Chapter 3

To shore up her children's claim before the Mafia Council convened, Bianca moved the twins' christening forward.

On the day of the ceremony, Matteo, dressed in a tailored black suit, bent over Leo to fasten a silver christening medallion around his neck.

"Bella, come help me with the clasp." Matteo did not even look up, his tone as natural as if they were still a devoted married couple. "This is the Moretti family's blessing on the next generation. It's their legacy."

Isabella walked forward stiffly. When her eyes landed on that silver medallion, every drop of blood in her body seemed to drain away at once.

An iris pattern had been engraved so faintly around the edge of the silver medallion that it was almost invisible. No one else would have known it, but how could she possibly be wrong? Her mother, Elena Moretti, had commissioned it three years earlier, full of hope, when Isabella was pregnant! The back even bore the pet name for Isabella's unborn child, a name only she and Elena had known!

And now the token meant for her poor unborn child hung brazenly around Leo's neck!

Isabella's fingers shook hard. She stared at Matteo, her heart squeezed by an invisible hand until the pain made it almost impossible to breathe. But she did not take it out on the innocent child. She forced down the taste of blood rising in her throat and turned to Matteo.

"Where did that medallion come from?" Her voice was ice.

Matteo frowned, plainly displeased with her tone. "Bianca found it in a box of family keepsakes. It's a Moretti heirloom. What's wrong with letting the children wear it? Isabella, can't you be bigger than this? Stop looking at a child that way. You're jealous, and it shows!"

Jealous?

Inside, Isabella laughed bitterly. He actually thought she was jealous!

The ceremony began, and outside the church a deafening gun salute went off.

"Bang! Bang!"

The sound pierced Isabella's eardrums. The cell, the beatings, the terror of a bullet grazing her scalp swallowed her whole. Her face went white, and for one instant her mind went blank.

Standing beside Isabella, Bianca's eyes flashed with malice. She deliberately let go and shoved Leo in the back, sending him pitching toward the bottom of the high marble stairs!

"Ah!" Bianca's scream tore through the hall and pulled every eye toward her.

At the last possible second, Isabella lunged forward on instinct and caught Leo against her wounded shoulder, shielding his head before it could strike the stone.

Pain tore through the old wound. Isabella made a low, choked sound as cold sweat soaked the back of her dress. She fought through the pain, steadied the crying boy, and then, before several hundred guests, pulled the silver medallion from his neck.

"That medallion belongs to me. This child has no right to wear it." She clenched it in her sweat-slick palm, her back perfectly straight, her gaze cutting across Matteo and Bianca like a blade.

The hall erupted.

"Miss Moretti disappears for three years, then comes back this vicious?"

"Exactly. She can't even stand the sight of an innocent child. Snatching a christening medallion in public? Disgraceful!"

Accusations and abuse rolled over her in waves. Matteo's face was livid, and the look he gave her was full of disappointment and disgust.

Isabella did not offer a word of explanation. She simply turned away, cold and composed, leaving every contemptuous stare behind her.

Back in the guest room, Isabella locked the door and removed her coat. Her hands shook as she used scissors to pick open the lining and drew out a creased, yellowed medical report: the record of her miscarriage, which she had somehow managed to keep hidden throughout her captivity.

The date on it was September, exactly three years ago.

Julian Meyer, an attorney specializing in transnational crime, pushed open the door. The only ally she trusted now, he took the bloodstained report and the silver medallion from her.

"I've already looked into it." Julian's expression was grim, and his eyes betrayed how much her pain affected him. "This medallion was listed on the manifest of a distress package you sent out three years ago. The strange part is that the package was never logged in any De Luca receiving or dispatch record. Not once."

Isabella's head snapped up, her eyes bloodshot.

If her plea for help had never been logged, how had one of its tokens ended up in Bianca's hands? Three years ago, who had intercepted the distress package she had nearly died sending out and deliberately cut off her only lifeline?!