Chapter 1

On our fifth wedding anniversary, I was kidnapped.

A month after they rescued me, I found out I was pregnant.

Five paternity tests. Every single one said the baby wasn't Nico's.

My husband, Nico Valenti — the man who clawed his way from bastard son to head of the most powerful family on the East Coast — got a vasectomy the next day. Stood in front of his people and swore he'd raise this child as his own, no matter whose blood it carried.

I believed him.

The family doctor said the trauma had buried itself too deep. That I needed hypnotherapy to recover suppressed memories. So I went, session after session, and every night after, I dreamed the same thing — multiple men holding me down, taking turns. The images were so vivid I could feel their hands on me hours after waking up.

I scrubbed myself raw every morning. Clawed at my own arms until they bled, trying to peel off whatever those men had left behind.

Six times, I tried to end it.

Six times, Nico pulled me back just in time.

After the sixth, they pumped my stomach and hooked me to an IV. Nico sat beside my bed for three hours, holding my hand, whispering that he couldn't live without me.

Twenty minutes after he left, I still couldn't sleep.

I got out of bed and walked barefoot down the hallway. Nico's study door was cracked open, and I could hear him talking with Leo — his right hand since they were kids, the only person in the world he didn't perform for.

Leo's voice came first.

"You faked your own wife's kidnapping to bury a set of Sofia's intimate photos? Five forged DNA reports, all those drugs — what happens if she actually doesn't make it one of these times?"

I stopped breathing.

Nico didn't miss a beat. "Sofia caught a Moretti bullet that was meant for me. That's how she ended up with this pregnancy in the first place. I wasn't going to let her name get dragged through every family's gossip circle on top of it."

"There were other ways to handle that," Leo said. "Why did it have to be Mara?"

"Because Mara could use the humility." His chair creaked. He sounded relaxed — bored, even. "She's never once let Sofia forget where she came from. Every dinner, every family gathering — that look she gives her. Maybe now she understands what it's like to be the one people look down on."

"Besides, it's just talk within the family. She's still my wife. Nobody would actually dare touch her. A few months of gossip, and once Sofia has the baby and I send her overseas, I'll make it up to Mara. I always do."

A pause. Then Leo, quieter: "She's tried to kill herself six times, Nico."

Nico laughed. Short, dismissive — like he'd heard a bad joke.

"Every single time, it's ten minutes before I walk through the door. You think that's a coincidence? She knows exactly what she's doing. She's not trying to die — she's trying to make me feel guilty enough to drop everything and sit by her bed."

My fingers were already on my arm. Scratching at the inside of my forearm — the same patch of skin I'd been tearing at for three months, convinced I was scraping off the filth those men left on me.

Only there were no men. There was never anyone.

The kidnapping was staged. The nightmares were chemicals. The DNA reports were fiction.

Every wound on my arms — I carved them myself, but he put the blade in my hand.

Twenty minutes ago, he was holding that same hand, telling me no one would ever hurt me again. His voice had been so steady. So warm. And the whole time, he knew. He'd always known, because he was the one who designed it.

I barely made it to the bathroom before I threw up.

Nico showed up within seconds — footsteps quick, voice soft. He held my hair back, rubbed my back, helped me up.

"You're up again? The doctor said no stress." He pressed his palm to my forehead, checking for fever. "I'm getting you a new therapist next week. Someone who specializes in trauma recovery. Just hang in there a little longer."

His hand moved to my stomach. Gentle. Protective.

"This baby is a Valenti. Doesn't matter what those tests say. I gave you my word."

I didn't pull away.

Because I understood now. His vasectomy was exactly as real as my kidnapping. Sofia Marchetti — the war orphan he'd taken in, the one he publicly treated like a sister — was carrying the child he actually cared about protecting.

He could make that sterility promise so easily because it had never cost him a thing.

I closed my eyes and leaned into him.

"There's a family dinner this week," he said, stroking my hair. "You should come. Show everyone you're doing fine."

He'd been performing for three months. I could do it for a little while longer.