noticed the blood smeared across my thighs. I tried to cover it, fumbling, but Lorenzo saw it anyway.

His brow creased, and he turned toward me.

"Is the baby all right?"

I opened my mouth to answer, but his phone rang first.

Bianca's voice came through, thick with the start of tears.

"Lorenzo, my Family's pushing me to come home for the alliance again. What am I supposed to do? My father's only giving me a week. Please, you have to think of something."

A young girl's heartbreak always pulls at people.

Sure enough, the second he heard it, Lorenzo slammed on the brakes and pulled to the curb. He sat in silence for a long moment, the engine ticking like a clock in an empty room, then spoke.

"A week is plenty. Wait for me to propose."

He murmured a few more comforting words and hung up.

The car dropped into a dead silence.

After a while, Lorenzo turned to look at me, something in his eyes I couldn't read.

"It's just playing along for the kid. Don't read into it."

When I didn't respond, he started the engine again and asked quietly,

"Where were we?"

I stared at the cars and people streaming past on the street, my mind gone blank.

I answered him mechanically.

"Nothing. I've forgotten too."

He nodded, and said nothing else the rest of the way.

And only then did it sink in.

My husband was about to propose to another woman.

And it just happened to fall on the day I walked out of the Moretti house.

How funny.

Half an hour later, the car turned through the iron gates and rolled into the courtyard, past the men who straightened the moment they recognized the car.

After I got out, Lorenzo kept staring at my seat for a long time. Maybe the smear of blood reminded him of the conversation we'd broken off. He took two quick steps and caught my hand.

"Adriana, you look pale. Yesterday, at the venue... are you all right?"

I pulled my coat a little tighter and didn't turn around.

"I'm fine."

I tried to twist free of his grip and head inside.

But the next second, Lorenzo was roaring.

"Adriana Falcone! Do you have any idea how insufferable you are? I'm your husband, and you treat me with this cold nothing every single day! If something's not good enough, say it! But this is exhausting! Do you feel anything at all?!"

The sudden eruption made me flinch. Across the yard, a guard's hand drifted toward his jacket, then stilled when no order came.

I turned and looked at him, his face flushed dark red, and for a moment I just froze.

I didn't understand where this came from. What right did he have to feel any of it.

But I knew that if I didn't give him an answer today, he wouldn't let it go.

So I looked at him and said softly, my fingers closing around the thin gold band on my hand,

"Lorenzo, you can do anything you want to me. But you shouldn't drag the Falcones into it. You threw me in front of those reporters today, and tomorrow my father will be the only name spoken in every Family's parlor. We both grew up in this world. You know what that means. He emptied his own coffers to pull your bloodline back from the grave"

I thought I'd picked the most harmless thing I could say.

Lorenzo stared at me, stunned for a beat.

Then the fury swept over him all at once.

He glared at me with bloodshot eyes and shouted,

"Adriana Falcone, you call that a blood favor? That was preying on us when we lay bleeding out! That was paid for with my whole life and Bianca's! Shameless!"

"Eight years. Do you have any idea what Bianca has been through these eight years?! We loved each other, and the two of you, you and your father, you cruel, vile pair, you tore us apart! So I'll torment you to death!"

"Your birthday's in seven days, isn't it? I know it is. And that's exactly the day I'll take Bianca as my own before the Family. I love her. I'm not acting. I want her at my side. She won't carry the name the bloodlines recognize, but she's the only woman I'll ever call wife in my heart. You can keep the Moretti name, and live out the rest of your life on nothing but that."

"And another thing. That day, when Bianca put her foot on your belly, I saw all of it. I let her do it. That seed you're carrying, even if it's born, won't get one ounce of a father's love from me."

"Adriana Falcone. This is exactly what you and your father deserve."

Then he shoved me aside, started the car, and drove off into the dark beyond the estate gates.

I had barely staggered up off the gravel

when Lorenzo's call came through again.

His voice on the other end had settled considerably,

cold and mocking, the way it always was, the voice of a Don who'd already decided a thing and saw no need to raise it.

"Adriana Falcone, you'll arrange the ceremony yourself, seven days from now. Aren't you the gracious wife of this house? Don't you have no feelings of your own? Then go do it properly."

"You'd better put your heart into it. If Bianca isn't satisfied, I have plenty of ways to keep your father's name dragged through every gutter in the territory, day after day, with no one left to defend it."

Then he hummed a little tune and hung up.

I knew Lorenzo was capable of it. In this world a Don's whisper could bleed a man's reputation dry before sunrise.

I pushed open the door and looked at the enormous wedding portrait of us hanging in the great room,

a bitter smile pulling at my mouth.

In the photo there wasn't a trace of warmth on Lorenzo's face.

He stood rigid, a great distance between us,

and it had taken everything in me just to rest my head on his shoulder.

The space of a single hand,

and in eight years I still hadn't managed to close it.

When he took his portraits with Bianca,

Lorenzo must have been overjoyed.

I forced myself up and took down every wedding portrait in the house,

tore them to pieces in the yard, and burned them to ash, the smoke curling up past the iron fence where his men kept their silent watch.

Then I packed up my clothes and had them shipped back to the Falcone estate,

had the Family's consigliere draw up the papers to sever the union, and left them on the desk in Lorenzo's study.

Once all of it was done, I began arranging his ceremony.

For a full week,

Lorenzo never came back.

The hotel was booked, one of the Family's own legitimate fronts, the gown chosen, the order of the night set,

and every day I sent it all to Lorenzo like a soldier reporting to the man who held her life in his hand.

Still no reply.

But no furious call came in either,

so I knew Lorenzo was satisfied. Or rather, Bianca was satisfied.

Fine. All I wanted now was to walk out clean, without a war.

...

Seven days later, Lorenzo knelt on one knee before Bianca, the whole room of made men gone quiet around them.

But before he could slide the ring onto her finger,

the doors of the banquet hall were thrown open from outside,

and the Moretti matriarch, gray at the temples, pointed a shaking hand at Bianca and screamed until her voice broke.

"I will not let her through the Moretti door. The only daughter-in-law of this Family is Adriana!"

Lorenzo was angry now too.

He seized Bianca's hand and turned on his mother, demanding,

"Why? By what right? Mamma, I'll take Bianca tonight even if it kills me!"

Mavis pressed a trembling palm flat against her chest, shaking all over,

and looked at her son's furious face, weeping as she spoke.

"My boy, you ask me why? Because she and her father are the ones who put your father in the ground! Because it was me, on my knees, who begged Adriana into this house! My boy, you can't go on being this blind!"