Chapter 2

Elena Gallo POV:

"The program is six months," the director's voice crackled over the line from Zurich. "Complete isolation. No outside contact. Are you certain, Ms. Gallo?"

"I'm certain," I said, the words feeling like the first real thing I'd said in years. I was building my own fortress, my own Omertà.

When I returned to the house, it felt alien. It wasn't a home; it was the seat of the De Luca family's power, and I was just another one of its expensive decorations. Rage, cold and clean, burned through me. I grabbed the thick black trash bags from under the sink.

The coffee cup I filled for him every morning. Smashed against the marble countertop.

The framed photos of our wedding day. The glass shattered as I ripped the smiling images of us from their frames.

The cashmere blanket he'd wrap around me on cold nights.

His custom-tailored suit, the one that made him look like a god of the underworld, reeking of power and lies.

I dragged the bags, heavy with the ghosts of our marriage, to the curb like common garbage. It was a desecration of his territory, an insult to the Capo himself. I didn't care.

Then I packed my own things. My architectural drawings, my books, my models. I called a moving company and told them to take everything to my old studio apartment, a place I'd kept like a secret promise to myself.

He didn't come home that night. Or the next. When he finally walked through the door on the second evening, he wore the exhaustion of his double life like a mask.

"Elena," he said, his smile not quite reaching his eyes. He moved to embrace me, to pull me into the familiar circle of his arms.

But I smelled it. A faint, sweet perfume that wasn't mine. It was the scent of the Valenti woman.

I flinched back, pushing against his chest. "I'm tired."

The lie came easily. It was a shield.

He frowned, his brow furrowing in that way that used to make me want to soothe him. Now, it just looked like a part of the act. He pulled a small box from his briefcase. "A gift. From my trip."

Inside was a silk scarf in a pattern I hated and a bottle of perfume I would never wear. It was a gift for a stranger, a placeholder wife. A testament to how little he saw me, how little he cared to know. An insult to the woman who was supposed to be his queen.

I met his gaze, my own eyes hard. "I want a baby, Alessandro."

The words hung in the air between us, a challenge.

His expression tightened. "We've talked about this. It's a critical time for the family." He was protecting his secret. Protecting his Valenti heir.

Just then, a phone buzzed. Not his main phone, but a second one, a burner. The screen lit up with a blocked number. His Valenti line.

"Work," he said, his voice clipped. He leaned in, kissed my forehead-a sterile, dismissive gesture-and walked out the door, leaving me in the echoing silence of his lies.

Later that night, as I sat numbly on the sofa, I saw it. The second phone had slipped from his coat pocket and lay half-hidden under the couch. The screen was still lit.

A message from Scarlett.

*Leo has a fever. He's asking for you. Please come.*

A wave of nausea crashed over me. I stumbled to the bathroom, my stomach clenching violently. I retched into the toilet, my body trying to expel the poison of his betrayal.

And then, a terrifying, impossible thought bloomed in the back of my mind. A thought born of missed cycles and a strange tenderness in my breasts.

I was pregnant. I was carrying the legitimate heir to the De Luca family. An heir for a man who had just left to tend to his bastard.

The next morning, I drove myself to the hospital. The doctor's face was kind, his voice gentle as he confirmed it.

"Congratulations, Mrs. De Luca," he said, pointing to a tiny, flickering speck on the screen. "You're six weeks along."