Chapter 3

"Cecilia!"

Right before I blacked out completely, I thought I saw Lucas rush toward me and lift me out of the car.

When I came to, I heard Bianca's soft voice beside me. "You didn't have to go this far for me and the baby, you know. It was only a scare. The Donna only just got better, and now she's..."

"That's enough." Lucas cut her off. "The doctor says she's been out of danger for a while."

Bianca sighed. "But I did have you all to myself for years. No woman could accept that easily."

"That still doesn't mean she gets to want someone dead."

Lucas's face hardened. He thought about the harsh things I'd shouted at him in the car, and his hands curled into fists.

"All she thinks about is how she's been wronged. Does she have any idea what the council has put me through all these years?"

"Bianca, stop defending her. It only makes her push you around more."

Bianca was about to say something when she saw my eyes slowly open. She hurried to the bed.

"Donna, you're awake?"

Her eyes were still red, like she'd just been crying.

"Please don't be angry with the Don. He was only this upset because he was worried about the baby."

Then she dropped her eyes, and her voice caught.

"If you really can't stand having me here, I can take the baby and move into the guest wing. I'll never bother you."

"After all, I'm only your stand-in. If it weren't for you, the Don would never have looked at me twice."

"Are you done?"

I shook her off, pulled out a handkerchief, wiped my hand with obvious disgust, and dropped it at Lucas's feet.

"Stand-in? Don't insult me. Other than your face, I can't think of one thing about you that's like me."

"Especially this whole fragile act. I couldn't pull that off if I tried for the rest of my life."

"That's enough, Cecilia."

Lucas looked furious.

"Bianca has already let it go. Do you really have to be this cruel?"

He thought I just couldn't stand having Bianca around. What he didn't know was what that sweet, kind woman had done.

Her face had twisted into something ugly as she held a pillow over my nose and mouth, trying to smother me.

If Marco DeLuca, my right-hand man, hadn't gotten there in time, I might never have woken up at all.

At the memory, my breathing quickened.

Lucas picked up the glass of water beside the bed and held it out to me without thinking.

I pushed his hand away, took the other glass instead, and drank.

Lucas glanced at his own hand, left hanging in midair, and the look he turned on me grew colder.

He turned to Bianca. "Wait outside the door for a minute."

Bianca didn't move. Her eyes were still red. "What about you?"

"Three minutes."

Lucas smoothed back her messy hair and said softly, "As soon as I'm done here, we'll go see our son together."

Only then did Bianca nod, casting one last worried look at me.

"Then don't fight with the Donna anymore. She's still not well."

"I know."

Lucas patted her shoulder.

"Go on."

He didn't look away until the door closed behind her.

I sat back against the headboard and stared out the window without expression, as if I hadn't heard a word of all that tenderness.

I had grown used to scenes like that over those three years.

Lucas had Bianca read that love letter from beginning to end, imitating my voice. The second she finished, he kissed her.

They breathed so heavily that it sounded as if they were right against my ear.

When he got carried away, the hand he'd braced on the bed rail came down over mine, the one full of IV lines, and our wedding rings clicked softly together.

That tiny click was the one sound from those three years I could never forget.

Once, they even had sex on the couch beside my hospital bed, and I heard Lucas breathing hard.

"Don't call me Don. Call me baby, the way she used to, okay?"

I wanted to scream at them to get out, but no matter how hard I fought, I couldn't move.

The calmer I remained, the more conflicted Lucas looked.

His eyes landed on the red welt the seat belt had left across my shoulder and neck, and he reached out to touch it.

I pulled away without thinking. His hand stopped. He didn't say anything, just tucked the blanket around me.

"Cecilia, how long are you going to keep this up with me?"

He sat down beside the bed with a bitter little laugh.

"I should have put a camera in your hospital room back then. Then you'd see how I begged God to bring you back to me."

What he didn't know was that I didn't need to see it. I had heard every plea clearly.

That was exactly why all the sweet things he later said to Bianca sounded so cruel.

When I didn't answer, Lucas caught my chin and forced me to look at him.

"You're doing it again. Acting like you're above caring about any of it."

"You can be disappointed in me all you want. But if you're still planning to hurt Bianca and the baby, I really will start to hate you."

I looked at him and said nothing.

After a moment, I just glanced down at my watch.

"That's three minutes." I moved his hand away. "Don, don't keep Ms. Conti waiting."

Lucas gave me a long look. Then he set the silver revolver down beside my bed.

"Bianca doesn't even mind being the stand-in. You could learn something from how gracious she is."

"Tomorrow night you're coming with me to the Capello family's party. It's been a long time since you showed your face as the Donna."

The next afternoon, Lucas had a jewel-encrusted gown sent over.

The dress was gorgeous, but after three years in a coma, clothes that used to fit me now hung loose.

That evening I got ready and came downstairs, and when I looked around, Lucas wasn't there.

The butler hesitated. "Donna... the Don already left with Ms. Conti."

I was quiet for a moment, then got straight into the car.

Thirty minutes later, the car pulled up outside the Capello estate.

As soon as I got out of the car, I stumbled into the restroom, braced myself against the sink, and threw up.

Soon I heard a few women come in, laughing and chatting.

"Did you hear Cecilia woke up?"

"What good does that do? If you ask me, she'd have been better off dead. At least then she'd be the Don's one true love forever."

Another woman agreed, "Right? Everyone used to say the Don loved her more than his own life. Doesn't look like much to me. Did you see tonight? He still brought Bianca."

"Everybody knows now. If you want the Don to do something for you, the easiest way is to take Bianca out for coffee. Whatever she asks for, he says yes without thinking twice."

"Not like Cecilia. She was more difficult than the Don himself, sour-faced all the time. If I were the Don, I'd fall for Bianca too. She's so sweet."

"I heard he's giving Bianca a proper wedding in three days, and it's going to be even bigger than the one he had with Cecilia. We'd better get her something good. After that we'll probably all be calling her Donna."

The laughter faded down the hall.

My stomach turned again. I closed my eyes and waited until it settled before I opened the door and walked out.

The ballroom rang with clinking glasses.

Lucas stood in the middle of the crowd with Bianca hanging on his arm.

When our eyes met, he frowned.

His gaze settled on my pale face, and he let go of Bianca without thinking.

But before he could come over, the Capello family closed in around him with drinks.

I sat down in a corner and swirled my champagne.

Suddenly I remembered another party like this one, years ago.

That night, a man used a dance as an excuse to get too close to me. Lucas came straight through the crowd, caught me by the waist, and pulled me back against him.

"Had enough dancing?"

I teased him. "Jealous?"

He bent close to my ear, his thumb moving slowly along my side.

"Yes."

"I don't like other men touching my woman."

Laughing, I tilted my head up and kissed him.

We were young then, and loud about it. We loved out in the open and didn't care who saw.

And now, after one accident, somebody else was standing next to him.

Across the crowded ballroom, Lucas looked over at me again.

But I'd already looked away and started on what I'd really come here to do.

After those three years, it wasn't hard to tell who had switched sides and who had only done it grudgingly.

Most of them had grown used to gathering around Bianca and laughing with her. Only one man hadn't raised a glass to her all night.

I got up and walked over to Antonio Russo.

"Antonio, will you take a walk with me?"

He set his glass down at once and followed me out onto the terrace.

I got right to it. "Before the wedding, I want a list."

"Who in the Moretti family I can trust, who's gone over to Bianca, and who only bowed their heads because they had to. I want to know all of it."

Antonio was quiet for a while.

"Donna, almost all of them have gone over to Bianca. She looks harmless, but once she makes a move, she's vicious. Bianca framed Marco just because he came to see you every day. The Don ordered his legs broken and had him locked up for life."

The world around me went silent.

I stood there, and for a long time I couldn't get a word out.

While I was in that coma, I had to listen to Bianca gloating and cursing me every day, and to people in the Moretti family airing their grudges against me.

I couldn't move. I couldn't open my eyes. I couldn't even tell them to get out.

Marco was the only one who still came to see me.

He never talked to me about the family's troubles. He would just sit by the bed and ramble.

He told me about the new guy at the South Port who was so hopeless he filled out the shipping manifest wrong three times.

Once, when he'd really run out of things to say, he told me the cat in the kitchen had kittens.

One black, one white, both of them adorable.

Before he left, he'd always pat my hand.

"Wake up soon, Donna, or I'm really going to run out of stories."

And then one day he stopped coming.

I thought that, like everyone else, he'd finally gotten tired of sitting with someone who was never going to wake up.

But now Antonio was telling me his legs had been broken and he'd been locked away for two whole years.

I swayed, spilling champagne all down the front of my dress.

Right then, Bianca said from behind me in a small, timid voice, "Donna, please don't get the wrong idea about tonight. The Don only brought me first because..."

Smack!

I put every ounce of strength I had into that slap.

The blow knocked Bianca to the floor. Half her face swelled red at once, and blood welled at the corner of her mouth.

"You took my territory and went after my husband. I let all of it go! But how dare you touch my right-hand man!"

I grabbed her by the collar, my eyes red with fury.

"You wear my perfume, you wear my clothes, you sleep with my man, and now you think you're actually the Donna?"

"Bianca, I was in a coma for three years. I wasn't dead! You don't get to decide what happens to my people!"

I yanked her up off the floor.

"Get up and take me to Marco!"

"Donna! Let go of me, I really don't know what you're talking about..."

Bianca was sobbing and struggling. I didn't listen to a word. I dragged her straight toward the door.

The commotion quickly drew everyone's attention.

"Cecilia, have you lost your mind?!"

Lucas pushed through the crowd, pulled Bianca behind him, and shoved me hard.

I didn't have much strength to begin with. I stumbled a few steps and went down hard on the floor.

Bianca threw herself into his arms, holding her swollen cheek, sobbing so hard she shook.

I pushed myself up on my hands and stared at Lucas.

"Did you order them to break Marco's legs?"

Lucas hesitated.

"Yes."

"Why?! You knew he was the man I trusted most!" I screamed at him.

Lucas couldn't have cared less. "He talked back to Bianca in front of everyone and humiliated her!"

For a second I thought I'd heard him wrong.

"Just for that?"

Lucas frowned.

"Bianca had just taken over the South Port. If she couldn't keep one subordinate in line, how was she ever going to command anyone?"

I forced down the ache in my chest and looked at him coldly. "Where's Marco? I'm going to see him."

Lucas didn't answer. He only looked at the mark on Bianca's face.

"Apologize to Bianca. In front of everyone."

His tone left no room for argument.

"Do that, and I'll tell you where Marco is."

For the first time, I wanted to kill the man standing in front of me.

But in the end, I didn't do anything.

"I'm sorry."

Bianca shook her head quickly. "Donna, I know you were just so worried about Marco. I don't blame you."

One of the capos couldn't keep quiet. "Worried or not, you don't hit people. That's no way for the Donna to behave."

"Exactly. And since when is it strange for the Don to deal with one of his men? Don, I think you've spoiled her."

"Who gets this upset over a subordinate? If you ask me, she was just looking for an excuse to hurt Bianca."

With every word, Lucas's face grew darker.

He dropped a handkerchief in front of me. "Wipe the blood from the corner of her mouth."

I stared at the handkerchief. I'd sewn it for him myself.

My heart was already numb, yet it still ached for one brief moment.

I bent down, picked up the handkerchief, and wiped the blood off Bianca's lip, a little at a time.

The room went dead silent. No one could believe their eyes.

After a moment, somebody snorted with laughter. "Would you look at that. I thought Cecilia would never back down as long as she lived."

"Guess three years in a coma wasn't all bad. At least she finally learned her place."

The jeering got louder. I just handed the handkerchief back to Lucas calmly.

"Where's Marco?"

Seeing how calm I was, Lucas went rigid.

He pulled a key out of his jacket and threw it on the floor.

"The livestock pens behind the old racetrack on the north side of the city."

I froze.

The livestock pens?

I snatched up the key and hurried out. Ignoring my terror of cars, I urged the driver to leave at once.

Bianca noticed Lucas staring after me, lost in thought.

She immediately burrowed into his arms and burst into sobs.

"Don, I can't live like this anymore, scared all the time."

"I was only ever the Donna's stand-in. Now she's back. Please, just let me go."

"I know you still love her. So please don't make her cry anymore, okay?"

The capos all looked at her with sympathy.

"Bianca, she's fooling you! Cecilia never cries. She's just trying to get to the Don."

"Right. Did you see how fast she jumped in that car just now? She didn't look the least bit scared. It's all an act to make the Don feel guilty. And he arranges a helicopter for her every single time!"

"How much longer is she going to keep this up! She acts like we all betrayed her! But this world is about more than love. There's also the family business. Any Don would have picked another woman. If it wasn't Bianca, it would have been someone else."

"She should be grateful it was someone as sweet as you. Anyone else would have taken the Donna's seat from her a long time ago!"

Every word hit home.

Lucas tore his gaze from the door and looked down at Bianca as she sobbed in his arms.

Her eyes were almost identical to mine.

Yet what they held could not have been more different.

She looked at him with eyes full of love. I looked at him as if he were my enemy.

It seemed to Lucas that no matter how he explained or how hard he tried to win me back, nothing could ever thaw my heart again.

And this woman, who'd been beside him for two years, had always given in. Not once had she made things difficult for him.

It broke his heart.

He held Bianca tight. "Don't talk nonsense. I'm not letting you go."

"As for Cecilia, I promise I'll teach her a lesson she won't forget. She'll never dare push you around again."