Chapter 2

I don't know how long I was in that basement.

The bleeding got worse. The floor beneath me was soaked. I was fading in and out of consciousness with the pain.

Every contraction was like a bomb going off in my belly.

Suddenly, the door flew open.

"Madonna mia!" a familiar voice cried out.

Dr. Russo.

The Falcone family's private doctor.

He rushed to my side, kneeling in the pool of my blood, his trembling hands checking my pulse.

"Signora Falcone! What are you doing here?" His face was white. "I thought you were in the VIP suite upstairs—"

"Elena—" I said weakly. "She put me—"

"Don't talk." Dr. Russo lifted my dress to examine me. The horror on his face grew. "You're fully dilated, your water broke, and you're hemorrhaging. This is a Code Red!"

He tried to use his phone, but the screen read "No Signal."

"Damn this basement!" he cursed, then looked at me. "Signora, I have to get you to a delivery room. Right now!"

Dr. Russo bent down to pick me up. "Here, hold on to me."

"My baby—" I grabbed his arm. "Please, save my baby."

"I'm saving you both," he said through gritted teeth, lifting me into his arms. "But first, we get out of this hellhole."

The guards outside saw him and moved to block our path.

"Stop! Miss Elena said—"

"Miss Elena said what?" Dr. Russo roared. "To let a woman in labor bleed to death in a storage closet? Get out of my way!"

His voice had the authority of a doctor, and even the guards flinched.

Dr. Russo stumbled with me toward the elevator.

Blood dripped onto the floor, leaving a sickening trail behind us.

"Hang on," he panted. "The top floor has the best equipment. We're almost there."

The elevator felt like it was moving through concrete. Every floor was torture.

My vision was blurring, but I could feel my baby fighting, trying to get out.

"How much longer?" I whispered.

"Two minutes," Dr. Russo said, watching the floor numbers. "Just two minutes."

The elevator finally reached the top floor. The doors opened, and Dr. Russo charged toward the luxury private delivery suite—

The door was open.

We rushed in and froze.

The room was empty.

The millions of dollars of medical equipment—all gone.

Monitors, ventilators, the surgical table, even the goddamn bed—gone.

There was nothing but four bare walls and a few dangling wires.

"This is impossible," Dr. Russo whispered, standing stunned in the doorway. "Where's the equipment?"

Footsteps echoed from the hall.

Elena appeared at the door, a few nurses behind her.

She saw us and put on a show of surprise.

"Oh my god! Alessia!" She clutched her chest. "You look terrible! Dr. Russo, why isn't she resting in bed?"

"Resting?" Dr. Russo stared at her. "She was hemorrhaging in a basement storage room! And this suite—where is all the equipment?"

Elena blinked, like the answer was obvious.

"Oh, that equipment?" she said casually. "We moved it to Ornella's suite."

Dr. Russo's face went even paler. "What?"

"To ensure the safe delivery of the one true heir to the Falcone family," Elena said, her voice slow and deliberate. Her eyes raked over me with pure contempt. "Ornella gets the best of everything. It's her right."

"But Signora Falcone is crowning!" Dr. Russo was screaming now. "She needs surgery, right now!"

Elena glanced at me. She shrugged.

"Drop the act, Alessia. Vittorio already told me. That dose is harmless. You're just putting on a show for sympathy, trying to distract from Ornella's labor. We're not falling for your games again."

I stared at her perfectly made-up face.

I suddenly remembered a year ago, using the first money I ever made from selling my paintings to buy her a Dior dress she'd been dreaming of.

She hugged me and said, "Alessia, you're the sister I never had."

What a joke.

The "sister she never had" was lying on the floor, bleeding out, while she and her precious brother pushed me toward my grave.