"Lorenzo, I think I turned my ankle just now. It hurts so much~"
Without a word, Lorenzo lifted her into his arms like a bride and carried her straight up to the second-floor bedroom of the compound, never once glancing at me. The soldiers along the staircase stepped aside for him, eyes lowered, as though they had seen nothing.
The Don's mother gave me a pointed look across the long table, her voice dripping with contempt. The black rosary at her wrist clicked once, bead against bead.
"Can't lay an egg, and can't even keep hold of your own man. If Matteo hadn't married Gioia first, do you think my son would ever have looked twice at you? And you still have the nerve to sit at this table. Go upstairs. The sight of you kills my appetite."
She had never liked me. I'd always known that.
To her, I was the woman Matteo had thrown away, the one who'd latched onto her son and brought shame on the Falcone name before the whole Family.
And after I'd lost so many children, her disgust only deepened.
But she was Lorenzo's mother, the matriarch of the bloodline, and I'd believed it was my own fault that I couldn't carry a child, so I swallowed the guilt.
Besides, Lorenzo used to speak up for me here and there, so every time, I let it go.
But now Lorenzo was too busy doting on Gioia. Why would he ever think of me?
For a moment, I almost wanted to tell them the truth. In the end, I let it die. Omertà had taught me that some words, once spoken at this table, could never be taken back.
I'd already decided to leave. There was no point wasting my breath.
I climbed the stairs without a word, and noticed that Gioia's bedroom door hadn't been shut all the way.
Some impulse I couldn't name pulled me toward it.
And there was Gioia, sprawled across the bed with her clothes in disarray, Lorenzo pressing down over her.
"Lorenzo, you're still the one who treats me best. Matteo can't father children, and if Adriana had a baby, he wouldn't be able to take the seat of the Family. Who knows how much I'd suffer after that." Her hand rested low on her belly as she spoke, daring the room to argue with what grew there.
Lorenzo's breath came shallow, the flush of want rising at the corners of his eyes.
"Does Matteo treat you well? Has he ever mistreated you?"
"No. Ever since I got pregnant, he can't dote on me enough. He's terrified I'll tire myself out, washes my feet for me himself, and he's even gentler with me in bed."
A bitter look crossed Lorenzo's face.
"As long as he's good to you, as long as you're happy, then I have no regrets."
"Matteo, you've done so much for me. I couldn't marry you, so the least I can do is give myself to you. Tonight, I'm yours."
Whatever restraint Lorenzo had left snapped. His movements turned harder, and the two of them tangled together in a frenzy.
I'd never known that Lorenzo, the Don who ordered men into the ground without changing his expression, always so cold and self-controlled, had a side that could come undone like this.
Tears slid down my face as I stumbled back to my room.
All night, Lorenzo never came back.
The next morning, he looked at me, apologetic.
"Adriana, I meant to come keep you company last night, but Winslow held me up talking for hours. I just couldn't get away."
I didn't expose his lie. I turned and went to wait for him by the door of the compound.
A bucket of slop, thick with leftover scraps from the Family table, came crashing down over my head. Gioia appeared in front of me out of nowhere, the bucket still dangling from her hand.
"Adriana, the way Lorenzo lost himself on top of me, wasn't it something to see?" She smiled, taunting.
So she'd left that door open on purpose.
"Miscarrying doesn't feel good, does it? But you won't have to worry about that anymore. After all, you'll never be able to have a child again."
"And you still kept getting pregnant, one after another. Did you think you could fight me for the seat as the Family's first lady? Stop dreaming. For my sake, Lorenzo not only gave up his own claim to the throne, he got me pregnant himself. And those dead babies of yours? Every one of them became my strengthening rite." Her hand pressed flat and hard against her belly, the only crack in her smile.
My head shot up, my voice shaking.
"What did you say?"
"Why else do you think Lorenzo told you, every time you lost the child, that the baby was already buried and wouldn't let you see it? Because I told him eating that was good for my body, of course."
Despair, fury, and disbelief flooded my mind all at once. The world went very still around me, as if even the soldiers in the courtyard had stopped breathing.
So this was why Lorenzo never let me see my children?
For Gioia's sake, how could he have gone this far?!
