Bile traveled up my throat.

These looked bad.

Really bad. They would have looked bad to someone who had average trust in people, but Luca was distrustful, suspicious and cautious. For him these photos could only lead to one conclusion. But he couldn’t possibly believe I had an affair with Dante? God, he should know better. He knew me.

“Luca,” I whispered, reaching out to touch his shoulder, but I froze when he raised his eyes to mine. I had never seen that look in his eyes. They were wild with anger.

I wanted to run as far away as I could.

My eyes flickered to the empty bottle of whisky at his feet. Luca had drunk most of it. Some of the amber liquid had spilled and stained the beige carpet, but there were also darker stains. Slowly my gaze moved on to his hands, which were clutching a knife. One of his palms was curled around the blade so tightly that blood was dripping down his hand and onto the carpet.

I knew I needed to run, but that would have been admittance to a crime I hadn’t committed. I hadn’t cheated on Luca, would never do it. And the words Luca had said to me on our wedding night flashed through my mind. Did your father never teach you to hide your fear from monsters? They give chase if you run.

“You’re bleeding. You’ve hurt yourself,” I said in a soothing voice, trying to get through to him. I needed to get past the demons the alcohol and the compromising photos had summoned.

His face twisted with so much rage, I recoiled from it. He released the blade and more blood dripped down his hand as he straightened from the sofa.

I took a step back, couldn’t stop myself.

The arm with the knife hung limply at his side.

I forced myself to meet his gaze again. Luca was in there somewhere. Behind the anger and the hurt, my Luca was in there.

“Luca, please listen to me. It’s not how it looks.”

“So you didn’t let Cavallaro have what’s mine?” he roared. And he was upon me, his bleeding hand clamped down on my forearm. He was still holding the knife.

“I would never do that! You will always be the only man I want to be with. I went to Chicago to meet with Val and talk to Fabi. But Dante followed Val and wanted to talk to me. That’s all, I swear.”

“And what’s your swear worth? You’ve betrayed me before.”

“I never lied to you. I never cheated. I helped my sisters and didn’t always tell you everything, but I never lied to you.” He was the one who’d cheated, and it wasn’t like he’d never kept a secret from me—like Matteo asking for Gianna’s hand.

His eyes seemed to bore through me. There wasn’t only anger in them, and the other emotion worried me more, because it was agony.

“Luca, can you please put down the knife? It’s making me nervous.”

His eyes trailed down to the blood-covered blade as if he had forgotten all about it and he released it, not even hesitating despite what he thought I’d done. The steel clanged to the floor, splattering it even more with blood. Then his eyes moved back up. He pulled me sharply against him and kissed me fiercely, brutally. There was only anger and despair in his kiss.

I knew what he wanted, what he needed. And I would have gladly given it to him if the test hadn’t changed everything. Luca didn’t want to hurt me, but the last time he’d been this angry when we’d had sex, he’d been rougher than I could risk so early in this pregnancy. I had to protect our child and Luca. He would never forgive himself if he hurt our baby.

His hands roamed over my body hungrily, and a small part of me felt exhilarated at the sensation, but I ripped away from him. “No!” He tried to pull me against him again. “Luca, stop! I don’t want this!”

His lips were an inch from mine and he was breathing harshly, his eyes like molten steel. “You deny me?”

I bit back a snappy comment. I’d denied him before when I hadn’t felt well or wasn’t in the mood, and he had always honored my wish. I knew he was drunk and hurt and on the verge of losing control. That he hadn’t yet showed how much he loved me. He had killed his first man at eleven, had killed and tortured countless more, had called himself a merciless monster on many occasions. And I knew what he was. With others.

“Funny that you say you haven’t been with Dante, and yet you can’t bear my touch.”

God, he thought my refusal was admittance to me cheating?

“Don’t do anything you will regret tomorrow,” I said quietly, begging him with my eyes.

His lips curled in a cruel smile. So wrong. “What makes you think I would regret anything?”

I knew he would because I knew him better than anyone else, better than he knew himself.

“Our love is too important.”

“Love,” he spat the word. “That I ever loved you was my biggest mistake. I won’t make it again.”

Loved? I could feel my heart shatter as I looked into his menacing face.

“Luca, please.” I reached for him but he shook me off. There was only cold anger in his eyes.

“Because you are my wife, you’ll live. Don’t expect more. We are done.”

I couldn’t comprehend what he was saying. I stared at him, my throat clogging, my heart drumming in my chest. For a moment, he hesitated but then he turned and stalked off, leaving me standing there alone.

I sank down on the sofa, where Luca had sat before. The leather was still warm. I touched my stomach and I cried. Cried because I might have destroyed our love. That Luca had let himself love me in the first place had been a miracle. What if I’d lost him forever?

I was still sitting in the same spot when Matteo entered the room cautiously a couple of hours later. He pushed the button that opened the curtains and light flooded the room. I blinked twice, but my lids felt like they were made from lead. Slowly I lowered my palm from my stomach.

“He didn’t kill you,” Matteo said. His voice didn’t reveal his emotions. His facial features were similar to Luca’s, but Matteo was poster-boy pretty where Luca was all hard lines and raw attractiveness. But he looked enough like Luca to set my heart aflame with heartbreak.

He walked toward me, his eyes taking in my bloody clothes and the blood on the couch and the ground.

“Do you need a doctor?”

“It’s not my blood,” I whispered in a raw voice.

Matteo didn’t say anything for a while, only regarded me. “Making him bleed. You are quite good at it for a woman.”

I raised my gaze to meet his straight on. My eyes burnt with unshed tears, but I couldn’t cry anymore. I’d cried for hours. I stood, legs shaky. I grabbed Matteo’s arm. He let me, only regarded me emotionlessly.

“Matteo, I didn’t do anything. I swear on my life. I swear on my…” I trailed off. I’d almost said “child.” “Please, help me. Help me make Luca see the truth.”

“The photos.”

“The photos show me with Dante in a restaurant and a car. We talked. He considered using me against the Famiglia as leverage. That’s all.”

“Then why did he let you go, Aria. Why?”

I stared up at Matteo. I couldn’t tell him about the child when I hadn’t even told Luca. “Because he has an ounce of decency in his body.”

A dark smile curled his lips. “Is that so?”