Chapter 1 - The Father
Gerald Whitmore did not ask questions he already knew the answers to.
When he asked if she wanted him to call her father, it was not a suggestion.
It was a warning.
Lucia gripped the edge of the hospital bed as another wave of pain ripped through her abdomen.
Her father was Salvatore Romano.
Before she became Dante Moretti’s wife, she had been the only daughter of the most ruthless syndicate boss in Chicago.
Dante’s empire was built on logistics, political favors, and quiet intimidation.
Salvatore’s empire was built on blood.
Her marriage to Dante six years ago had been the fragile treaty that kept the city from tearing itself apart.
If Salvatore Romano found out his pregnant daughter had been left to bleed out while Dante rushed to another woman’s hotel room, the treaty was over.
The streets would burn by midnight.
“No,” Lucia gasped, her free hand clutching the sheets.
“Do not call him yet.”
“Lucia, you have lost a massive amount of blood, and you are unprotected,” Gerald warned.
“I have Michael,” she replied.
Michael Grant was Dante’s head of security, but he was standing outside her door right now.
“Michael answers to Dante,” Gerald reminded her.
“Just file the injunctions, Gerald.”
“I will have the paperwork filed with the midnight judge in ten minutes,” the old lawyer promised.
The line went dead.
Lucia dropped the phone onto the stainless-steel tray.
It landed right next to Dante’s discarded wedding band.
The fetal monitor beside her bed suddenly began to beep faster, the green line spiking erratically.
The charge nurse, Marilyn, rushed back into the room with two other doctors.
“Her pressure is dropping,” Marilyn shouted.
“The abruption is tearing further.”
A sharp, blinding agony tore through Lucia’s stomach, making her scream.
“We have to deliver right now, or we lose them both!” the obstetrician yelled.
The trauma room doors flew open violently.
It was not the surgical team.
It was Claudia Moretti, Dante’s mother, flanked by four massive men in dark suits.
May you like
Claudia looked at the pool of blood on the floor and then glared at the doctor.
“If you have to choose between them in that operating room,” Claudia ordered coldly, “you save my granddaughter and you let this Romano bitch die.”
