Daria POV:

I woke up screaming, though no sound escaped my lips.

My throat felt raw, flayed of its lining.

The darkness of the room pressed against my eyelids, heavy and suffocating.

For a fleeting, desperate moment, I hallucinated that I was back in our penthouse.

I imagined that if I rolled over, I would find the solid warmth of Kaeden's chest, the steady rhythm of his heart that used to lull me to sleep.

Memory dragged me back to the day he gave me the ring.

It was a sapphire, dark as the midnight ocean, haloed by diamonds.

"Blood washes away," he had told me, sliding the cold metal onto my finger. "But loyalty is forever. You are my loyalty, Daria."

And I believed him.

I was the corporate girl, the outsider who organized charity galas and sipped wine on patios.

He was the Prince of the City, the dangerous bad boy who swept me into a world of private jets and silent dinners.

I thought I was his sanctuary.

I didn't realize I was merely a placeholder.

Then came Clemmie.

Clementine Odonnell.

She wasn't just a friend; she was a fixture.

The daughter of a fallen soldier, raised alongside Kaeden in the brutal nursery of the Mafia.

She was "fragile."

She was "damaged."

She needed constant saving.

"She has no one else, Daria," Kaeden would insist when he left our bed at 2:00 AM to answer her frantic calls. "I owe her my life. I pulled her out of the ice when we were sixteen. You have to understand the bond."

I tried.

I swallowed my jealousy like bitter pills.

I invited her to dinners where she picked at her food and stared at Kaeden with wide, watery eyes.

I ignored the way her hand lingered on his arm, the way she knew his coffee order better than I did.

I thought I had finally won the war when the test stick turned pink.

A baby.

An heir.

In the Mafia, bloodline is everything.

Kaeden had cried.

Actual tears.

He held me like I was made of spun glass.

"A son," he had whispered against my stomach, reverent. "We'll build an empire for him."

I was so happy, I wanted to scream it from the rooftops.

So I posted the photo.

Just a pair of tiny, knitted booties.

No location. No names. Just pure joy.

Two hours later, Clemmie was at our door, hyperventilating.

She claimed a rival family had DM'd her threats because of my post.

She claimed I had put a target on Kaeden's back.

She threw herself into his arms, shaking, sobbing, playing the victim with a performance that deserved an Oscar.

And Kaeden... he changed.

The love in his eyes curdled into suspicion.

The protector became the prosecutor.

"You don't understand this world," he had spat at me. "You're reckless."

He brought me here for "safety."

That's what he said.

He lied.

Voices drifted in from the hallway now, cutting through my reverie.

The heavy steel door muffled them, but I knew that cadence.

"Is she ready?" Clemmie's voice. Impatient. Hungry.

"She's barely conscious," a male voice replied. Not Kaeden. Clinical. Detached. "Her heart rate is erratic. The shocks..."

"It doesn't matter," Clemmie snapped. "The organs need to be fresh. Kaeden signed the release. He thinks she's brain dead from the stress. He thinks it's a mercy."

My blood ran cold.

Organs.

She didn't want to teach me a lesson.

She wanted my heart.

She wanted my kidneys.

She wanted the parts of me that worked, to replace the parts of her that were failing.

And Kaeden... my husband, the father of the child inside me... he signed the paper.

He gave me to the butcher.

Daria POV

The heavy steel door creaked open.

Harsh, white light flooded in, searing my retinas and blinding me.

I tried to lift my head, but my neck felt too fragile, as if it could no longer support the weight of my skull.

I was still strapped to the chair, but the jumper cables were gone.

My wrists were raw, the skin peeled back to the dermis where I had fought against the leather restraints.

I looked down at my stomach.

It was bruised, a mottled canvas of purple and blue.

"No," I whimpered, the sound barely escaping my throat.

Clemmie walked in, followed by two men in scrubs.

They weren't doctors.

They looked like butchers in sterile drag, men who dismantled bodies instead of healing them.

"Load her up," Clemmie ordered, idly checking her manicure. "Dr. Gates is waiting at the clinic. We have a tight window for the transplant."

"Kaeden..." I rasped, my voice like sandpaper. "Where is Kaeden?"

Clemmie laughed.

It was a dry, hollow sound, devoid of any real humor.

"He's mourning, sweetie. He's in the chapel, praying for your soul. He thinks you had a stroke during the interrogation. A tragic accident."

She leaned down, her face twisting into a vicious sneer.

"He couldn't watch you die. He's too weak. But I'm not."

The men grabbed the chair.

One of them unbuckled my legs.

I tried to kick, but my limbs were useless jelly.

They hauled me up.

My knees buckled instantly, and I hit the concrete floor hard.

"Careful!" Clemmie hissed. "Don't bruise the merchandise."

They hoisted me up and dragged me into the hallway.

It was a long, concrete tunnel, smelling of damp and rust.

I saw a shadow at the end of the hall.

A man.

He was leaning against the wall, smoking a cigarette.

He was huge.

Broad shoulders blocked out the exit sign, casting a long silhouette across the floor.

He wasn't one of Kaeden's usual guards.

He was darker. Something far worse.

Alois Rivas.

The Ghost.

He was an Enforcer for the inner circle, a man who allegedly cut out a rival's tongue for interrupting his breakfast.

He pushed off the wall as we approached.

The men dragging me stopped abruptly.

"Mr. Rivas," one of them said, his voice trembling. "We have orders from the Capo."

Alois didn't look at them.

He looked at me.

His eyes were black, bottomless pits that seemed to swallow the light.

He saw the blood on my lip.

He saw the burns on my arms.

He saw the way I cradled my stomach.

"This isn't business," Alois said. His voice was like gravel grinding together.

"It's family matters," Clemmie stepped forward, trying to summon her authority. "Kaeden ordered this. Step aside, Alois."

Alois dropped his cigarette and crushed it under his boot with a slow, deliberate twist.

"Kaeden is a boy playing with matches," Alois said. "And you..."

He looked at Clemmie with pure, unadulterated disgust.

"...you are a disease."

"Kill him!" Clemmie shrieked to the men in scrubs.

They reached for their waistbands.

Bad move.

Alois moved faster than a man his size should be able to.

Two shots rang out.

Silenced. Phut. Phut.

The men in scrubs dropped to the floor, neat, dark holes in their foreheads.

Clemmie screamed and scrambled backward, tripping over her own heels.

I started to fall, but strong arms caught me before I hit the ground.

Alois held me against his chest.

He smelled of gunpowder and rain.

"I've got you," he rumbled against my ear, the vibration deep and steady.

"My baby," I sobbed into his coat, clutching the rough fabric. "They hurt my baby."

"I know," he said.

He lifted me effortlessly, carrying me toward the exit.

We burst out into the parking garage.

Black SUVs were blocking the ramp.

Kaeden's men.

Marcus Thorne, Kaeden's right hand, stepped out of the lead vehicle.

He raised his gun.

Alois didn't stop walking.

He stared Thorne down.

"She's innocent, Marcus," Alois called out, his voice echoing off the concrete walls. "This is a hit. A personal hit. Not sanctioned by the Commission."

Thorne looked at me.

He saw the torture marks.

He looked at the empty doorway where Clemmie was likely hiding.

Thorne lowered his gun.

He stepped aside.

"I didn't see anything," Thorne said, turning his back to us.

Alois nodded once.

He put me in the passenger seat of his car.

"Stay with me, Daria," he ordered as he slid into the driver's seat.

"Where are we going?" I whispered, darkness creeping into the edges of my vision.

"To hell," he said, revving the engine. "And back."

Daria POV:

The car ride was a dizzying smear of neon lights and agonizing bumps.

Every vibration sent a fresh spasm of nausea rolling through me.

Alois drove with one hand on the wheel, the other pressing a towel hard against the bleeding wound on my arm.

"Don't sleep," he commanded.

"It hurts," I mumbled, my words slurring.

"Good. Pain means you're alive."

He swerved sharply into an alleyway behind a dilapidated veterinary clinic.

Not a hospital.

We couldn't go to a hospital. Kaeden had eyes everywhere.

Alois kicked the back door open, hauling me out and carrying me inside.

The sharp sting of antiseptic mixed with the earthy scent of dog food hit me.

A man in a lab coat rushed out.

He wasn't Dr. Gates.

He was older, his hands shaking.

"Alois? You said you were bringing a dog with a gunshot wound!" the vet stammered, eyes widening.

"Plans changed," Alois growled, depositing me on the cold stainless steel table. "Save her. And the child."

"I'm a vet! I can't-I treat animals, I don't-"

Alois pulled a gun and slammed it on the counter.

"You're a doctor. Figure it out."

The vet swallowed hard, his Adam's apple bobbing, and grabbed a stethoscope.

He ripped open my blouse.

He hissed through his teeth when he saw the burns.

"Electrical," he muttered, horror in his voice. "Who did this?"

"Is there a heartbeat?" Alois asked, cutting through the question.

The vet moved the ultrasound probe over my bruised stomach.

Silence.

My world stopped.

Please. God, please. Take me, but not him.

Whoosh-whoosh. Whoosh-whoosh.

A faint, rapid rhythm filled the room.

I let out a sob that felt like it tore my chest open.

"Fetal heartbeat is distressed but present," the vet said, working with frantic efficiency now. "She's dehydrated. In shock. Severe electrical trauma. I need to stabilize her before her kidneys shut down."

"Do it," Alois said.

He stood by the door, watching the alley, his gun loose but ready in hand.

I looked at him, vision swimming.

"Why?" I whispered.

He turned his gaze to me.

For the first time, I saw something other than cold lethality in his eyes.

I saw a debt.

"Three years ago," he said quietly. "My daughter. Leukemia. The insurance company denied the experimental treatment. You were on the board of the charity."

I blinked, the memory hazy through the pain.

I had signed thousands of papers.

"You pushed it through," he said. "You paid the deductible from your personal account. You didn't know who I was. You just saw a dying girl."

Tears leaked from my eyes, hot tracks on my cold skin.

"She lived?"

"She's seven now," Alois said, his voice softening just a fraction. "She likes horses."

He looked away, his jaw tightening.

"Kaeden threw you away like garbage. But to me... you are the reason my world still spins."

The vet stuck a needle in my arm.

"I'm giving her a sedative," the vet said. "She needs to rest to lower the stress on the fetus."

The room began to tilt and spin.

"Kaeden..." I murmured, the drug pulling me under like a heavy tide.

"Kaeden is dead to you," Alois's voice was the last thing I heard. "You died in a fire tonight, Daria. The woman you were is gone."