Fake Divorce, Real Revenge

For four of our five years of marriage, I shot myself up with fertility drugs. All for a pure-blood heir for Alaric.

Today, I finally saw two bright red lines on the pregnancy test.

I canceled all my appointments at the gallery—the family’s money laundering front. I grabbed a bottle of 1982 Lafite I’d paid a fortune for. I went home early to our Gold Coast mansion, my heart soaring.

"Alaric, I'm home," I called out, pushing the door open.

The house was dead silent.

No answer. I figured he wasn't back yet.

I set the wine on the marble island, slipped off my heels, and walked slowly upstairs. I was going to change into something sexy. Give him the surprise of his life.

Instead, a woman's moan hit me from the master bedroom. A sound that crawled under your skin.

"Ahh... Alaric... deeper..."

The slick slap of skin on skin. The rhythmic rocking of the bedframe. Then, a man’s heavy breathing. It struck me like lightning.

My brain shut down.

My legs went weak. I could barely stand.

But I gripped the banister. I forced myself up the stairs, one step at a time.

"God, you're so tight," Alaric growled.

That was his voice. The one he used when he was at his limit.

That impossibly sexy, possessive sound.

I thought it was just for me. Something he only did when we were tangled in our sheets.

Now he was using it on another woman. While he was inside her.

I froze outside the half-open bedroom door. My stomach churned.

"Mmm... gentler..." the woman panted, then her tone shifted. A petty complaint. "What about her? She'll be home soon..."

"Who cares? Focus." Alaric let out a cruel little laugh. The rhythm of his thrusts picked up. "Forget that naive fool. She already signed the divorce papers. Once the lawyers finalize the paperwork, she's history. Then I'll make you my real wife."

"Finally..." The woman giggled. The sound was sickeningly sweet. "I've been waiting for two years. Scurrying around like a rat in the dark."

Two years.

The number was a dagger dipped in ice. It stabbed me in the heart. And twisted.

Two years ago, we were at Lake Como for our third anniversary.

The sex that night was frantic. Like we wanted to fuse our bodies into one.

A few weeks later, I had a low fever. My period was late. Classic early signs.

I thought I was finally pregnant. Our baby.

But the doctor came back with a cold report. A false pregnancy.

My body... my chances of conceiving were next to none.

I fell apart. Alaric held me tight, his tears dripping onto my neck.

"It doesn't matter if we never have kids, Alessia. I just want you. Loving you is enough."

His tears felt so real.

I believed him.

I never gave up. I endured the sting of the needles in my belly. I slowly nursed my body back to health.

And him? He turned around and crawled into this woman's bed.

I leaned against the wall and slid to the floor. The blood in my veins turned to ice.

In the bedroom, the aftershocks of their climax lingered.

"I want that blue sapphire ring on her hand," the woman whined. "That cornflower blue is a collector's piece on the black market."

"It's all yours," Alaric said, his voice casual. Like he was tossing a bone to a stray dog. "You keep me happy, everything that woman has is yours. Including the ring her mother left her."

That was the only thing I had left of my mother.

I thought about a week ago. He held my hand in his study. His eyes were red.

"Alessia, our rivals in New York bought a fed. To protect you, to protect our money, you have to sign this divorce agreement. It’s just for show. Six months. Just six months, and I'll bring you home."

He played his part so well. I signed my name without reading a single word.

Thump. Thump. Thump.

Upstairs, the headboard started slamming against the wall. A frantic, steady rhythm.

Our wall.

I painted it my favorite dove gray last spring.

Alaric had held the ladder for me, his face full of adoration, complaining about the paint fumes.

Something inside my chest tore apart.

Cleanly.

I almost looked down to see if there was a hole ripped through my shirt.

I was twenty-two when I married into the Gallo family. A decaying, old-school outfit on its last legs.

That January, a turf war over the South Side drug lines took his father and brother. At twenty, Alaric had nothing. He was facing hard time.

It was me. I burned through my mother's favors and my father's hidden network.

On the steps of the federal courthouse, I bought his freedom. Two million dollars and three fall guys. I saved him from a sentence that would've seen him rot in a cell.

That day, he cupped my face in his hands, his eyes wet. He swore a blood oath. "Alessia. I swear to you. I will spend my life protecting you."

Five years.

He protected me for three. And for two, he'd been plotting behind my back. Sucking me dry like a leech.

This was what I got for giving him my all.

I don't know how long I sat on the landing. Long enough for my foot to go numb. Long enough for my jaw to ache from clenching it shut.

When I could finally breathe again, I forced myself to stand.

Vertebra by vertebra. I straightened my spine.

Just like my father taught me. The blood of the Rinaldi family doesn't bow. We never break.

Alessia Ricci, the naive, soft wife, died tonight outside that dove-gray wall.

Now, Alessia Rinaldi lives. The sole heir to Chicago's most powerful syndicate.

I walked silently down the stairs. Back to the foyer.

I opened my purse. I dropped the pregnancy test—the one with two red lines—inside. Along with all my pathetic weakness.

Just then, the master bedroom door clicked open upstairs.

A woman’s light footsteps on the hardwood. Heading for the stairs.

"Baby? Is someone downstairs? I thought... I thought I heard the front door close."

Her voice, laced with suspicion, echoed from the top of the staircase.

The footsteps grew closer. A second away from the landing.