My lips had gone white.

"No."

Luciano's face collapsed into disgust. He stood up sharply, jacket lapels snapping. "Then I can't protect you."

"On your knees."

One of the guys kicked the back of my leg and I went down hard, hitting the floor with a thud that rang through my whole body.

Avery picked up a glass and dropped it on the floor right in front of me. Broken glass, right under my kneecaps, sharp edges biting into skin.

She settled back into Luciano's arms, watching me. The corner of her mouth curved. "Search her. Make her crawl over there." She pointed to the scattered shards and checked Luciano's face.

Luciano's jaw tightened. "Do what my fiancée says."

His fiancée. I was shaking, laughing without any warmth in it.

The man pushed my head down, both hands on my shoulders, and I crawled forward across those broken pieces, inch by inch. Blood drew two long tracks across the marble floor. I didn't make a sound. I bit down hard and swallowed everything.

It hurt. But the real pain came from looking up at Luciano as I crossed that glass. He had his eyes shut and his head turned away.

I remembered four years ago, when I tripped in the warehouse and cut my knee open on a crate. He'd gone red-eyed tying the bandage and said, "Nina, does it hurt? I'm sorry. If I were worth anything, you'd never have to suffer like this."

Now I was bleeding all over the floor and he wasn't watching. I didn't know this man anymore. I felt nothing but ash.

"Still not sorry." Avery heaved a sigh against him. "She needs to learn her lesson."

Two men dragged me up. I fought them, fingertips leaving red smears across the floor. Luciano kept his eyes on Avery, kept talking to her softly. Never looked back.

Hands locked on the back of my head, and they drove my face down into the garden fountain.

Cold water rushed into my nose. I choked, fighting, thrashing against the grip, but the grip didn't move. Water in my ears. In my mouth. My chest felt like it was splitting open. The edges of my vision going dark.

From somewhere behind me came Avery's laughter, Luciano's low coaxing murmur, then something softer and closer between them, sounds that had no business being made in a moment like this.

I wrenched my eyes open against the water, lips shaking, and screamed with everything I had.

"Luciano! Do you even have a soul—"

"Shut up."

A kick to my ribs. I went sprawling onto the stone steps at the edge of the fountain, my abdomen hitting the ledge corner-first.

Pain tore through me from the inside like a blade being turned. Then warmth, down my thighs, mixing with the pool water, dark red in the moonlight.

"She's bleeding—"

One of the men went silent. Both of them let go at once, backing away, faces going white. I lay on the cold stones with my arms clutched over my stomach, my whole body shaking.

One of them said something under his breath, a word that landed like a door slamming shut.

I went very still. My ears started ringing.

Avery wrinkled her nose and pressed a handkerchief to her face. "Disgusting."

Behind her, Luciano saw the blood on the ground and went pale as paper. He started forward, and I could see his hands shaking.

Avery's voice cut across the courtyard. "So she was carrying a bastard. A woman who's about to take the fall for someone else, and she's been running around with who knows which man." The contempt in her voice was casual, offhand. "Could've been anyone."

Luciano stopped. His fingers curled. He looked at me with something unsteady in his eyes.

Avery laughed. "When she was working for me, she was very friendly with the male staff. God only knows whose it was."

Luciano's eyes found mine. "Nina." His voice was careful and still. "Whose child is it?"

I looked up at him. At that moment I understood, with total clarity: he didn't believe me. He had never believed me.

I laughed, a hollow ruined sound, and closed my eyes.

The whole world had left no room for me. But I wasn't going to give them the satisfaction of watching me give up.

You wait and see whose grave gets dug first.

"Take her to the storage room." Avery's voice, satisfied.

Then she turned back to Luciano, and the sound of soft laughter and teasing filtered through to where I lay.

Even as my eyes closed for the last time in that moment, I saw clearly: Luciano's arm, tight and steady around Avery's waist.

They dragged me to the storage room. The floor was already turning brown.

I curled into myself, vision going black, everything burning. The baby was gone.

I let out a sound I'd never made before, not a word or a cry but something jagged and animal from somewhere deeper than I'd known I had. My nails drove into my palms until blood came.

Fever and pain picked at the edges of consciousness. Just before it pulled me under, one last thought surfaced, clear and hard as a stone:

I can't die yet. I need to find my brother. I need to make them pay.

The next morning was the day the family sent someone to collect me for the event.

Don Moretti stood in the main hall, hands clasped behind his back, looking well-rested. Luciano stood behind him, wearing a smile of quiet self-satisfaction. Avery leaned against his arm, playing the part of the adoring girlfriend.

She looked up at the Don. "Father, should I go out to greet the family's representative? Proper daughter and all that."

The Don smiled. "Of course. You're the real heir here. Your husband's going to run a territory one day — good for you to be seen by the right people."

Luciano took Avery's hand with a look of devotion so thick it was practically a costume. "You don't need to worry about anything. I'll make sure you have the highest standing in this family."

She pushed him away with a little pout, but her eyes glittered.

Then rapid footsteps from outside: the doorman stumbled in, all the color gone from his face.

"Sir — sir, there's a problem—"

The Don's brow furrowed. "Calm down. The family sent someone, what's—"

"It's — it's not that." He pointed toward the gate, hands trembling. "The Shadow King. The Shadow King came himself."

The air in the main hall went solid.

The Shadow King. The hidden supreme of the Cosa Nostra. The man who controlled the life and death of every crew in this city, who ran operations that left no trace. Every underboss in the organization deferred to him. Even Don Moretti lowered his head.

The iron gates of the estate swung open.

Don Moretti moved without thinking. He grabbed the hem of his jacket and dropped to one knee.

"Your servant, Vincent Moretti, welcomes the Shadow King. Forgive me for not meeting you at the gate. I am unworthy."

The Shadow King said nothing. He walked slowly into the courtyard, his gaze sweeping over the assembled faces and landing on Avery.

"Don Moretti." His voice was level. "I understand there's someone here who was meant to take a fall on someone else's behalf. Which one?"

Luciano's expression shifted. He tightened his grip on Avery's hand and got there first: "Your Excellency, it wasn't Avery — there's another girl going in her place. She's just not feeling well right now."

"She's not showing the family the respect they deserve by hiding in her room. I'll go get her out." He said it through his teeth, stood up fast, sweat on his forehead.

In the storage room, a hand grabbed me and hauled me upright.

"Get up. Stop playing sick."

I coughed twice. My face was burning.

Luciano's face was dark. "Nina. You really want to pull this right now? You agreed to this yourself. Now you're faking an illness — what, you're trying to force Avery into taking your place?"

His eyes were full of fury, like I'd become something he just needed gone.

He half-dragged me out, and I hit the courtyard floor on my knees with a dull sound.

Everything he'd ever been to me looked, from here, like something that had never existed. Blurred and fighting to keep my eyes open, I felt tears drop onto the stone. Too weak to do anything else.

Luciano pointed at me and addressed the Shadow King. "Your Excellency, this is Nina. She agreed to go. Now she's putting on this show — it's a disgrace to the family."

I lay half-collapsed on the courtyard floor, hair loose, the dried blood on my skirt cracked into dark flakes. Face paper-white. I managed, barely, to lift my head.

The Shadow King was looking at me. The hand that had quietly moved armies was trembling slightly. He was staring at the mark on my inner wrist and had been staring for a long time, long enough that the entire courtyard had gone silent.

The Shadow King's throat moved. His voice came out rough, almost unrecognizable.

"...Nina?"