I was eight months pregnant.
There were bullet holes in the walls of our Miami house, broken glass under my bare feet, and a burning pain tearing through my left side. I had one hand wrapped around the marble railing and the other pressed beneath my stomach, trying to understand why everything suddenly felt wet.
Then Roman looked at me.
For one second, our eyes met across the ruined foyer.
I saw terror on his face.
I also saw him make a choice.
“Get Serena out!” he shouted.
Not me.
Serena.
The beautiful woman everyone had been calling his mistress for the last six weeks.
Roman lifted her into his arms and disappeared behind his men.
I stood there bleeding with his son inside me and understood something that changed my life.
My husband loved me.
But apparently, there was something he loved more.
By sunrise, Roman Rinaldi still had his mansion, his money, and the criminal empire men had killed to build for him.
He just didn’t have a wife anymore.
And he had no idea where I had taken his son.
Six weeks earlier, I had still believed there were lines Roman would never cross.
That sounds ridiculous when your husband is the head of the Rinaldi organization.
I knew what Roman was when I married him.
I knew men lowered their voices when he entered restaurants.
I knew black SUVs waited outside our house at all hours.
I knew the legitimate freight companies, hotels, and construction businesses in his name were only the clean side of a much darker machine.
But I also knew the Roman no one else saw.
The man who peeled oranges for me because pregnancy had made the smell of the rind stick to my fingers and turn my stomach.
The man who drove twenty-seven minutes across Miami at midnight because I cried over wanting a chocolate milkshake.
The man who slept with his palm spread protectively over my stomach as if he could guard our baby even in his dreams.
To everyone else, Roman Rinaldi was a threat.
To me, he was the man who kissed my swollen ankles and whispered, “I still can’t believe you chose me.”
Then Serena Cross appeared.
She was thirty, maybe thirty-one, with long dark hair, expensive clothes, and the kind of confidence that made people move out of her way before she asked.
The first photograph reached me on a Thursday afternoon.
Roman leaving the Marlowe Hotel.
Serena beside him.
His hand against the small of her back.
The second picture came two days later.
Serena getting into Roman’s car outside a private club.
The third was taken through the window of a restaurant.
They were sitting alone.
Close.
Too close.
I stared at the photographs while my son kicked beneath my ribs.
When Roman came home that night, I placed my phone on the kitchen island.
“Who is she?”
He looked at the screen.
His expression barely changed.
That hurt more than panic would have.
“Her name is Serena Cross.”
“I know her name.”
Roman loosened his tie.
“Claire—”
“Are you sleeping with her?”
“No.”
The answer came instantly.
I wanted to believe him.
But Roman had survived as long as he had because he could lie while looking directly into a man’s eyes.
“Then why does half of Miami think you are?”
He walked toward me.
I stepped back.
That stopped him.
“Because right now,” he said carefully, “I need them to.”
I stared at him.
Roman lowered his voice.
“There are things happening that I can’t explain yet.”
I laughed once.
It sounded ugly even to me.
“You need the city to think you have a mistress, and somehow I’m supposed to find that comforting?”
“She isn’t my mistress.”
“But you’re letting people humiliate me.”
His jaw tightened.
“I know.”
“Women I have dinner with are whispering about me.”
“I know.”
“Your own men look embarrassed when they see me.”
“I know.”
My eyes burned.
“And you’re still doing it.”
For the first time, Roman looked away.
“Yes.”
That was the moment the first crack appeared.
Not because I believed he was sleeping with Serena.
Because I realized there were parts of Roman’s life where my pain could be considered an acceptable cost.
He came around the island slowly.
“Claire, there is a man named Victor Kane.”
I knew the name.
Everyone did.
Kane had arrived in South Florida less than a year earlier and built influence through intimidation, extortion, and men who seemed to have no families and therefore nothing to lose.
Roman hated men like him.
Not because Roman was innocent.
He wasn’t.
But Roman had rules.
No children.
No families.
No random civilians.
Kane considered rules a weakness.
“He’s planning something,” Roman said. “Something bigger than territory.”
“And Serena?”
“She has access to him.”
“What kind of access?”
Roman hesitated.
That hesitation stayed with me.
“She handles information.”
“What information?”
“I can’t tell you.”
I folded my arms over my stomach.
“Then don’t ask me to trust what you refuse to explain.”
Roman’s face changed.
Not anger.
Pain.
He reached for me again.
This time I let him touch my cheek.
“Give me until Friday,” he whispered. “After Friday, Serena Cross disappears from our lives.”
“Promise me.”
“I promise.”
“On our son.”
His eyes dropped to my stomach.
He went still.
Then he pressed his forehead against mine.
“On our son.”
Friday came with a thunderstorm.
By midnight, our home was under attack.
The first explosion shook me awake so violently that a framed photograph fell from the bedroom wall.
Roman wasn’t beside me.
I sat up.
Another crash came from downstairs.
Then shouting.
Then the unmistakable sound of gunfire.
I had lived around Roman’s world long enough to recognize danger before my mind could process it.
I grabbed my robe and phone.
No signal.
The hallway lights flickered.
“Roman?”
Nothing.
I moved toward the staircase.
Smoke curled upward from the foyer.
One of Roman’s men appeared below.
“Mrs. Rinaldi! Go back!”
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