He Broke Vows, I Left

That day marked both the third anniversary of Isabella's disappearance and the memorial Mass at which the Moretti family would formally lay her to rest.

When Isabella walked into the hall, her funeral portrait stood on the dais, and directly beneath it sat the man she had once been willing to die for, Matteo De Luca.

Beside him sat information broker Bianca Verdi and their two-year-old twins, Leo and Clara De Luca. Bianca wore the formal gown of a Donna and rested her head on Matteo's shoulder as if no one else existed, utterly unconcerned with who might be watching.

The instant Matteo recognized Isabella, the color drained from his face. He lurched to his feet, his lips trembling violently, and blurted out the nickname that had always been his alone to use:

"Bella..."

She thought he would come running. She thought he would hold her the way he had three years ago, ask how much she had suffered, ask whether the bullet wound in her shoulder still hurt. He did not.

Thunder cracked dully outside the church.

Leo and Clara shrieked and threw themselves at Matteo, one from each side.

Matteo stopped mid-stride. Without a moment's hesitation, almost by instinct, he turned and shielded Bianca and the twins with his body, one hand already moving toward the holster at his waist.

In that moment, Isabella understood with perfect clarity that she was no longer his first priority.

Bitterness and hurt crawled up her throat like poison.

"Daddy, I'm scared..." The little boy clung to Matteo's leg, sobbing.

Matteo bent down to soothe him, and when he looked up at Isabella again, the shock and panic in his eyes had already been replaced by coldness and caution.

"Take the portrait down," he told the butler coldly. "Put Miss Moretti in the guest room in the east wing."

Miss Moretti.

He did not call her his wife anymore. He did not call her Bella. Three years ago Isabella had drawn off an enemy hit squad for him and been taken prisoner for it, and now that she was back, she had become a guest in her own house.

Late that night, Isabella sat at the guest room window, staring at nothing. The door opened and Matteo walked in. He had brought no bodyguards.

He stopped behind her and reached for the old bullet wound that still ached in her shoulder. Halfway there his hand snapped back as though he had touched a live wire.

"Why now, of all times?" His voice was hoarse, an accusation buried beneath the words. "Three years, Isabella. If you were alive, why did you wait until today to show up?"

Isabella did not explain how she had faced the torture in that basement for three years. She did not explain how she had clawed a coffin lid apart after faking her death to get out alive.

She turned and calmly regarded the man she had once loved with every part of herself. "I came back for one thing: what my parents left behind."

Matteo's gaze flickered and slid away from hers.

Early the next morning a notice from the Mafia Council arrived in her room. In fourteen days the Council would convene in the Moretti Building. Isabella was required to sign the succession papers and formally transfer control of the Moretti family's port routes and accounts into the names of Bianca's twins.

If she refused, the Council could strip her of her position as Moretti heir on the grounds that her prolonged disappearance had left the family unable to function.

Isabella's fist closed around the thin sheet of paper, her nails driving deep into her palm.

She took out a concealed transmitter and called Nora Leclerc, the old friend she had once trusted more than anyone.

"Nora, arrange a route out of New York to Marseille." Isabella looked out at the port that belonged to the Moretti family, her voice level and devoid of warmth. "But before I go, I want my parents' things back. And... I want to find out what really happened."