***POV - Melaena The misty rain outside chills the already cold wind blowing through the broken glass of the tiny window a few more degrees. Covered in goosebumps I pull the thin blanket tighter and move closer to Luke’s small body, hoping to transfer more of my body heat over to him and vice versa. The movement wakes Kiara and her eyes flick open, catching mine over the little man’s head. We just silently stare at each other, drained loopy eyes looking but not seeing. I know exactly what she’s thinking, that she’s uncomfortable with everything, but she keeps quiet. We’ve ployed up a plan A, and just in case it flops miserably, schemed a plan B and C as backups. Although it’s all altogether the same plan. Kiara is not happy with it, and yes I know it’s risky at best, but we both know it's the only way. The tiny bean in my tummy seems to tap all my energy and I swear I’m too tired to even close my eyes. I send up a mindless prayer, hoping that Damion will find us in time, a

***POV - Damion fratello = Italian for ‘brother’ “Get Dr. Burden on the phone, now!” My aching head lifts a fraction from my hands, Doc Barney is standing at the nursing station a few feet from my chair. Something in his posture alerts my non-functioning brain. As if in a dream I see the nurse handing him the phone over the counter. “Dr. Burden? Doc Barney from ER. Melaena Blackburn is here – level 2, your name is on her chart. Anything I need to know?” He rambles the information off. He looks confused, surprised even, pouting his mouth. “Neh!” He shouts out in shock. Something is wrong, I can just feel it. His eyes find me and he looks even more confused and worried. What is wrong? I want to shout at him, but my tongue is stuck to the top of my mouth and all I can do is stare back. “Okay, thanks, doctor. I’ll see you in a few minutes then.” His eyes stay on me for the rest of the conversation, and the nurse takes back the phone. He rushes back to Mel’s room,

***POV - Melaena I shift my legs into a more comfortable position where I sit on the freshly-planted green grass covering the small heap of the gravesite, and then I place the red flowers against the newly erected marble tombstone. A few tears roll down my cheek and I wipe them away anxiously with my hand. I didn’t know it was possible to feel so devastatingly sad losing someone you didn’t even truly know. Fudge-jackets, it's so unfair. Hatred for Harry, for Darren, for Lucinda … for the whole fudge-upped family … boils through me. I put my hand against the cold stone that’s now the only indication of the life that was lost and buried deep in the earth underneath. And for what? Revenge? Money? Power? And in the end, Harry and his family ended up in graves themselves. What a loss of lives. And all the bloodshed and suffering was for nothing. It just caused more pain. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to forgive them for everything they’ve taken from me, but in a way, I

***POV – Damion 18 months later Damion: I’m sure that from lack of use, my sperm grew legs and looks like frogs instead of tadpoles. But the situation is going to be rectified before the night is over. I touch my crotch with a groan, abstinence is definitely not my thing. These last weeks have been torture, being in bed next to the woman of my dreams, and the closest I got to touch her was a hug. Fuck, a day without sex with Mel is a fudging long time, two weeks is a fudging excruciating fierce eternity … a month … that’s just plain torturing hell. My dick stirs at the forecast of ripping off her clothes and moves into a full-blown hard-on when I look at the photo she sends me as her answer. She’s fudging with me, the devious little witch, but I keep staring at the picture of her feet, her toe nails painted in a checkered flag pattern. Damn my soon-to-be wife. Even her fudging feet turn me on. Damion: You make my balls so blue – sure this maltreatment is sexual abuse