Chapter 3

Marco did not come home that night. I was not surprised.

I sat at my desk and looked at the ring on my finger. The Falcone family crest was engraved on the outside, and a thin scratch ran along one edge. It had been left by a knife during an assassination attempt years ago. I had raised my hand to block the blade, and the ring took the hit. If not for that ring, I would have lost the finger.

I took the ring off and put it on the table. Then I opened my laptop and started drafting divorce papers.

I had never had a choice in my life. I was swapped at birth, brought back, rejected, and forced into a marriage. The only thing I could choose was how I left.

At nine in the morning, Marco called.

"Last night..."

"Marco, come eat breakfast. I made you bacon."

Sofia's voice came through from somewhere nearby as he was speaking. It was the same sweet, spoiled tone I remembered from when I first arrived at the Conti house.

"I am not interested," I said coldly.

"Ginevra, do you have to be this distant?"

I waited for him to continue. Sofia seemed to move closer to the phone.

"Marco, do not fight with your sister. If she really cannot accept me, I will just leave for another ten years."

"You do not have to leave," Marco said, his voice softening. He was not thinking. It was instinct.

Then he said to me, "There is a dinner at the Conti house tonight. I want you to come."

"You must come, Ginevra." Sofia's bright voice followed.

I hung up and gripped the phone until my knuckles went white.

Of course I would go. My parents, my husband, the position I had bled for over ten years. What was there to be afraid of?

Two hours later, I walked into the Conti villa in a black dress.

Sofia was sitting barefoot on the sofa, flipping through a stack of photos and chattering to the three people on the couch. She looked up when I walked in, laughed, and covered her mouth.

"Ginevra, you came. I thought you would not show up." She waved the photos at me like we were old friends. "I was just telling everyone about the gallery opening in Milan. It was so much fun. You probably do not go to these things much, right? You are always busy handling Marco's business." She tilted her head and smiled. "Sit down, sit down. Do not just stand there."

I ignored her. I walked past her to the dining table and pulled out a chair. Sofia saw I was not responding. Her smile faded and she tossed the photos onto the coffee table.

"Actually, what do you have besides the title of Falcone's wife? You took everything while I was gone. You can dress up all you want, but it is still stolen."

Hearing those words from the fake daughter Sofia Conti was almost funny.

I took a sip of water and set the cup down slowly. I met her eyes.

"Sofia, do you know what size wedding dress they put me in the morning after you left? Yours. It was a full size too big. Everyone at that wedding watched a bride wearing a dress that did not fit. The photos are still online."

Her expression shifted.

"Some days you said you were Conti's daughter and everything belonged to you. Other days you said your life was your own and you could do whatever you wanted. You left, and I had to clean up all the mess you left behind."

I set the cup down harder this time, and the sound echoed.

"Now you are back, calling me a thief. Let me ask you this. Who stood in your place while the Falcone family was closing in? Who showed up at those meetings you would not even look at when Marco was being pushed to the side? Who almost died in the fighting you refuse to mention by name? "

"You were at your gallery opening in Milan while I was in surgery. You were skiing in the Alps while I was at the negotiation table. You were watching the sunset in Santorini while someone held a gun to my back. And you are sitting on your parents' couch in your robe, flipping through photos, telling me I stole your life."

Then I looked at Marco. He had not moved since I started speaking. He was sunk into the armchair with a lighter in his hand and his knuckles white. He was not looking at Sofia. He was not looking at me. He was staring at the edge of the photo stack on the coffee table.

"Marco," Sofia's voice softened and her eyes reddened. "I did not know. You never told me any of this."

She stood up and walked to him, crouching down and placing her hands on his knees.

"Marco, I really did not know Ginevra went through so much. If I had known, I would never have said those things. I just..." Her voice became barely audible. "I just remember when we were young, you were always the first one there when I fell. You carried me three blocks to the clinic when I scraped my knee. Do you remember that? You said you would never let anyone hurt me."

She looked up at him with tears hanging in her eyes.

"I know she is your wife. I know you have been together for ten years. I just..." She dropped her head. "Everything looks different. Even your coffee cup is different. The blue one I gave you for your birthday, you used it for years."

She pressed her face into the blanket on his lap, her voice muffled.

"Please do not fight because of me. If she really cannot accept me, I will leave. I left before. I am used to it."

Marco finally lifted his head. He looked at Sofia first, then at me.

"Ginevra, I have not forgotten what you did for me. Including what you lost. I never pretended none of it happened."

"But she just got back. She does not know anything. You cannot expect her to understand ten years in one night."

"I heard everything she said. But you had to bring up every wound in front of her. You had to show her all your scars."

He stepped closer, his voice rising. "She came back expecting to find her family. Instead she found you cutting her down like she was your enemy. She is not your enemy. She is a girl who made a mistake and came back to fix it. And you could not stand the sight of her, so you gutted her in front of everyone."

"You are stripped of all authority in the Falcone family. No decisions, no representation, no access to assets. You will stay out of family business until you have reflected on your conduct and proven yourself worthy of the position you hold. You are Donna in name only until I say otherwise."

Behind him, Sofia gasped and covered her mouth. "Marco, please do not be too hard on her. She did not mean any harm. I should not have come back. I should have stayed away."

I held his gaze without flinching. I did not beg. I did not apologize.

"Ginevra..." mother stood up, reaching for me.

I held up my hand to stop her.

"No need," I said quietly. "He has made his position clear."

"I want a divorce. I built the Falcone family's shipping network from nothing. The freight companies, the storage docks, the logistics lines. Those are mine to run. I am taking them."

"This is not a handout. You had nothing when we started, and I held the line behind you. The businesses I built belong to me. Marry her or start over, that is your choice. But you cannot pretend I was not part of building any of this."