Chapter 3

Later, while walking through the garden one day, I overheard a conversation between Luca and Raul.

Raul wore a sycophantic smile.

"Consigliere, it was all thanks to your brilliant idea, sending me to Dr. Dean Mercer, director of St. Raphael Medical Center, for an undetectable poison.

"Claire would never suspect that I put the poison in her bedtime milk!"

My heart clenched as if it had been sliced to ribbons.

"I did it for Quill's sake." Luca's eyes gleamed with cunning. "If that woman gives birth to a bastard, it would jeopardize the business alliance that Sherry's family brings to the table and destroy the Moretti Family's international partnerships. I will never allow that kind of threat."

Raul gazed at him with admiration. "You always see the bigger picture! With a consigliere like you, the Moretti Family will never fall!"

I stumbled my way to Quill, crying and screaming that I wanted out of this sickening arrangement.

For the first time, Quill lost his temper at me. He gripped my chin, his eyes bloodshot.

"You're not going anywhere! You're mine!"

Before long, Sherry really did come back.

She looked at me with pure disdain.

"You think I'd care about your past with Quill?

"You're nothing but a stain on Quill's shirt, an accident he can wash away."

At Sherry's emphatic suggestion, Quill chose to hold their wedding on my birthday.

Consigliere Luca considered me an embarrassment and forbade me from appearing at the ceremony.

So he ordered Raul to lock me in an abandoned warehouse.

Having been around Quill long enough, I was well aware of Luca's brutal methods.

What he didn't know was that two months earlier, I'd already found someone who could help me escape this hellhole.

That someone was my husband, Giovanni Fontana.

Two months prior, late one night, a hotel guest suddenly craved something sweet.

That guest was Giovanni.

But all the chefs had already gone home.

Every dessert shop was closed.

Just as the manager was pacing in frustration, I volunteered.

"I learned to make desserts from my mother.

"Why don't you let me try?"

The manager's face lit up, and he immediately sent me to the kitchen.

Back when I was with Quill, I'd heard of Giovanni. He was Quill's fiercest rival, and their two families were constantly fighting over business.

A week earlier, I'd heard the manager mention during a staff meeting that Giovanni would be arriving at the hotel that night.

In that moment, an idea sparked. Giovanni was the perfect person to get me out of the Moretti Family.

So I deliberately swapped shifts with a colleague, trading my daytime hours for the night shift.

All so I could get close to Giovanni.

I just hadn't expected that while I was biding my time, he'd suddenly want dessert.

It was an unexpected turn, but also an opportunity.

I told myself I had to seize it.

I quickly finished the dessert, then brought it to Giovanni with my sweetest smile.

The moment I walked in, I could feel his gaze circling over me, a light glimmering in his deep eyes.

After his first bite, he couldn't help but praise it.

"This is wonderful! It reminds me of my sister!

"When she was alive, she was always making me all sorts of desserts!"

It turned out that when Giovanni was eighteen, he and his older sister, Sofia Fontana, went on a trip together.

She was driving that day.

Less than twenty minutes in, a truck slammed into them.

Sofia instantly shielded him with her own body.

In the end, the truck's crossbeam pierced her heart, and he survived.

"All these years, I've lived with the guilt over my sister, and I've missed the desserts she used to make so much.

"Thank you for making something this delicious.

"Whenever you need help, just tell me."

The moment he said that, an idea flashed through my mind.

I clutched the hem of my skirt and finally voiced the plan I'd been harboring.

"What if the help I need... is for you to marry me?"

Afraid Giovanni would think I was out of my mind, I told him everything about me and Quill.

"I want to live a normal life. I've been trapped in darkness for so long. I'm exhausted. I just want someone who can walk with me toward the light."

After I finished, Giovanni stared at me in shock, saying nothing.

I thought he was refusing me, and embarrassment crept across my face.

"I'm sorry, if you're not willing..."

"I'm willing to marry you." Giovanni cut me off and rose to his feet, urgency in his voice. "The truth is, I was drawn to you the moment you walked in."

After a pause, he looked at me with complete sincerity.

"Claire, I've actually dealt with Quill before."

He took a deep breath, his voice dropping.

"My family and the Moretti Family have been business rivals for years. I've never been able to stomach the way Quill monopolizes resources on both sides of the law." He walked to the window, then turned back, his deep eyes fixed on me. "What you've suffered at the hands of the Moretti Family, you have my deepest sympathy. And I need to join forces with you to keep the Morettis in check. Are you willing?"

I nodded eagerly. "As long as I can escape the Moretti Family, I'm willing!"

Giovanni and I spent a month devising an escape plan.

I let Raul lock me in the warehouse without a fuss, then quietly waited for Giovanni's men to come rescue me.

I'd already told Giovanni that anyone who crossed the Moretti Family ended up in this warehouse.

I'd even hand-drawn a map of the grounds, marking both Quill's villa and the warehouse where they kept me.

So on the day of Quill and Sherry's wedding, several of Giovanni's most trusted men used my hand-drawn map to locate the warehouse and got me out.

At my suggestion, Giovanni and I married in a private civil ceremony.

"Claire, I know you haven't fallen in love with me yet." Giovanni gazed at me tenderly. "But I'll work to earn your love."

After the wedding, I kept having nightmares about the dark things I'd been through.

When Giovanni found out, he spared no expense to bring in a top therapist for me.

He also taught me horseback riding, skiing, scuba diving, golf...

He helped me grow more capable and confident with every passing day.

Gradually, under Giovanni's guidance, I forgot the nightmare that had been my life.

And at the same time, I fell completely in love with him.

Before long, I was carrying his child.

...

"Claire, you just never learn!

"How dare you sneak around and get pregnant with Quill's baby!"

A shrill, familiar voice yanked me back to reality.

Quill's wife, Sherry, had arrived.