I Was His Secret Wife,Until I Became His Nightmare

So he laced my favorite pastries with the drug, and I ate them without a second thought.

"Cesare, my stomach hurts so much. I just ate them, there's still time. Please, go find the doctor."

He didn't move. My voice cracked raw with panic. "I won't marry you, is that what you want? I just want my child. I'll take her and leave, go far away. I won't be in your way, I swear."

No matter how I screamed and begged, Cesare didn't flinch.

He held out his arm. "Bite down on this. It won't hurt as much."

I shoved his arm away. "Go find the doctor. I'm begging you, Cesare."

"Serafina, don't be ridiculous. No Family doctor is going to waste his time on someone of your standing."

"The drug's already taken effect. It's too late. Be good. Once Sienna gives birth to the legitimate heir, we can have another child."

I seized his hand and held on with everything I had. "Cesare, listen to me. I am a Valente. Serafina Valente. Don Valente's daughter. Go get the doctor. Save this child."

But he thought I was lying. He wrenched his hand free, anger flashing across his face.

"You've truly disappointed me. If you're going to lie, at least make it believable. This is the city, not your little Hudson Valley cottage. One wrong word here can get you buried where nobody finds you."

He straightened his cuffs and walked out.

"A miscarriage won't kill you. Look after yourself."

I watched his retreating figure until it disappeared. Every last shred of hope in me went with it.

I curled into the corner, the pain splitting me open. I could feel it, every moment of it, the child slipping away from my body.

The child I had longed for day and night, killed by its own father on the very first day he learned of its existence.

I was unconscious through the night. The skirt beneath me soaked through with blood.

The door crashed open with a kick. Sienna Marchetti strode in, flanked by several older servants. The hallway beyond her was still. No guards intervened. No one in this house answered to me anymore.

She glanced at me, drenched in blood from the waist down, then settled into a chair by the table and poured herself a glass of wine as if she had all the time in the world.

"Don't blame me. The child in my belly has to be the firstborn heir. That's the only way I'll have any standing in the Delgado household. Surely you understand."

I braced myself against the wall, barely upright. "So you had my child killed."

Sienna let out a short laugh. "Now that's unfair. Cesare was the one who laced the food. Cesare was the one who didn't want it. All I did was mention it in passing."

I stared at her, unblinking. My nails dug into my palms until the skin split.

She rose and walked over to me, one hand resting on her belly.

"Besides, you should count yourself lucky. Even if your child had survived, it would have been taken from you and raised under the legitimate wife. Better this way, really."

"Bring the tonic over. Make her drink it. Help her recover."

The servants pried my jaw open and forced the liquid down my throat. I recognized the taste. Bitter herbs. The sterilizing concoction. The kind of old-country remedy that doesn't show up in any hospital record, the kind passed between women in whispers and administered in rooms no one speaks about afterward.

I thrashed, tried to spit it out, but they pinned me down and held my mouth shut.

Sienna crouched beside me and patted my cheek, slow and deliberate, every touch a humiliation. "Can't have you bearing more children down the line. All that squabbling over heirs gets so tiresome."

"My wedding is in two days. I still need to go try on my jeweled crown. If you'll excuse me."

As she stood, she let her robe fall open just enough to reveal the pendant at her throat. A saint's medallion on a thin gold chain.

Cesare's medallion. He told me once that his mother left it to him, the only thing he had of hers. And he had given it to Sienna.

My fingers drifted to the hollow of my throat where my own locket used to hang. There was nothing there. Just skin and bone and the absence of everything I'd buried.

She was nearly at the door when she paused, smoothing the front of her dress with both palms, as though something had just occurred to her. "Oh, one more thing. Cesare transferred this property into my name. I hear you're fond of the simple country life, so by all means, keep living here. Just remember, it's my house now. My rules."

My whole body went rigid. When Cesare burned down our cottage, he told me he bought this place for me. Told me I could fill the yard with lemon trees and vegetable gardens.

He never intended to give me anything. Not from the very beginning.

"Sienna."

I called after her, my voice scraped hollow.

"Miss Marchetti, have you ever heard of Serafina Valente? The Don's daughter?"

Sienna froze for a beat. "What, are you going to tell me that reclusive princess has something to do with you?"