Chapter 1

The day I died, Luca touched me willingly for the first time.

He sat beside my bed and took my chin between cold fingers, forcing me to look at him.

Thirty years had left fine lines at the corners of his eyes, but his gray gaze was as cold as it had been on our wedding night.

"Serafina." He leaned close, his voice almost gentle. "I wish I'd never met you."

When my heart gave its final beat, I was surprised by how little it hurt. I had been sixteen when I first followed my father into the Moretti estate. Luca stood beneath the chapel's stained glass in a black suit, sliding an engagement ring onto my sister Isabella's finger. Most of my life had revolved around him after that: first with a girl's secret devotion, and later as punishment for a crime that was never mine.

By the time he came to my deathbed, I felt nothing but quiet. I managed the faintest smile.

"Luca."

It was the first time in thirty years I had called him by his name.

"So do I."

He went still.

I never saw what crossed his face after that. My vision darkened. When sound returned, it came as the sharp cry of violins. A crystal chandelier hung above me. The air smelled of champagne, cigars, and white roses. Men in black suits filled the banquet hall.

They carried guns beneath their jackets and wore the smiles reserved for weddings.

I lowered my gaze.

A brass key lay in my palm. A number was stamped into its tag.

217.

My breath stopped.

"What are you waiting for?"

My father, Enzo Vitale, stood before me. He turned just enough to block me from the guests' view. A polished smile remained on his face, but the hand on my shoulder tightened until it nearly crushed the bone.

"Luca drank something he shouldn't have. Marco has taken him upstairs."

I stared at the face my father had worn thirty years ago. A roar filled my ears.

Tonight was Luca and my sister's engagement banquet. It was also the beginning of everything that had gone wrong in my first life.

"Why haven't you called a doctor?" I heard myself ask.

"Because no doctor can appear here tonight, and no one can learn that the future head of the Moretti family was caught off guard."

At the center of the ballroom, my sister wore a white dress sewn with pearls. She stood on the arm of Luca's uncle, accepting congratulations from the guests. She was beautiful and obedient, and she carried a child whose existence had not yet been announced. Father would never allow her to disappear from her own engagement banquet. That was why he had given the key to me.

"You're her sister," he said under his breath. "You look enough alike."

My nails dug into my palm. The last time, I had taken the key to Room 217 and gone upstairs as Father ordered. He gave me a glass of champagne, claiming it would steady my nerves. Everything after that was broken and confused. I remembered Luca's burning breath, the long table toppling over, the weakness in every limb, and the colorless face of my sister in the doorway.

I had spent thirty years blaming myself. I believed I had failed to push Luca away, and that I had killed her. Three days later, the police pulled a woman in a white dress from a river outside the city.

The child in her womb died with her. To preserve the alliance between our families, Luca married me. I took the Moretti name but was barred from family business and denied even a key to the estate. He never touched me in thirty years of marriage. Everyone knew it was his punishment for a traitor. Until the day I died, he believed my greed had driven my sister to her death.

"Serafina."

Father's fingers tightened impatiently.

"The Vitale family raised two daughters for this day. If something happens to Isabella, you take her place. Tonight, you're simply performing your duty a little early."

I stared at him.

In my first life, I had never asked why Father had prepared the room and key so far in advance, or why he had insisted I drink that champagne. Looking back now, the arrangements were far too thorough.

I had lived with the Morettis for thirty years. I knew the estate's hidden doors and the guards' habits. More importantly, I knew what men like these feared most: losing control. I accepted the champagne from my father.

"I understand."

Satisfied, he released me. I raised the glass. The moment he turned away, I poured it into a planter filled with white roses. As the wine soaked into the soil, a brown ring spread along the edges of the petals. Whatever I had swallowed that night, it had never been meant to calm me.

Across the ballroom, my sister turned and smiled. Her right hand rested unconsciously over her abdomen. I crossed the room and seized her wrist.

"Come with me."

She flinched.

"Serafina? The ceremony isn't over."

"Something happened to Luca."

The color drained from her face.

"What happened?"

"There's no time to explain."

I pulled her toward the side door. Father spotted us and immediately came after us through the crowd.

"Serafina!"

I did not look back.

In the service corridor, I yanked the silver bell cord from the wall. It rang in the duty room beside the first-floor kitchen. Thirty years ago, the family doctor had been sitting there that night. He had not been allowed to see Luca until the next morning, when every trace of the drugs had already left Luca's blood.

"Find Dr. Rossi," I told the approaching servant. "Tell him to bring his medical kit and two Moretti guards to Room 217. Now."

The servant saw Isabella behind me and did not dare question the order. He ran for the stairs. My sister wrenched her hand free.

"What is going on?"

I looked at her face and remembered the pale, swollen body by the river three days from now. Father had ordered the coffin sealed that same day, before a complete autopsy could be performed. I had believed he could not bear to look at her. Now, that haste felt wrong.

"Isabella," I said. "Are you pregnant?"

She staggered back.

"How do you know?"

A crash sounded upstairs, as if someone had smashed a glass cabinet. My sister stopped asking questions. She gathered her skirt and ran to the second floor. Two guards lay outside Room 217. One was still conscious, his right hand clamped to the side of his neck, blood filling the spaces between his fingers. From inside the room came a man's strangled breathing.

I picked up a pistol beside one of the guards and fired twice into the lock. My sister cried out and covered her ears. I kicked the door open. The bedroom was wrecked. Luca knelt beside an overturned table, his white shirt soaked through with sweat. His left hand braced against the wood. A gun remained in his right. The instant he heard us, he aimed it our way.

Even half-conscious, his hand was steady.

"Get out." His voice was nearly too hoarse to hear. "Don't come near me."

The last time I opened this door, Luca had already lost consciousness. We were fifteen minutes earlier now. It might not be too late.

"Luca, it's me." Isabella stepped forward.

"Don't go near him!"

I stopped her and turned toward the corner of the room. An open silver ice bucket sat beside a vase, half a bottle of champagne still inside. Its label did not match the brand being served downstairs. The painting opposite the bed hung crooked as well. I crossed the room and tore it from the wall. A camera no larger than my thumb was hidden behind it, aimed directly at the long table and the bed.

My sister's face slowly whitened. Someone had drugged Luca and installed a camera in advance. Whether I or Isabella entered the room, the resulting footage could tear both families apart. Footsteps approached behind us. Dr. Rossi arrived with the guards. I pushed Isabella into the bedroom and remained in the hall.

"Hold Luca down and test his blood. Isabella stays and watches the entire process. No one is to approach either of them alone."

My sister caught my hand.

"What about you?"

"I'm going to find whoever drugged him."

Father charged up the stairs with several men while I was fastening a chain around the fire door at the end of the corridor.

"Have you lost your mind?" he shouted. "Who gave you permission to call the doctor?"

"No one."

I turned and aimed the pistol at him.

"I wasn't planning to ask."

Father stared at me without speaking. The music downstairs had stopped. Guests gathered in the center of the hall, murmuring about the shots on the second floor. Several family heads ordered their men to open the estate gates, only to learn that Moretti guards had sealed every exit. I walked to the railing above the ballroom and held up the half-empty bottle of champagne.

"The wine was drugged."

The hall fell silent.

"No one leaves the Moretti estate. Seal every glass, bottle, and kitchen record. Anyone who entered the wine cellar tonight will be searched one by one."

Father's face turned livid.

"Serafina, you have no authority over these people."

"She does."

A weak male voice came from behind me. Luca leaned against the doorframe, Dr. Rossi's needle still in his arm. His face was pale, but his gray eyes were clear again. He looked at the gun in my hand, then at the sealed ballroom.

"Do as she says."

Every Moretti guard drew his weapon. The ballroom doors closed. Dr. Rossi hurried to Luca's side, his expression grim.

"This wasn't an ordinary aphrodisiac. It was mixed with a compound capable of causing cardiac arrest. A slightly larger dose would have killed you tonight."

The crowd stirred. My sister seized my arm. Her hand was shaking.

"Serafina."

She pulled a folded sheet of paper from inside her dress and pressed it into my palm.

"This arrived in my room three days ago. I was afraid to tell Father. I was afraid to tell Luca."

There was only one typewritten sentence on the page.

The first Moretti heir will never be born alive.

I looked at my sister's still-flat stomach. In my first life, everyone said she had thrown herself into the river in her engagement dress after finding Luca and me together. But someone had tried to kill Luca tonight, and someone had threatened her unborn child before that. The body buried in haste, without a complete autopsy, might never have been a suicide.

I looked down at the guests in the ballroom.

The person who killed her might still be inside this estate.