Chapter 1

I pushed open the doors to Harbor Club with my pregnancy report clenched in my hand.

The report said I was two months pregnant.

For the past three years, every family doctor had told me I could never have children again.

This was supposed to be a miracle.

I was going to tell Ethan we were having a baby.

Then I saw him behind the bar, in the dim evening light, with his hand resting on Serena’s swollen belly.

Serena.

The widow of Ethan’s father.

His stepmother.

And now she was pregnant, leaning against him like she belonged there.

“Diana?” Ethan jerked his hand away. “What are you doing here?”

I didn’t say a word. My bag slipped from my shoulder and hit the floor. The pregnancy report fell from my hand.

Serena glanced down at it. The corner of her mouth twitched, but she stayed silent.

“Don’t misunderstand.” Ethan reached out and took a step toward me.

“Misunderstand what?” I slapped his hand away. “That your hand was on your stepmother’s belly? Or that you’re the one who put the baby there?”

Ethan’s face went white.

“Diana, please. Trust me this once—”

“When did it start?” I cut him off.

Ethan froze.

“Let me guess. After Jack died? Or was it even before that?”

Jack.

Ethan’s older brother. The former heir to the Leone family.

Three years ago, he put a gun in his mouth and pulled the trigger. Rumor had it that he and Serena had been a little too close.

After Jack’s funeral, Serena said she was going back to Sicily.

Then she threw herself into the sea.

I searched for her for an entire year. I checked every port along the East Coast. We never found her body.

Now it seemed she had been living in a vacation villa on Long Island all along.

A villa under my name.

“Diana.” Ethan lifted his head, his eyes red. “Back then, Serena was alone and had nowhere to go. I only felt sorry for her. Dad and Jack were both gone. I was in a bad place, and I had too much to drink. I made one mistake…”

“Just once?”

Ethan went still.

“Or has every business trip you took this past year really been another drunken mistake?”

That was when Serena spoke, her voice soft as poison.

“Diana, blame me. It was my idea. Once the baby is born, you can raise it as your own. You can’t have children anyway. This only helps you.”

I finally looked at that snake of a woman, the one who had crawled into the beds of both father and sons.

“Shut up.” I stared at her. “Who gave you the right to speak about my marriage?”

Serena sighed. She wasn’t frightened. Instead, she spoke to me in the patient tone one used on a child, “Think about it calmly. Ethan needs an heir. I can give him what you can’t.”

“What exactly are you giving him? A stepmother warming her stepson’s bed?”

“Ethan and I aren’t related by blood,” Serena said calmly.

I turned to Ethan. “Is that what you think too?”

He said nothing.

But he didn’t deny it either.

At that moment, I finally understood what had happened three years ago.

He hadn’t proposed because he loved me.

He had proposed because I sold the last of my family’s properties to help the Leones survive their financial crisis.

He married me to repay a debt.

“Diana,” Ethan finally said. “Don’t make this sound so ugly. I do care about you—”

“Care? You took away my chance to have a child, and now you want to talk to me about care?”

“Three years ago, I took that bullet for Serena because she was your family,” I said. “For you, I was willing to die. And this is how you repay me? By cheating on me?”

Ethan’s expression changed.

Not with guilt.

With impatience.

“You lost your fertility because you chose to take that bullet for Serena. That was your choice. No one forced you.”

Behind him, Serena rested a hand on her stomach, smiling.

I bent down and picked up my bag and the report.

“Diana!” Ethan took a step after me. “Is that… a pregnancy report?”

I didn’t look back.

Behind me, Serena’s voice floated over, light but perfectly clear.

“Pregnant? I thought she couldn’t have children. Could it be someone else’s…”

I didn’t listen to the rest.

I got into my car and called the family doctor.

“Schedule an abortion for me. As soon as possible.”

After I hung up, I leaned against the steering wheel.

And finally broke down crying.