He Chose His Brother’s Widow, So I Took Our Daughter and Disappeared

After I was given in alliance to the Morettis, one of the oldest families in La Cosa Nostra, as the second wife, I was Vitale's bound wife in name only. Everyone in the famiglia knew the real love of his life was his widowed sister-in-law, Serafina, the woman his dead brother had left behind.

He called me the perfect consort, a graceful hostess who could stand at his side at any sit-down. At his gatherings, I would take shot after shot of grappa to shield him from any insult passed across the table. Yet when Serafina so much as sipped a glass of fruit wine another man had offered her, Vitale had the man's hand taken off at the wrist, and never blinked.

He hung my photographs through the estate, saying he wanted every family from here to the coast to know how beautiful his wife was. But her? He kept her hidden like a secret worth killing for, locked away where no rival could ever lay eyes on her.

Then one of my photographs slipped out. His enemies saw it, and I was taken. I called him from the dark, begging him to send men for me.

He said, "Lori... Serafina is carrying my child now. It's the only heir I can give my late brother. I have to stay beside her and keep her safe."

"You'll just have to hold on a few days. Once the sickness eases, I'll come for you."

He never came.

For a full year, I was tortured. Violated more than a thousand times, my leg broken, my soul shattered.

Still, he never showed.

When I finally escaped, barely alive, covered in blood and filth, I crawled back to the Moretti Estate. Only to find my daughter locked in a dog cage, emaciated and filthy, eating scraps off the ground.

She was clutching a framed photograph of me. My memorial card. They had buried me without a body and declared me dead.

Meanwhile, my husband was throwing a lavish celebration for the one-month birthday of the son he'd made with her, proudly announcing to the whole famiglia that a blood-bound union was coming.

I held my daughter close, her tiny frame trembling against me. Through tears, I whispered to her, "Sweetheart, you don't need that kind of father. Not anymore."

When I walked into the inner courtyard of the Moretti compound, Vitale was gently sliding a vintage gold ring onto Serafina's finger. The same ring that had passed down through generations of the family, the mark of the Moretti Lady of the House.

At that moment, Vitale announced the union would be sealed in three days.

Serafina held a newborn boy, barely a month old, cradled against her. She leaned into Vitale's chest with a bashful smile, playing the glowing mother of the heir, perfectly in love. The picture of a made man's domestic peace.

Vitale turned to smile at the gathered soldiers and capos raising their glasses. That was when he saw me.

Even with my face caked in blood, barely recognizable, he knew it was me. After all these years, after everything, he still knew.

Shock flickered across his face, then something I hadn't seen in so long. Joy. Real, raw joy. He looked like he was about to cross the courtyard to me.

"Lor"

But Serafina caught his sleeve, her voice soft and full of quiet desperation.

"Vito..." Something in that tone made him stop cold. Like she was reminding him of something. Something bigger than me.

He froze. Whatever name had surged to his lips, whatever memory had risen, he swallowed it.

Just like that, the look in his eyes shifted. From elation, to guilt. Then confusion. Then fear.

Around us, the guests who had been toasting and murmuring their respects went quiet and turned to stare. Their smiles died when they saw me. Drenched in blood, barefoot, broken.

Someone muttered, loud enough to carry, "Who let a filthy, crazy woman past the gate? This is a celebration. What a damn omen on a day like this."

Another whispered, louder, "Wait... isn't that Adriana? The Falcone woman Vito said died a year ago?"

"Didn't he say his enemies snatched her? That he grieved for months? Grazie a Dio Serafina was here to hold him together. She got him through it, they fell in love, had the boy... and now they're finally happy again."

I almost laughed. Dead wife? Strange. I hadn't realized I'd died.

The murmurs swelled now, rippling through the stunned crowd, ice settling in more than one glass.

"Wait... that's really Adriana? She's not dead?"

"Then doesn't that make Serafina the other woman? She got into bed with her husband's brother while the man's wife was still breathing?"

"Adriana's standing right there, alive, and Serafina still slid into his sheets the moment she had the opening..."

The words struck Serafina like a slap. Her face went pale, her eyes flicking to me with a resentment she couldn't quite bury. She had recognized me too.

Tears welled in her eyes, and she reached up with trembling fingers, pretending to slip the ring off. The corner of her mouth tightened a half-second before the first tear fell. Her voice cracked with practiced heartbreak.

"If that's what everyone believes... Vito, I don't want the ring. Call off the union. I'm only a widow. I can't carry that kind of shame. I never wanted to ruin anything. I only wanted to be at your side. You and the baby... that's all I ever needed."

Vitale's heart broke right on cue. He seized her hand and pushed the ring back onto her finger, his voice low and thick with a tenderness he'd never once spent on me.

"Lisa, don't say that. Don't even think it. You gave the Moretti family a son. An heir. You've done more for this famiglia than anyone alive. That ring, that title... they belong to you."

I stood there, stunned. Wide-eyed.

I couldn't believe it. Vitale, you once swore to me our daughter was the only rightful heir to the Moretti name.

But now, you were doing this?

That old gold ring was never just the mark of the Moretti Family's Lady of the House. It was the ring Vitale had slipped onto my finger the night he swore himself to me.

He gave it to me when he asked for the alliance to become something real, promising me forever in front of God and famiglia. To prove he meant it, he'd had the name "Adri" cut into the band with his own instruction.

But that was all buried now, like so much else in this life.

My eyes locked on that same ring, and it felt like a knife straight through my heart. The old engraving had been filed away. In its place, fresh and gleaming under the chandeliers, was a new name: "Sera." A short for Serafina.

I swallowed the bitterness burning in my throat. I was just about to speak, to tell every made man and every wife in that hall exactly who I was.

Then Vitale stepped in front of me. His words cut in cold and even, the way a Don speaks when the matter is already decided. "Adriana is dead. This woman is some beggar off the street. Anyone who dares slander Serafina again answers to me."

The room understood him. Conversations died where they stood. I froze, staring at him in disbelief.

"Vitale" I said, my voice shaking. "Say that again. Say it to my face! Who am I?"

Vitale hesitated for a second. His eyes moved across the crowd, weighing every witness, before he leaned in and lowered his voice so only I would hear.

"Adriana, you heard them. If I admit you're alive now, Serafina's name is finished. My brother left her in my hands. I can't let her be shamed in front of the whole Family. You've always been the sensible one. Please. Just endure this. For me. Be good."

Then he stepped away. He didn't even look back.

He lifted a hand toward the old steward and told him to "see to me." Said they would let me eat the leftovers from the banquet, some scrap of charity thrown to a stray. Said it would bring his newborn son good fortune.

Across the hall, the celebration picked right back up. Laughter, applause, the thin ring of crystal touching crystal.

Everyone poured their blessings over him and Serafina. Called them a perfect match. Said the two of them were meant to be, as though the whole thing had been ordained.

All I felt inside was nothing but cold.

The old steward, Don Ricci, who had served the Moretti Estate since the days of the old Don, knew me the instant he saw my face. He sent for clean clothes and walked me to a guest room so I could wash the road off my skin.

I couldn't help but wonder, why the guest room?

Ignoring the gentle way he tried to stop me, I walked straight to the door of the master bedroom. Without hesitation, I pushed it open.

This had once been our room. Vitale's and mine.

Now I couldn't find myself in it anywhere. Not a single trace of me was left. Everything had been rearranged to suit Serafina's taste. Even our wedding portrait had been taken down and replaced with photographs of the two of them.

The man who once swore he would look at our wedding photo every night before he slept and never take it down, not even when he was eighty, had clearly become someone else.

I stared at the picture of Vitale and Serafina, their smiles mocking me from behind the glass. The tears fell quietly, without sound.

So this was why no soldier ever came for me, why no rescue was ever sent through enemy lines. Was he afraid I'd get in the way of him and Serafina?

Don Ricci sighed. He smoothed the front of his waistcoat with both hands, and I saw him searching for something to say to me. In the end, no words came.

I stood there, numb, my eyes drifting to the baby crib in the corner of the room. I asked, almost in a whisper, "Where's my daughter? Where is she?"

The old steward hesitated, plainly unwilling to answer. But my questions kept coming until they wore him down. At last he told me my daughter was out back, in the shed beyond the compound wall.

That place was cold, damp, and filthy, the kind of hole where the Family kept things it wanted forgotten. What could my daughter possibly be doing there?

When I found her in that shed, I felt a surge of hot blood rush to my head, then a chilling cold that crept up from my feet.

I couldn't believe my eyes. My five-year-old daughter was clutching my memorial photo-card tight against her chest, locked inside a massive dog cage with a half-grown wolfhound that towered over her.

Once round-cheeked and healthy, my little girl was skeletal now. Her small body looked more fragile than a bird's.

Her clothes were torn open, showing bruises and wounds along her arms, her legs, even her face. Some of the cuts ran so deep I could see bone.

The wolfhound, a beast bred for violence, lay sleeping soundly beside her, its muzzle caked with dried blood.

My daughter, who once cried at the smallest pain, didn't shed a single tear. She only watched the sleeping animal, frightened but desperate. Slowly she crawled to the food bowl and began eating the spoiled scraps in it, swallowing them down with no thought for the filth.

I couldn't stop the image of Serafina from rising up, cradling her fat newborn son only minutes ago in that bright hall. Hatred surged through my chest.

"Vitale, how dare you?!"

My voice trembled uncontrollably as I called out, "Gia?"

My daughter froze, then slowly lifted her head to look at me. She stared for a long moment, dazed, until her eyes widened in disbelief.

"Mama? You're back?"

The next second, her small figure broke down into tears. She cried out like she'd finally found someone to cling to after holding on for far too long.

"Mama, Aunt Serafina locked me in the dog cage. She didn't give me any food. Papa didn't do anything about it! I was so scared. The big dog bites real hard, it hurts so bad. Mama, please get me out"

The word "Mama," spoken with such raw pain and trust, shattered me from the inside. But I didn't have time to cry, not with that hunting dog now awake, glaring at Gia like she was prey.

I grabbed an axe from the corner of the shed, ignoring the old steward's frantic protests, and brought it down hard on the lock of the cage.

Once the chain snapped, I rushed in, scooped Gia into my arms, and held her tight.

Then I turned back. I wasn't done. Raising the axe once more, I aimed it at the snarling dog.

"Signora, please! Don't be reckless!" Don Ricci begged, his hands smoothing the front of his waistcoat before he dared to step nearer. "That's the madam's favorite dog. Don Moretti gave it to her himself! If you hurt it, she'll be furious, and the master too."

Oh? So Vitale gave Serafina a dog... to mangle his own blood daughter?

I didn't even spare it a glance. As the beast lunged, I met it head-on, and with one clean, furious swing, I severed its head.

Still not satisfied, I turned to the cage that had imprisoned my child, and hacked it to splinters.

Vitale came in at the sound of the chaos, the noise cutting through the celebration in the main house. He started scolding me the second he opened his mouth.

"Adriana, you just got back and you're already making a scene? Do you want the men outside to start asking questions? Half the Family is here tonight."

"You scared Matteo half to death. He's crying his eyes out, and Serafina's been running herself ragged all day. Now she has to calm him down too? Can't you just stop causing trouble?"

"I know this past year hasn't been easy for you, and I will explain everything when I get a moment. But I won't let you ruin Serafina's name in front of every capo under this roof."

I let out a bitter laugh. Matteo, huh? Of course. His precious little heir.

And what were Gia and I to him, then? Disposable trophies, pawns spent and forgotten?

"So your heart breaks when her son cries, but not when your own daughter is locked in a dog cage? When she's bitten by some animal? Forced to eat slop like a stray? Tell me, Vitale. How twisted is your love?"

Vitale finally looked at Gia. When he saw the raw, bleeding wounds on her tiny arms and legs, confusion twisted across his face.

"What are you talking about? Gia's my daughter. I would never let something like that happen to her."

I froze for a beat. He didn't know?

Vitale frowned and turned to the steward. "Bring Serafina here."

Serafina walked in moments later, already crying. The corner of her mouth tightened a half-second before the tears came, but no one in that shed was watching her the way I was.

"Vitale, you've got it all wrong Adriana misunderstood me. Gia's such a sweet little thing. How could I ever hurt her?"

"You know how much she loves playing hide and seek. Just now, she begged me to play with her. I was busy seeing to the guests and couldn't find her in time. Who could've guessed she'd go and lock herself in a dog cage? That child has such an imagination"

Vitale staggered back a step, more stunned by my rage than anything else in that room. He didn't apologize. He didn't even look at Gia. Instead, he turned to Serafina, like she was the one who needed comforting.

Serafina dabbed fake tears with a silk handkerchief, her voice trembling just enough to sound fragile. "Vitale she's just making a scene. I know Gia's upset, but blaming me for something like this? You really think I'd hurt a little girl?"

Vitale looked torn for half a second. Just half. Then his jaw set, and his thumb went still on the signet ring.

"This isn't the time or the place for this," he snapped. "Adriana, if you want to talk, we'll talk later. But right now, Serafina and I are celebrating the birth of our son, in front of everyone who matters to this Family. Don't ruin that for us."

I stared at him, dumbfounded. He just watched as Gia stood there, shaking, her cheek already red and swelling. His daughter. His own blood. And he chose Serafina. Again.

Serafina slipped her arm through his and leaned her head on his shoulder like the doting saint she pretended to be.

"I'm not asking for much," she whispered, loud enough for the men in the doorway to hear. "I just want a peaceful home for our baby"

Peaceful? She had locked my daughter in a cage.

I wrapped my arms around Gia and whispered into her hair, "It's okay, baby. Mama's here now. I won't let them hurt you again."

Inside, though, I was on fire. I pressed my thumb against the smooth stump where three fingers used to be, and let the softness bleed out of me. If they wanted peace, they should have thought of that before crossing a mother with nothing left to lose.

Vitale hesitated for a moment, but before he could say anything, Serafina broke into louder sobs, her voice trembling with a grief pitched for the whole household to hear.

"Forget it. I know I'm nothing but a burden under this roof," she cried. "It's all my fault, isn't it? Fine. I'll take Matteo and go. I'll lie down in the grave beside your brother and keep him company where I belong!"

Then she spun on her heel and fled down the corridor.

Vitale's eyes followed her retreating figure, heavy with worry. But before he went after her, he turned a venomous glare on me.

"This is the daughter you raised?" he snapped. "A child already old enough to lie, to twist people, to scheme. She's always tormented her aunt. What next? Was she planning to turn on her baby brother too?"

He stepped closer, his voice thick with a righteousness I had learned to hate.

"My brother died young. Serafina has no one in this world but me. Is it truly so much to ask that the two of you simply make room for her? You disappoint me, Adriana. You've forgotten every ounce of decency your father raised you with." With that, he turned and left us standing there, bloodied and bruised on the marble, and went after her.

Gia watched his back vanish through the doorway, her tiny hands clutching the hem of my shirt, her big eyes brimming with confusion and hurt.

"Mama," she whispered, "is it because I'm a girl? Is that why Daddy loves Auntie Serafina and Matteo more than us?" She went on, softer still, "I'm sorry It's my fault. I made everything hard for you"

Even after Vitale struck her, after all of it, my daughter didn't hate him. Not even a little. She blamed herself for having been born the way she was.

I knelt and pulled her into my arms, my heart shattering all over again.

"No, baby. None of this is your fault," I murmured, my voice thick with tears. "You're the best thing in my life. The kindest, bravest little girl I've ever known."

"Sweetheart," I kissed the top of her head and whispered, "you don't need that kind of father. Not anymore."

I carried Gia back to the guest room and asked Don Ricci to send for a doctor the Family trusted, one who asked no questions. He came quickly and gave her a rabies shot, his old hands steady, his eyes never once meeting mine.

From Gia, I finally learned the truth about the past year.

Vitale had poured all his attention into Serafina and her unborn child, leaving his own blood daughter to fend for herself in a house full of armed men who answered to him. Serafina, in the meantime, had tormented Gia in secret, and sometimes right under his nose. Every time the child tried to tell her father the truth, Serafina would twist it, brand her a liar, and Vitale would believe the widow without a moment's doubt.

It was the two of them, Vitale and Serafina, who had told Gia that I'd been taken and killed by "bad men."

Gia had cried herself to sleep night after night, clutching a small memorial card with my name on it as though it were the only thing left of me in the world. She had even let the dog sink its teeth into her rather than let it ruin the picture of my face.

After I finally coaxed her to sleep, I sat on the edge of the bed, but there was no peace anywhere inside me.

I had told her we didn't need that kind of father anymore. She hadn't agreed. She hadn't said a single word.

I knew. Deep down, she still ached for him.

No matter how often Vitale scorned her for being a girl, called her weak, called her worthless, she still longed for his love. Still saw him as her father.

Should I give Vitale one more chance, for her sake?

I was lost in thought when I felt myself pulled back into a warm embrace. The smell of milk and the sour sweat of the birthing bed clung thick around him.

"Adri," came his voice from behind me, trembling with feeling. "Thank God you're alive. You found your way back to me."

Vitale pressed soft kisses along my neck, his voice low and coaxing. "I gave my brother my word I'd look after Serafina. That I'd give his line an heir. When she learned she was carrying, it went hard on her. Sickness, fainting, all of it. I had to stay at her side. That's why I wasn't there to pull you out."

"I turned over every stone looking for you. And then word came that you were dead Adri, it broke me."

I pushed him off, swallowing down the nausea rising in my throat. My voice came out calm, but there was steel underneath it.

"I'm back now. Very much alive. And you still mean to bind yourself to her, don't you? You still plan to make her your wife."

Vitale let out a helpless sigh, as though I were the unreasonable one. "Of course not. You're my wife. You always have been. The union is only for the eyes of the Family. No blood oath will pass between us, no pact signed."

"I need to give Serafina and Matteo some standing, so the men stop whispering. That's all this is. A performance. You understand that. What's between us is the real thing. In every way that counts. You've always been the reasonable one, Adri. You won't make trouble over this will you?"

So that was it. He still expected me to live in the dark corner of his house, dead to the world outside, his in secret. Hidden. Forgotten. And then, with the same easy entitlement of a man who had never once been refused, Vitale began working open the buttons of my blouse.

"Serafina's already given me a son," he murmured. "We should make up for lost time, don't you think? A boy of our own, and with Gia the three of them together would make a perfect little family. Harmony. Balance."

He wanted to finish his pretty family portrait. With me tucked away as the piece no one was ever meant to see.

There were milk stains on his trousers, just below the belt, still damp and threaded through with the lingering scent of Serafina's perfume. I didn't need to guess what the two of them had been doing.

My stomach churned.

Just then the wet nurse from Serafina's rooms came knocking, flustered, wringing her hands the way retainers did when they feared the Don's temper.

"Don Moretti, the lady's chest has swollen again. She's been holding back tears all morning. The baby hasn't fed, and she's hard as stone with the pain. Please, would you come?"

Vitale shoved me aside without a moment's thought. My ruined leg buckled and I went down onto the marble. He didn't so much as glance back.

"She's in that kind of pain and no one saw fit to tell me sooner? What do I keep this household for?" he barked, already at the door.

"From today she doesn't nurse at all. Hire as many wet nurses as it takes. I won't have Serafina suffer another minute, and my son does not go hungry."

And just like that he was gone, leaving me crumpled on the floor of his estate.

I sat there in silence, remembering.

When he first decided to take Serafina under this roof, Gia had only just been born. I was still bleeding from the birth when the word reached me, so angry and heartbroken that my milk dried up. My chest swelled until it felt packed with stones, the pain so terrible I couldn't sleep.

I'd begged him to bring in a nurse, someone to help.

But he'd only looked me over and said, "Adriana, you're a Don's daughter. You were bred to endure. What is a little pain to a woman like you?"

"I won't have strangers moving through my house. What if they're planted by a rival family? I won't gamble with Serafina's safety."

"So, no. No nurse. You'll feed the child yourself. You were always the sensible one. Hold out a while longer, will you?"

Vitale would move heaven and earth so long as Serafina was comfortable. When had that begun?

When had he gone from calling her his brother's widow, to Serafina, and now to my wife?

And me? What did that leave me?

"Mama, don't cry."

I hadn't noticed Gia wake. She slid off the bed and padded over, her small hand brushing my cheek.

Only then did I realize my face was soaked with tears.

She wrapped her arms tight around me, her little voice thick. "Mama, this is the hundredth time Papa left us to go be with her."

"I've made up my mind. We don't need him anymore. Let's go, just the two of us."

So she knew. She had known all along. She had kept giving him one more chance, and then another, until she finally ran out of them. Until she finally gave up.

I pulled her against my chest and held her there, my tears falling again, but this time I smiled through them.

"All right, baby. Mama will take you away."

The next morning Serafina appeared at my door wearing a bright, easy smile, as though nothing had happened. She invited me out to the shops, said it was her way of apologizing for "not looking after Gia better."

She threaded her arm through Vitale's and purred, "Vitale, you should come and settle the accounts. Adriana's had such a hard year. We owe her that much, don't we?"

Serafina wore the part of the lady of the Moretti Estate as if she'd been born to it, poised, entitled, entirely in command. So when I didn't answer at once, Vitale's face darkened.

"Adriana," he said, irritated, "Serafina is only trying to be kind. You and Gia upset her so badly yesterday she ached all night, couldn't even nurse Matteo. And still she holds nothing against you. The least you can do is not make this harder."

He must have forgotten how thin the walls were in that house. I'd heard everything the night before. Their moaning, their whispered oaths, the sickening sound of their bodies tangled together.

The memory turned my stomach, but I swallowed the bile and gave a small nod. I hadn't the strength to fight, not then. Under my sleeve, my thumb found the smooth stump where three fingers should have been, and pressed.

At the shops Serafina stayed fastened to Vitale's arm the whole time, parading him like a trophy. He wore his tailored suit like armor; she drifted beside him in a gown that cost more than most men earned in a year. They basked in the flattery of the clerks, drinking down the attention like royalty holding court.

And I limped behind them in a faded, cheap dress that had seen better days, if it had ever seen a good one at all. I caught the judgment in the clerks' eyes, the sneers they didn't trouble to hide. I didn't belong in their world.

Whenever someone asked who I was, Vitale would glance back at me, nervous, guilty, and say with a tight smile:

"She's our household help. My wife thought she could use some new clothes."

The boutique staff always fell over themselves, their flattery thick as honey poured over the marble floors of the Moretti front on Via Sartori.

"Don and Signora Moretti," one of them gushed, "you look like a match blessed by God Himself, and such generous hearts. Treating even your household girl like family? That is true devotion. May your union last a lifetime."

I bit my tongue and smiled politely, even as every word sliced through me.

Then, on the road home, fate decided the day was not yet finished with me.

Halfway through Moretti territory, our car was suddenly boxed in. A dozen men in masks and helmets roared up on motorcycles, cutting across the road like a storm rolling off the water. They forced the driver to stop, shattered the windows with crowbars, and swarmed us. This was no street robbery. This was a hit against the Family, aimed straight at Vitale.

Their leader leaned in through the broken glass, voice rough and unhurried. "Fifteen million. Cash. Now."

Vitale, still holding to that cold composure of his, smoothed his jacket and answered evenly. "Fifteen million? That's pocket change to a man like me. But cash takes time to move. Let us go and I'll have it wired, or fetch it myself."

The man scoffed. "Don't insult us, Don Moretti. We know how this works. Word on the street is you're getting married. So tell us." He glanced between me and Serafina, lips curling. "Which one's the lucky bride?"

His tone turned venomous. "Leave one behind. A little insurance. You try anything clever, we take a finger. Every hour, another one."

Serafina and I both turned to Vitale. These men weren't bluffing. They had the look of people with nothing left to lose and no debt to answer for.

Vitale hesitated, his face a knot of calculation and fear.

Then, without warning, he seized me by the arm and shoved me forward. "It's her," he said coldly. "She's my bride. Look her up. The photos are all over. Same face. You'll see."

I stumbled, stunned, as he offered me up like tribute owed.

"This is who you want. Let the rest of us go."

I stared at Vitale in disbelief.

So that was the real reason he'd been parading my photograph, playing the devoted groom. It was never love. It was strategy. I was a shield, and Serafina was the thing being shielded.

The gang wasn't playing. One of them caught my hand and, without a word, took one of my fingers off. Blood came at once, hot and blinding.

I went white from the pain, but I never looked away from Vitale.

"Are you sure you won't regret this?" I asked, my voice low and shaking.

Vitale flinched under my gaze. He looked away, unable to meet my eyes.

"Adriana, Serafina has no one else. I swore to my brother I'd protect her," he said, as though he were the honorable man in this. "Just hold on a while, all right? I'll make it up to you. I'll get the money. I'll come back."

Without hesitation, he took Serafina's hand and walked away with her, and he never once looked back.

I watched them go, numb. My hand throbbed, blood soaking through my sleeve, but the agony inside me ran deeper still. In that moment the whole of our alliance, the years, the vows, the child we shared, felt like a cruel joke told at my expense.

Two hours passed. Two more fingers gone.

The gang leader lost his patience. He sent one of his men to press the Moretti Estate for an answer.

"Boss, we got played." The man came back furious. "I went to the house looking for that bastard Moretti, and you know what the old steward tells me? The Don's busy putting his wife to bed. Those were the words. His wife."

He spat on the ground and jerked a thumb at me.

"Turns out this one isn't the bride at all. She's a goddamn decoy. The real one's the woman he walked off with."

The pain shot from my hand straight into my chest, and for a moment I couldn't tell which hurt worse, my body or my heart.

The gang leader snapped.

"You lying bitch!" he roared, grabbing a fistful of my hair and wrenching my head back. "You think you can play me? Huh? I ought to open your throat right here!"

The blade was already against my neck when, finally, finally, Vitale appeared.

But he hadn't brought the money. He'd brought an army of enforcers, who stormed the road and beat the gang into the pavement inside a handful of minutes.

So that was where he'd been. Not raising cash. Not negotiating. Just putting Serafina to bed.

The ride back was silent at first. Then, as he wound gauze clumsily around my ruined hand, he sighed, as if he were the one who'd suffered something.

"Adriana, I know this was hard on you. I do. But Serafina, she isn't like you. She's fragile. She could never have survived something like that."

"If anything had happened to her, I couldn't face my brother in the next life. You understand, don't you?"

I was too exhausted to argue. Too done to care.

I waved him off, my voice flat. "You don't need to explain. I understand. I won't hold it against you."

His eyes lit like I'd pinned a medal to his chest. "That's what I've always cherished about you, Adriana. You're the one who understands."

"Once the union with Serafina is done, I swear, I'll settle the debt with these men in blood. You'll never be in danger again."

Whether Vitale did it for me or for Serafina's safety, he knew the answer better than I ever could. I didn't need to say it aloud.

On the morning of the blood-bound union, just before he left, Vitale took my hand.

"Adriana," he said gently, "thank you for being so understanding. Once all of this is behind us, I'll take you and Gia away. Just the three of us. A real rest."

I gave him a soft smile and reached up to straighten his collar. "Of course," I said. "Go on now. Don't keep your dear sister-in-law waiting."

He paused, surprised, maybe even wary. He hadn't expected me so calm. So agreeable. I'd fought him over his precious Serafina too many times to count.

He let it go in the end. With a nod he turned and left for the hotel, his wedding suit crisp, his step certain.

I watched his back vanish down the long drive of the compound and thought to myself, yes. It was time. Gia and I needed to disappear.

Meanwhile, at the hotel, the ceremony was well underway.

The officiant stood tall, his voice carrying through the grand hall of the Moretti front. "Don Moretti, do you take Serafina to be your lawfully wedded wife?"

Vitale opened his mouth to answer. Before a word left him, the aged household steward burst through the doors, pale and breathless.

"Don Moretti, something terrible has happened. Right after you left, those men from the other day, they came back. More of them this time. They took the house. They took the Signora and the little miss."

The room froze.

"They've sent a video," Don Ricci stammered, smoothing the front of his waistcoat with both trembling hands. "They, they've been killed."