Chapter 1

The day I learned I was pregnant, my husband announced at his father's funeral that another woman was carrying his heir.

The blood test results were hidden inside my handbag.

It was only a thin sheet of paper, folded twice. In the lower-right corner, it said seven weeks and three days. The doctor had circled the number in red and told me the embryo already had a heartbeat.

I had waited seven years for that heart to begin beating.

On my way out of the clinic, I bought a small silver rattle engraved with an olive branch. I planned to give it to Matteo after the funeral.

I had imagined the look on his face when he saw it.

He might not smile. Men of the Moretti family rarely showed emotion in public. But he would pull me into his arms, lower his head, and lay a hand over my stomach.

At least, that was what I believed until Bianca Rossi walked into the chapel.

She arrived later than the priest.

The chapel's heavy wooden doors opened from the outside. Bianca wore a fitted black dress. She carried no flowers, and there was little grief on her face. She paused in the doorway until every gaze had settled on the slight curve of her belly, then walked in slowly.

The Moretti men moved aside to clear a path for her.

Matteo went to meet her himself.

His hand settled at her waist. He looked at her face, then at her stomach, as if checking that something more important than the funeral had arrived unharmed.

That hand had held me every night.

Now it supported another woman with the instinctive care of a protector.

Bianca stopped when she passed me.

"Lucia," she said softly. "I never wanted it to happen today."

She spoke as though this public execution had begun without her consent.

Before I could answer, she offered Matteo her hand and let him guide her up the steps beside the coffin.

The chapel fell silent.

Matteo stood before his father's coffin in an immaculate black suit, a mourning band around his left arm. The old Don had only just died, yet Matteo already carried the silence of one.

Before the service, the lawyer had read the final article of Salvatore's family charter: the new Don had six months to establish a legitimate heir, or the council could elect another leader.

Matteo's uncle, Enzo, sat in the first row with his cane across his knees like a sheathed blade.

Matteo could not afford to wait.

"Today is not only the day we say goodbye to my father," he said.

His gaze crossed the room and rested on my face for one brief moment.

"There is something else I must announce to the family."

Bianca did not lower her eyes. She watched me as one hand came to rest gently over her belly.

My fingers found the silver rattle inside my bag.

"Bianca is eighteen weeks pregnant," Matteo said. "The child is mine."

Low voices stirred around the chapel.

Bianca took two documents from her purse: an ultrasound photograph and a prenatal paternity report.

She gave them neither to the lawyer nor to the elders.

She walked straight to me.

"You should be the first to see them," she said.

The baby in the ultrasound already had a clear outline. Beneath the report's conclusion was a number so large it seemed to burn through the page.

99.9 percent.

"We ran the test twice," Bianca added. "Matteo didn't want to wrong you, but he wouldn't allow my baby to be wronged either."

I did not take the papers.

They hung between us like two flags pronouncing my sentence.

Someone murmured, "God bless the Moretti family." Others were already moving toward Bianca to kiss her cheek.

Only I remained where I was.

I felt like a stranger who had wandered into the wrong funeral.

"Matteo."

My voice was quiet, but he heard it.

He looked at me, a warning forming between his brows.

"Today is my father's funeral, Lucia."

"And?"

"Not here."

"You just told everyone here that another woman is carrying your child. Where would you prefer I ask you about it?"

Bianca tugged gently at his sleeve.

"Don't be like that, Matteo. Lucia has every right to be angry."

Her voice was as soft as ever. She had spoken this way even as a girl. No matter what she did, all she needed was a shimmer of tears in her eyes, and everyone else would begin inventing excuses for her.

"This is all my fault," she said, looking at me. "Matteo was drunk that night. He thought I was you."

The room grew even quieter.

A laugh escaped me.

"He mistook a blue-eyed blonde for his dark-haired wife?"

"The lights were off." She paused, lowering her voice. "And he kept saying your name."

Several people looked away.

Bianca had not come to apologize.

She had come to make sure everyone knew that even on the night my husband betrayed me, my name had been nothing more than part of their pleasure.

My hand tightened around my bag. The clasp had not closed properly, and the silver rattle rolled out.

It spun twice across the black marble floor and came to rest beside Bianca's shoe.

She bent to pick it up.

Its bright chime carried to every corner of the chapel.

"For the baby?" She looked at me and smiled. "I didn't know you had brought a gift too."

"Give it back."

As if she had not heard me, she pressed the rattle to her belly and shook it gently.

"Can you hear it, sweetheart? Aunt Lucia brought this for you."

The cold moved through my blood inch by inch.

Matteo stepped forward, placing himself between us.

"Enough."

"Do you remember what happened that night?" I asked him.

His jaw tightened. He did not answer.

The silence was answer enough.

He did not remember.

But he believed her.

"We had the paternity test done," Matteo said. "The result is conclusive."

"So what are you going to do?"

After a moment's silence, he took an envelope from inside his jacket.

"My father's charter requires the heir to be born within a legal marriage. The council has agreed to annul our marriage once the mourning period is over."

I stared at the envelope.

Seven years of marriage had been folded into less than half an inch of paper.

"And then you'll marry her?"

"I have a responsibility to the child."

"I asked if you intend to marry her."

Matteo said nothing.

Bianca laid her hand over his.

In that moment, I understood.

It was not that he had no answer.

He simply knew that saying it to my face would make him look too cruel.

One of the family elders cleared his throat.

"The Morettis finally have an heir. It was the old Don's last wish. This is not the place for an argument."

"Don't blame them," Bianca said. "Seven years is long enough. Matteo cannot make the whole family keep waiting for a child who will never come just to spare your feelings."