Chapter 27
Fran
“You ungrateful little bitch,” my father hisses. “Get out of bed.”
I keep staring at the wall in front of me.
I hate this wall.
I hate the color of it, the heaviness of it, the way it seems to absorb every scrap of light and throw back only gloom.
Lorenzo likes everything in this house dark—dark wood, dark paint, dark curtains.
After the wedding I asked if I could repaint the bedroom.
Something softer. Warmer. He’d looked at me for a long moment and said I should learn to like it.
Learn to like it.
As if misery is simply another skill a wife is supposed to master.
My father slaps the back of my leg. “I said get out of bed.”
I glance over my shoulder. “Why?”
“Why?” He laughs, bitter and ugly. “Because your husband has been back in town for two weeks and hasn’t come to see you once. It’s no wonder, looking at the state of you.”
There was a time those words would have made me shrink. I would have rushed to the mirror, pinched my cheeks, fixed my hair, tried to make myself prettier for the men who only ever seemed disappointed by me.
But things have changed.
This baby has changed everything.
She has changed everything.
The thought of her makes my hand drift to my stomach.
My daughter. Another little girl destined to be born into a world run by men who think love is control and protection is ownership.
I blink fast to keep the tears from falling.
She’ll be a Mafia princess too. She will be born with expectations around her throat like a collar.
She’ll be watched, bartered, assessed. Men like my father will decide what she is worth long before she is old enough to decide it for herself.
That is why I no longer care what people think of me. I need to become the kind of woman who can stand between her daughter and this world. Which is why I am still in bed.
My father hits my leg harder this time.
“Francesca,” he warns.
I throw back the bedding and stand. “I’m up. Now leave.”
He gives another humorless laugh. “No. You’re going to get dressed and meet me in the living room in thirty minutes.” His gaze drops deliberately to my middle. “Wear something that shows off your stomach.”
My skin goes cold.
“Why?”
His mouth twists. “Because appearances matter.”
They always do. More than comfort. More than truth. More than dignity.
I say nothing, because there is no point. He turns and leaves, shutting the door behind him. I stand there for a moment, staring at that wretched wall again, and suddenly I understand why I hate it so much. Because it is the color of death.
Thirty minutes later, I walk into the living room wearing a fitted cream dress and a cardigan I do not need.
My father’s gaze lands on my stomach first. He is seated in one of Lorenzo’s dark leather chairs like he owns the house. Maybe all men like him assume every room belongs to them the second they step inside it.
“There,” he says, nodding once. “Better.”
I remain standing. “What do you want?”
He studies me in silence long enough to make my skin crawl.
“You know,” he says at last, “I used to think marrying you to Lorenzo Conti would make you useful.”
My lips part in disbelief. “You dragged me out of bed for this?”
“For truth.”
I let out a short laugh. “Then perhaps we should invite a priest. No one in this room has any experience with that.”
His eyes narrow. “Watch your mouth.”
“Or what?”
For one dangerous second, I think he might strike me. Instead, he smiles. And I have always hated him more when he smiles.
“Do you know where your husband has been?” he asks.
Something inside me stills. No. I don’t know. And honestly, I don’t care. I don’t voice this thought to my father, though.
I lift my chin. “If you have something to say, say it.”
His smile widens. “He’s been here, in Chicago.”
I feel that in my ribs.
My father sees the flicker in my face and enjoys it.
“And he hasn’t been there alone,” he continues. “He has your little replacement with him. His whore of a mistress.”
For a second, I cannot breathe. My replacement.
That’s not even the cruel part, and yet it is the part that lands first. Birdie is back, and Lorenzo with her.
Something deep in my chest gives a slow, awful twist. Not sharp enough to be surprised.
Too familiar for that. No, this is something older.
Something I have known since the moment I married him.
I will never be first.
Not first in his heart. Not first in his mind. Not first in the life he would choose if he were ever allowed to choose honestly. I was the suitable option while she was always the weakness. The woman he would burn down cities for.
I knew that, which is why I helped have her removed. But she clearly didn’t tell Lorenzo I had hand in sending her to Italy. I know that with every fiber in my body. If he knew, he would kill me.
I make myself hold my father’s gaze. “You’re lying.”
“No.” He leans back, enjoying himself. “Conti left you here while he played house with the fat blonde.”
I will not let him see this hurt me. But he knows me too well and knows exactly where to press.
“He didn’t even bother hiding it properly,” my father says. “That’s the most pathetic part. He’s made a fool of you, Francesca, and everyone knows it.”
My throat tightens because he is right. Not about Birdie.
Not about whatever is between Lorenzo and me, because there has never been enough there to truly break.
But about the humiliation. About the fact that if he has heard, others have heard too.
That somewhere in those whispers is the simple truth I have spent my whole marriage trying not to look at.
I was never his first pick. Maybe not even his second. Just the woman who helped him gain more power.
I force out a breath. “What exactly do you want from me?”
“There she is,” he says softly. “My practical daughter.”
I hate him. I hate that he can still talk to me like this, as though he shaped me and therefore owns what is left.
He stands and comes closer, but I don’t move. His eyes drop to my stomach again. His expression changes slightly in a calculating way.
“You’re going to help me,” he says.
“No.”
He smiles. “You don’t even know what I’m asking.”
“I know enough.”
He reaches out and places his hand over the curve of my stomach and my whole body goes rigid.
“Take your hand off me.”
His fingers remain right where they are.
“No,” he says mildly. “Not until you understand something.”
Cold fear slides down my spine.
My voice drops. “Take. Your hand. Off me.”
He leans in, close enough that I can smell the cigar smoke in his clothes.
“You are going to scare that girl off,” he says quietly. “Do whatever you need to do. Cry to your husband. Threaten her. Humiliate her. I don’t care. But you will make sure she leaves.”
“And if I don’t?”
His eyes lock on mine. Then, very deliberately, his hand presses just slightly harder against my stomach. My breath catches.
“If you don’t,” he says, “I begin solving this problem another way.”
My blood goes ice-cold. For a second I can only hear the pounding of my own heart. He means the baby.
“You wouldn’t,” I whisper.
He lifts one shoulder. “You know I’m a man of my word, darling.”
My hand flies to his wrist and I shove it away from me so hard he actually steps back.
“You touch my child again,” I say, my voice shaking with rage, “and I will kill you.”
For one beat, we simply stare at each other. Then he laughs and it’s a delighted, ugly sound.
“There’s some spirit in you after all.”
I want to scream. Instead, I wrap both arms around myself, shielding my stomach from him like that can undo what just happened.
“You’re evil.”
“No,” he says. “I am practical.”
I think that may be worse.
He straightens his cuffs as though he has not just threatened his own grandchild.
“You will go to the house he’s bought for her,” he says. “And you will remind that girl exactly who she is.”
My voice comes out raw. “And who is that?”
His smile returns.
“A distraction,” he says. “A weakness. A woman who should know better than to come between a wife and her husband.”
I almost laugh at the absurdity of that. Birdie is not what came between Lorenzo and me. There was never enough between Lorenzo and me for anyone to come between. But my father does not care about truth. Only leverage.
“I won’t do it,” I say.
His face hardens. Then his gaze drops again to my stomach, and the message lands loud and clear.
He heads for the door, then pauses and looks back.
“You have until tonight, Francesca.” His eyes sweep over me one last time. “Choose wisely. You are no longer the only life I can punish for your mistakes.”
The door closes behind him.
I stand there in the middle of Lorenzo’s dark living room, my hands wrapped protectively around my baby, and for the first time in a very long time, I am not numb.
I am furious. Terrified. And suddenly, perfectly clear. Because I know two things now. The first is that Lorenzo will never choose me first. The second is that my father believes that makes me weak. He’s wrong because I will do whatever it takes to protect this baby.
I lower myself carefully into one of the leather chairs and stare out the window.
Birdie.
I should hate her. Maybe part of me does. Not because she stole anything from me but because she was loved in a way I never will be.
Still, hatred is a luxury I cannot afford. Not with my father threatening my child.
My fingers shake as I reach for the phone.
Because whatever I do next—warn her, threaten her, beg her—I know one thing for certain. This is no longer about Lorenzo.
It is about survival of my child.
“Bring the car around.”
My voice doesn’t sound like mine.
One of the house staff nods and disappears without a word. No one in this house asks questions when my father is involved. They’ve all learned the same lesson I did as a child. Curiosity is only useful if you enjoy pain.