Chapter 3

Julian's roar made me tremble with fury.

A sly look flashed in Chloe's eyes.

She pushed the shard away and fell into Julian's arms, clutching her bleeding neck.

"Julian!" she sobbed, a mess of tears. "Valeria's crazy! She's jealous I'm carrying your heir. She wants us both dead!"

I stood up slowly, still holding the bloody piece of porcelain.

The hate in my chest was a fire, burning me from the inside out.

I stared at the man in the doorway.

"Did you know?" My voice was raw, my eyes bloodshot. "When you signed that paper. Did you know I was pregnant?"

Julian froze.

The color drained from his face. He looked at me, stunned, then down at Chloe in his arms.

"Pregnant? What four weeks pregnant?" he demanded.

Chloe flinched.

Then she put on her innocent, pitiful act.

"I'm sorry, Julian... The doctor said the drugs were too risky. I was afraid you'd worry, so I told him to keep it from you... I just couldn't bear to see Valeria kept in the dark." She sobbed her confession.

Julian took a deep breath.

He saw me, my hands covered in blood, and a flash of panic crossed his eyes.

He shielded Chloe behind him and looked back at me.

"We keep this in-house." He tried to step forward to grab the weapon from my hand.

"Blood on the estate floor? The Commission won't stand for it." His brow was tight, his tone a hard command. "Put the shard down!"

"Keep this in-house?"

A bitter laugh escaped my throat.

"You're a butcher."

I gripped the sharp piece of porcelain and lunged at him with all my strength.

"You'll pay for my child's life!"

Before the shard even touched his clothes, a blur of motion.

Julian was ex-special forces. His fighting skills were legendary in the mafia.

He swept my legs out. I hit the floor hard. The force sent me crashing into the coffee table behind me.

Glass shattered everywhere.

Pain exploded in my stomach. I curled up on the floor, coughing up bile.

Julian looked down at me, the veins on the back of his hand bulging from the force he'd used.

"Don't push me, Valeria," he ordered. "Get up and come with me. Now!"

My mouth was filled with the taste of blood.

I fought through the feeling of my insides being torn apart and pushed myself up from the floor.

"You're rotten to the core," I spat through my tears.

I grabbed a piece of broken glass from the floor and went for him again.

This time, he didn't kick.

He grabbed my throat and slammed me to the ground.

I couldn't breathe.

He pulled a syringe with a powerful sedative from his tactical pocket.

The needle found the vein in my neck.

Cold liquid flooded into me.

"Drag her to the lockup in the basement. Lock her in," Julian's cold, tired voice said from above.

"When she's worked through this rage, then you can let her out. No one goes near her without my order!"

My vision blurred.

I saw Chloe wrapping her arms around his neck, still shaken.

Julian frowned, picking her up, but his eyes were locked on me on the floor.

I don't know how long passed.

A bone-chilling cold woke me.

I snapped my eyes open. A blinding fluorescent light made my head spin.

I was in a rough hospital gown, sitting on a cold iron chair.

Heavy leather straps were buckled around my wrists, ankles, and waist, holding me down.

This wasn't the lockup. This was the estate's interrogation room.

A withered old woman in a black suit stood in front of me.

The estate's Matron. In charge of all internal punishments.

"Donna," the Matron said, her eyes grim. "Drop the spoiled princess act. Don't disgrace the wife of the Don."

I struggled. The iron chair scraped against the floor.

I stared her down, refusing to back down.

The Matron sneered and clapped her hands.

Two guards dragged in a bloody, battered woman and threw her on the concrete floor.

"Nina!" I cried out.

It was my personal assistant.

Nina was covered in wounds, too weak to even stand.

She spat out a mouthful of bloody saliva and looked up at me.

"Miss..." Nina sobbed. "They took Mr. Vieri."

My mind went blank.

"What happened?"

"They're accusing your father of embezzling fifty million dollars from the Commission," Nina wept. "They're also saying he leaked the family's drug routes to our rivals. They dragged him to the Commission's underground lockup."

"All of the Vieri family's overseas assets are frozen. The estate is surrounded by armed guards. Everyone is on house arrest."

A cold sweat soaked my gown.

"My father would never do that! Where's the proof?"

"The proof..." Nina closed her eyes in despair. "The ledgers. The Don submitted them to the Commission himself."

"He signed your father's death warrant. The old guard are all praising him for putting family duty above personal ties."

The air was sucked out of the room.

I was hyperventilating, my eyes burning.

Julian submitted the ledgers himself. To frame his own father-in-law for a death sentence.

He wants to destroy the Vieri family. Take our territory.

"Bastard!" I thrashed wildly. The straps cut into my wrists, drawing blood.

"Julian! You spineless snake!"

"I want to see him!" I screamed at the Matron. "Let me see him!"

The Matron looked down at me, a mocking sneer on her lips.

She pulled out a set of tools.

"The Boss was clear," she said.

"You get out when your fangs are pulled and you're ready to admit you were wrong."