Don Gio Ferrante weighed over two hundred pounds, and every single ounce of him was currently crushing the air out of Mara's lungs.
"Don Gio?" she whispered, shoving hard at his broad shoulders.
She pressed her trembling fingers to his thick neck, but there was absolutely nothing.
The sixty-five-year-old mafia kingpin was dead.
Four hundred thousand euros. That was exactly how much her Uncle Dario had sold her for to clear his gambling debt, and exactly how much went down the drain the second her new husband's heart gave out on their wedding night.
Mara finally managed to roll his lifeless body off her crushed silk dress, her eyes darting straight to the bedside clock. 8:54 PM.
She had exactly six minutes before the south gate guards changed shifts. It was a tiny, three-minute window to escape before the entire Ferrante family discovered their brand-new virgin bride was now their prime murder suspect.
She scrambled to her feet, her hands shaking as she stared down at Don Gio's body sprawled across the expensive Persian rug. His eyes were still open, staring blankly at the painted ceiling above.
The wine glass he had been holding was shattered near the foot of the bed. The bed itself was still perfectly made. The candle was still lit.
Nothing seemed out of place except for the dead man on the floor and the bride standing over him in a blood-red dress.
She knew exactly how this was going to look.
'Call for a guard. Report it. Play the horrified widow.' That was the only move that made sense right now.
She turned toward the door. But before she could reach them, the heavy double doors burst open.
Nico Ferrante filled the doorway.
Mara's breath caught in her throat.
She'd been told the estranged son was somewhere in Eastern Europe. She'd been told he hated his father enough to stay gone. But he was clearly home now, standing there in dark travel clothes that still looked rumpled from a long flight, and in his right hand was a gun pointed directly at her chest.
He held it easily, like someone who had done this many times before and didn't think need to much of it.
He looked at his father on the floor.
Then his eyes came back to her and stayed.
"Gold-digger or murderer?" he asked flatly.
Mara opened her mouth, but her voice had disappeared somewhere between her brain and her throat.
"I'll give you four seconds to make a case for gold-digger," Nico continued in the same emotionless tone. "It has a longer sentence."
"Neither," she finally managed to say.
"One."
"He collapsed on his own. I didn't touch him."
"You're standing over a dead man in his bridal suite." His gaze dropped briefly to the shattered wine glass, then came back to her face. "Two."
"I swear, he just grabbed his chest and fell. Heart attack, stroke, I don't know."
"Men like my father don't die of natural causes on their wedding night," Nico said coldly. "It's bad for business."
"Well, his heart didn't get the memo." Mara heard the sharp edge in her own voice and forced herself to breathe. "Look at the room. There's no sign of struggle, no weapons. I'm standing here in a dress that weighs twenty pounds. Does this look like an assassination to you?"
"Three." He pulled the hammer back, and the click sound filled the room. "A dress doesn't stop a poisoned needle or a spiked drink."
"The wine bottle is still sealed." She gestured toward the side table with a trembling hand. "We walked in less than five minutes ago."
"Then maybe you gave him something at the reception," he said, taking a step closer.
"I didn't give him anything. I'm not a murderer. I'm more of a collateral right now."
Something shifted behind Nico's eyes. "Collateral?"
"My uncle sold me to clear his gambling debt," Mara said bitterly. "Four hundred thousand euros' worth. He wouldn't risk me poisoning his meal ticket."
"You're Dario's niece." He stated it as if he had just realised. "The gambling debt."
"Exactly."
"And now you're a very convenient widow. Still sounds suspicious to me." The gun remained on her. "Move against the wall."
"What are you going to do?"
"Shoot you," he said simply. "Then tell the guards I caught you trying to flee the scene."
"The Council will ask questions."
"I'm Nico Ferrante, and my father is dead." His voice was flat. "Which means I can do whatever I want. Wall. Now."
Mara's back hit the cold plaster before she'd consciously decided to move.
This was it. She'd survived her uncle's fists, survived three years clawing her way back to something resembling a life, only to die in a locked room at the hands of a man who looked at her like a problem to be solved.
Footsteps sounded in the hallway outside, followed by a hurried, out-of-breath voice. "Don Gio? The guards let me through, I brought the…" The doors swung open. "Oh God."
The family lawyer stumbled into the room, holding a thick leather briefcase close to his chest, but stopped suddenly when he saw the body, his face losing all color.
"Valerio," Nico said without turning around. The gun stayed trained on Mara. "You're working late."
"Nico?" The lawyer's voice cracked. "You're supposed to be in Belgrade. What are you... is he..."
"Dead? Yes." Nico's tone didn't change at all. "What's in the briefcase? You don't visit the bridal suite this late with a briefcase to offer congratulations."
"The will." Valerio swallowed hard, his eyes darting between the gun, the body, and Mara. "The final signed copy. Don Gio called me this afternoon. He wanted it placed in his private safe tonight, after the ceremony."
"Read it."
"Nico, we need to call the doctor first. The Council will need to be notified…"
Nico shifted the gun an inch to the left. Not at Valerio. He didn't need to. "Read the fvccking will, and skip the preamble."
Valerio's hands were shaking so badly he dropped his pen. It spun across the marble and vanished under the bed. He fumbled with the briefcase, pulled out a thick stack of papers, flipped to the final pages, and began.
"Per Don Gio's instructions," Valerio babbled in a panicked voice. "The will states simply: the empire and all Ferrante holdings, alliances, and Council seat pass to Don Gio's direct bloodline."
"There's a contingency," Nico said. Not a question.
"Yes." Valerio swallowed hard, a drop of sweat rolling down his temple. "If no blood heir exists at the time of death, the estate enters Council receivership pending a vote on new leadership."
A pause.
Valerio glanced at Mara, then quickly looked back at the papers. "If the widow is with child at the time of death, she rules as Regent until the child reaches eighteen."
The temperature in the room seemed to drop ten degrees.
Nico looked at Valerio, then at his father's body, and finally at Mara.
Nico looked at Valerio, then at his father's body, and finally at Mara. She could see the wheels turning behind his eyes: the recalculation, the options narrowing, the cold focus of a man turning bad news into a problem to solve.
"Council receivership," he said quietly, almost to himself. "Which means a vote. Which means war before the week is out."
He took a step toward Mara, and she pressed herself harder against the wall.
"The marriage was never consummated," Nico continued in that same flat voice. "There is no heir. No Regent. Which means you're nothing but a liability standing in my dead father's bedroom."
"I can leave," Mara said quickly. "Tonight. I won't say a word to anyone. I'll disappear."
"You're right about one thing." He raised the gun again, leveling it directly at her forehead. "You'll definitely say nothing because I don't leave loose ends."
Her back was already against the wall. There was nowhere left to go.
She had two seconds before he pulled the trigger. Maybe one.
"Don't shoot!" The words left her mouth before she had consciously decided to say them. "I'm pregnant!"
Valerio dropped the papers, scattering them across the floor in every direction. "What?" he whispered. "But… the wedding was today…"
"I'm pregnant," Mara said again, louder, staring straight down the barrel even though her heart was trying to beat its way out of her chest. "With the heir. You shoot me, you shoot the Ferrante bloodline."
Silence.
Then, slowly, Nico lowered the gun.
He didn't put it away. He just held it loosely at his side, leveling his face with her neck. Mara stopped breathing, every muscle in her locked in place as he leaned in. He was so close that she could smell gunpowder and expensive cologne and the cold night air still clinging to his clothes.
He inhaled slowly.
When he spoke, his voice was barely a whisper. "My father has been impotent for ten years."
Every drop of blood drained from Mara's face.
"I have his physician's records," Nico continued in a calm voice. "That sick fvck has not been capable of fathering a child since 2014."
Mara wanted to step back, but there was no space between her and the wall.
Nico tilted his head back just enough to look directly at her.
"So that makes you a liar, or a whore, young lady" he said flatly. "Or should I call you..." The corner of his mouth moved, but it wasn't a smile. It was something much colder. "Stepmother."