Chapter 4

I was about to inject myself with medication to prevent a miscarriage.

The shock wave hurled me off my feet.

I slammed into a cold steel surgical cabinet, and pain tore through my back as if something had cracked.

Bang! Bang! Automatic rifle fire raked the clinic's exterior.

The Salvatore family's hitmen had finally made their move.

I curled up under the operating table, both hands clamped over my stomach.

Then something warm began to trickle down the inside of my thigh, slow and unstoppable.

Blood.

Shaking all over, I fumbled for my phone and called Cassius. Calling him was the only chance I had to save my baby.

The call connected.

"Cassius..." I gasped, my voice distorted by pain and terror. "The clinic's under attack... I'm bleeding. Help me..."

A soft laugh answered me. Mia's.

"Cassius is driving. I've got his phone."

"Give him the phone..." I gritted my teeth as the blood ran down my legs. "Mia, I'm pregnant! Put Cassius on..."

"Oh, but Cassius is taking me shopping for a wedding dress. We don't feel like turning back right now," Mia said sweetly. Then she suddenly screamed. "Cassius! Something's ticking under the car! Is it a bomb?"

My breath stopped.

"Sierra, stay at the clinic." Cassius's voice came over the line, cold and ruthlessly calm. "Mia's car might be rigged with a bomb. Whatever it is, it'll have to wait until I get back."

"Cassius, I'm pregnant! I'm bleeding so much..." I sobbed and screamed into the phone, clutching at my last lifeline.

"Don't you dare lie to me just to get your way, not now!" he snapped, cutting me off. There was none of his old patience or tenderness in his voice. "You're a trained surgeon. Take care of yourself!"

Beep... beep... beep...

The call went dead.

I stared at the words "Call Ended" on the screen. Suddenly, the whole world went terrifyingly quiet.

Outside, the hitmen had already breached the first steel door.

He'd left me bleeding and alone against a crew of armed killers so he could save Mia. She was sitting in a bulletproof car wearing a bulletproof necklace.

I bit my lip until it bled, forcing myself to stay conscious.

I grabbed a sharp scalpel and crawled with difficulty through the clinic's underground ventilation ducts, slipping through a blind spot in the hitmen's perimeter.

By the time I sped toward the downtown hospital in my old backup sedan, I could feel my life draining out of me bit by bit.

On a cold operating table in the ER, I lost the tiny life that had been with me for ten weeks.

The pain made me wish I were dead.

"I'm so sorry. You lost too much blood. We couldn't save the baby."

I stared blankly at the surgical lights overhead, unable to shed a single tear. It felt as though my heart had been torn apart along with the life I'd just lost.

Before dawn, still weak from the ordeal, I dragged myself back to the empty hillside villa.

News reports about the Vitelli family's bomb-disposal operation downtown were everywhere. The reports said there had never been a bomb under the car, yet Cassius had shut down three entire blocks to protect Mia.

I went into the study and neatly laid the finalized divorce decree and a bloodstained medical report confirming my miscarriage on his large black walnut desk.

He'd said I was lying, hadn't he? Then he needed to see what he'd killed.

The divorce was now final.

I walked out the front door with my suitcase and took a cab to the airport.

I pulled my trench coat tighter and watched the city lights recede behind me.

Goodbye, Cassius.

You no longer had a personal doctor in this city, or a wife who would always be waiting right where you left her.