Chapter 5

Soraya

The dungeon door stood open at the bottom of the stone steps, breathing out damp and mildew. For a hundred years, this was where the Scaffidis had disciplined their own.

I turned to Tiziano. "I didn't hurt her."

"I know." He sighed. "I'm not blind. Rosalinda's little games are pretty obvious. And she's not exactly a woman who lets herself get pushed around."

"Then why—"

"Because she's the Donna. She has to keep her authority over this house, and I can't humiliate her in front of the staff. So you take this one. Sit down there for a while, cool off. Be good, and I'll make it up to you."

Make it up to me.

He'd said that so many times. When they took my babies. When she humiliated me. When he locked me away in Villa Serena.

"Can't you be on my side?" I asked. "Just once. Just one time."

His face hardened. "Soraya. Be good."

I closed my eyes and smiled at my own stupidity. Why was I still hoping?

When I opened them, I didn't look at him again. I walked into the dungeon on my own. The heavy iron door slammed behind me, and the lock turned.

It was pitch-black. I curled up on the cold stone floor, a heavy exhaustion slowly washing over me.

To stay awake, I thought about Elio's last text. A one-bedroom near the water in Port Marisol. White walls. A little balcony. I held on to that picture like a lifeline.

I don't know how much time passed before the iron door screeched open. Two broad-shouldered maids came in: Nella and Fiore, Rosalinda's women.

"Orders from the Don," Nella said. "You scratched the Donna with your nails. So your fingers pay for it."

My blood ran cold. "That's a lie. Let me out! I want to hear Tiziano say it to my face!"

"Sorry, signora."

They forced me to the floor. They wedged my fingers into the gap of the iron door frame—all ten of them—and leaned their full weight against the heavy metal.

Bones cracked. Nails split and tore away.

I screamed until my throat gave out.

They didn't stop. One finger.

When they finally let go, my hands were a ruin of blood and mangled flesh. I blacked out from the pain and woke up from the cold, over and over.

Before leaving, Fiore spat a curse. "You're nothing now," she sneered. "Remember your place before you try fighting the Donna for the Don's favor."

The dungeon reeked of blood. I lay on the floor like a corpse.

No. I was not going to die down here. I was going to live.

I dragged myself across the floor on my elbows. My broken fingers scraped the rough stone, leaving a long, dark smear behind me. Somehow, I made it up the stairs, down the side corridor, and out along the covered walkway to my rooms in the west wing.

I hadn't reached the door when I heard voices inside.

"You know I'm not really infertile, Tiziano." Rosalinda's voice, soft and sweet. "I just refuse to have Alfonso's child. If you wanted, I could give you a baby. Ours."

Tiziano sounded cool. "Don't talk crazy. Pregnancy wrecks a woman's body, and you don't conceive as easily as Soraya does. Why put yourself through that? Besides, the only children I want are Soraya's."

Rosalinda laughed. "Don't pretend. You drugged her so she wouldn't marry your brother and escape your control. I just hate that you've spent eight years stuck with a woman you never loved."

A pause. When he spoke again, there was a hard edge to his voice.

"Soraya's not as bad as you make her sound. Spending my life with her isn't the worst thing in the world. Eight years ago, I set a trap for her family's businesses, knowing it would bleed them dry. I only meant to break her spirit, not to drive her parents to put guns in their mouths. That's a sin I have to carry."

Thunder cracked over the harbor. Rain came down all at once, hard and loud.

My mind went white. I staggered backward off the walkway, my foot sinking into a cold puddle.

Tiziano had drugged me.

Tiziano had driven my parents to their deaths.

The man I'd loved for most of my life, every single piece of it, had been a lie.