The Stand-In’s Stoke Back, Everyone Regretted It

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.