Chapter 2

Siena's POV

I didn't cry, nor did I demand answers.

I had learned long ago that in the Mafia world, tears are the cheapest commodity.

I backed out of the secret room and restored everything to exactly as it was.

In the following days, I continued my daily life with Marcello as usual, pretending nothing had happened.

I even rationalized it to myself: Camilla was dead, wasn't she? I was the one in his arms now.

As long as I remained docile and obedient, I would still be his sole favorite.

But I was wrong.

Half a month later, Marcello began disappearing for nights on end.

His gaze no longer held that burning infatuation when he looked at me.

Whenever I tried to embrace him, he would subconsciously pull away, his clothes carrying the faint scent of an unfamiliar perfume.

I thought I had done something wrong to make him tire of me.

That night, I personally cooked an entire table of his favorite Italian dishes.

Watching the wall clock tick past eleven, with him still nowhere in sight, I finally couldn't resist calling his phone.

"What is it?" he answered. The background was incredibly noisy, and his voice dripped with undisguised impatience.

"Marcello, when are you coming home?" I dug my nails fiercely into my palms and forced a tearful hitch into my voice. "I was slicing steak and... I accidentally cut my hand. It's bleeding everywhere."

"It hurts so much... Can you come back and be with me?"

There was a two-second silence on the other end. "Have the butler call a doctor. I'll be back shortly."

Overjoyed, I ignored my sliced finger and reheated the cold food.

However, after all my agonizing waiting, when I rushed to the front door full of anticipation, it wasn't his comforting embrace that greeted me.

It was him—and another woman.

I stood in the first-floor foyer, the wound on my finger still oozing blood. But Marcello's gaze didn't linger on me for even a fraction of a second.

He kept the drenched woman fiercely shielded inside his overcoat, brushing past me like a gust of wind as he bolted straight for the bedroom on the second floor.

It was Camilla.

She wasn't dead.

I stood frozen in place, the blood in my veins turning to ice. It wasn't until Marcello's underboss, Luca, trailed in from the rain that I snapped back to reality and grabbed his arm to stop him.

"How is she..." My throat was impossibly tight and dry.

Luca stopped and looked at me, his eyes filled with a trace of condescending pity and mockery. "Surprised? That explosion back then was nothing more than a meticulously staged fake death, planned by Miss Camilla to escape a family vendetta."

"Now that the heat has died down, the true mistress of the house is naturally returning."

In that moment, I didn't even feel jealous. I just found it utterly absurd.

That very night, Luca and his men "invited" me out of the master bedroom, relocating me to the coldest, draftiest guest room at the end of the hallway.

The next morning.

When I came downstairs, I saw Camilla wearing my favorite silk nightgown, sitting at the head of the dining table.

Holding my usual bone china teacup, she took an elegant sip of black tea.

Spotting me, she flashed an intensely provocative smile.

"How nostalgic," she said, looking me up and down with the gaze of someone inspecting a shoddy piece of merchandise. "I almost forgot how well Marcello groomed a body double to look just like me."

"But I suppose a fake is still a fake in the end."

She set her teacup down, stood up, and walked over to me. In a voice low enough that only the two of us could hear, she whispered:

"I'm back. You can get the hell out now."

I met her gaze coldly. I felt no anger, only an icy calm.

"You don't have to chase me out. I'm leaving."

I turned on my heel and headed for the study, my fingers clutching a thin slip of paper.

It was the pregnancy test report I had just received yesterday.

I was pregnant.

Two months along.

Marcello was seated in his massive study chair, flipping through the family ledgers.

Seeing me enter, his brow furrowed slightly, a flash of impatience crossing his eyes.

"Siena, didn't I tell you not to disturb me for the time being?"

I slammed the pregnancy report onto his desk.

"Marcello, we're done. I'm leaving."

He glanced down at the paper. His gaze hardened for a fraction of a second, but it quickly reverted to his usual condescending detachment.

He stood up, walked over to me, and tried to placate me with a sickeningly hypocritical tone:

"Siena, stop throwing a tantrum."

"The position as the mistress of the Giovanni family will always be yours. Camilla has just suffered too much, and I need to take care of her."

"Be a good girl. Don't put on a jealous act right now. I don't like it when you're like this."

I laughed out of sheer fury.

"An act? Marcello, you turned my entire life into a stage play, and now you're blaming me for acting?"

"I just want my freedom."

Suddenly, the study door burst open.

Camilla stumbled in, clutching her chest. Her face was deathly pale as she gasped heavily for air.

"Marcello... I can't breathe... my heart hurts..."

She collapsed toward the floor.

Marcello's expression drastically changed. Without a second thought, he shoved me aside.

The small of my back slammed brutally against the hard edge of the desk. The agonizing pain instantly drained all the color from my face.

But he didn't even spare me a backward glance.

He swept Camilla into his arms, his voice thick with panic and desperation.

"Call the doctor, now!"