The sky split open without warning, and rain came crashing down in sheets over the Moretti estate.

Water soaked through Adriana's clothes in seconds, plastering the fabric to her skin like ice. Yet she stood in the downpour with her spine ramrod straight, her gaze fixed on Lorenzo through the tall windows of the great room. There was no plea in her eyes. Not a trace.

Something twisted in Lorenzo's chest, sharp and unbidden. A terrible thought surfaced.

Did she want to leave him?

He crushed it almost instantly. She couldn't leave him. She loved him too much. His thumb went still against the heavy gold signet on his finger, and for one breath the room seemed to hold itself.

His eyes went cold.

"Adriana, you really think this house is yours to throw tantrums in? Don't you dare use my mother's name to strong-arm me."

He wrapped his arm around Vanessa's waist and turned toward the stairs without a backward glance, leaving Adriana standing in the rain.

The downpour only worsened, each drop hammering against her body like a fist.

Two of the enforcers moved toward her, ready to force her to her knees on the stone. Adriana lifted her gaze and pinned them with a stare that could cut glass.

"You know what the Don's mother is capable of. If I kneel on this ground today, do you really think you'll be breathing tomorrow?"

The color drained from their faces. They exchanged a look, and Carmela Moretti's name did what Adriana's words alone could not. They released her and stepped back, reluctance written in every line of them.

Adriana stumbled back inside. Every step sent a dull, dragging ache through her lower abdomen.

She made it to the second floor. Lorenzo's bedroom door stood ajar, and through the gap she saw something that made the world tilt sideways.

Lorenzo had Vanessa pinned against the headboard. Their bodies were tangled together, moving in a rhythm that left nothing to the imagination.

Vanessa looked up. Through the crack in the door, her eyes met Adriana's.

A slow, triumphant smile spread across her lips, mockery spilling from her gaze like venom. Her smile stretched a fraction too far. Then she draped her arms over Lorenzo's shoulders and let out a breathy, theatrical moan.

Something hot and metallic surged up Adriana's throat. She clamped both hands over her mouth, barely keeping the blood from spilling past her lips.

She couldn't watch. She turned and fled to her own room like a hunted animal.

The moment she locked the door behind her, a mouthful of blood poured into her cupped palm. Bright red. Violent against her skin.

She slid down the door and crumpled to the floor, still wrapped in her soaked clothes. The cold seeped into her bones as pain folded her body in on itself. Her vision blurred at the edges, then began to dissolve.

Time lost its shape. The chill burrowed deeper.

She fumbled for her phone and dialed Lorenzo's number on instinct. Once. Twice. Again and again. No one picked up.

She dragged herself out of the room on her hands and knees. From behind his bedroom door, the sounds hadn't stopped. Rise and fall. Rise and fall.

When she opened her eyes again, she was in a hospital bed in one of the Family's quiet private wings. A doctor stood beside her, his expression grim.

"Signora Moretti, your fever spiked past a hundred and two. Between the rain and the strain on you, the pregnancy is extremely unstable. You cannot endure any further distress. If you do, we may not be able to save the child."

Adriana stared at the ceiling and nodded.

Not long after, a commotion erupted in the hallway. Every member of the staff was summoned away.

The nurses chattered as they hurried past her door.

"The Don's Miss Carbone just got admitted. They say things got too rough in the bedroom. He called in every doctor in the building to see to her."

"And look at the lady in here. Carrying a child, burning up with fever, and not a single soul tending to her. That memory wound of his is a convenient thing. Seems the only person he's forgotten is his own wife."

"When you get down to it, the one who isn't loved is the real outsider. Miss Carbone is the one the Don actually cares for now."

Every cruel word found its way into Adriana's ears, precise as a blade.

She turned her head toward the window. Outside, the rain had stopped. Her eyes held nothing but emptiness.

In the days that followed, Lorenzo stayed at Vanessa's side, tending to her every need. He never once learned that his wife lay in the same building.

On the third day, Adriana checked herself out against the doctors' protests. There was a commission to be judged, and she would not surrender it.

This was her gift to the child she carried, the foundation on which she and her baby would build a future no Family could take from them.

In the corridors behind the showing hall, she crossed paths with Vanessa Carbone.

Vanessa drifted past her, every line of her wearing unbridled triumph.

"Adriana. Surprised to find me here? So the two of you came up together under the same roof. So you sat at his bedside after the hit that nearly took him. In the end you couldn't hold on to any of it. His body, his heart, the name of Moretti. It's all mine now."

"And today I'm going to ruin what's left of you."

The final presentations went in an order drawn by lot. Vanessa landed in the slot right before her.

She stepped onto the main floor and unveiled her finished pieces, and the blood in Adriana's veins turned to ice.

The collection laid out under the lights was her own Starlight Memories series.

Vanessa lifted the microphone and, without a trace of shame, recited every concept, every spark of inspiration Adriana had bled out over countless sleepless nights.

In the front row, seated where the Family's honored guests sat, Lorenzo watched with undisguised pride on his face.

"Vanessa has a real gift for the craft," he said.

The judges nodded along, murmuring their approval.

Adriana's mind went blank. She had never imagined he would take work she treasured like her own flesh and blood and hand it to another woman.

The host called her name several times before she came back to herself and walked out under the lights.

She drew a deep breath, set out her designs, and met the stunned room without flinching. Her voice came clear and steady.

"Esteemed judges. My name is Adriana Falcone. This Starlight Memories collection is my original work. What Miss Carbone has just shown you is a theft of my designs, entire."

The instant the words left her, the hall broke into noise.

The judges traded uneasy glances, their eyes drifting toward Lorenzo in the place of honor, waiting for the Don's son to speak.

Lorenzo rose slowly. His gaze moved over her, cold as a drawn blade, and his lips barely parted.

"Adriana. What do you think you're doing?"

"Look at yourself. What kind of spectacle is this? You call yourself a Moretti? You're an embarrassment to the name."

Adriana swallowed the agony turning over inside her.

"I'm making a spectacle? You took the work I poured my heart and soul into, night after night, and made a gift of it to your kept woman. And I'm the one making a spectacle?"

His face stayed glacial.

"Is your heart really that ugly? Because we're bound, no other woman is allowed to breathe near me? When did you become this person?"

Adriana laughed out loud. "Who changed here, Lorenzo? You or me?"

"In your eyes everything I am is worthless. But of course it is. You can't even remember your own vows."

"You swore you'd love me to the end of your life." Her voice dropped low. "Turns out your life was shorter than I thought."

She turned to Vanessa, who stood there glowing with satisfaction, and the corner of Adriana's mouth curved upward.

Then, before the whole room, she crossed to the fire station on the wall, lifted the extinguisher free, and brought it down on Vanessa's counterfeit pieces. The display burst apart, wreckage scattering across the floor.

Vanessa shrieked the moment it registered. Her people surged in, lunging at Adriana, screaming for her to drop dead.

The hall fell into chaos. Adriana was hopelessly outnumbered, and they shoved her to the ground.

Lorenzo's first instinct was to gather Vanessa against him and carry her out of the building.

Adriana curled in on herself on the floor, both hands locked over her lower belly, things raining down on her body. She trembled with the pain of it and would not let go.

It was not until the hall's men regained order that she was finally pulled free.

Her hair was tangled and wild, the look of her wrecked, and a thin line of blood crept from a gash at her temple.

The cameras came up all at once, catching every frame of her humiliation.

Mockery and vicious words swirled around her. She seemed to hear none of it. She simply kept walking, steady and unbowed, toward the doors.

She had barely stepped past the iron gates when a message from Carmela came through.

"Tomorrow is the old Don's feast day. I'm hoping you'll come one last time. I'd also like to put the papers severing the alliance in your hands myself."

Adriana stared at the screen for a long time before typing back a single word: "Okay."

The next morning, she arrived at the Moretti estate early, planning to pay her respects and leave.

She never expected Lorenzo to walk in with Vanessa on his arm.

The courtyard, hung with white linens and the scent of garlic from the kitchens, fell into a sudden hush, then erupted. Made men and their wives turned to one another, murmuring in disbelief. Somewhere a chair scraped stone.

Carmela's face drained of color.

"Who told you to bring her here? Carlo, the men, get this woman out of my house."

"I dare anyone to try."

Lorenzo stepped forward, shielding Vanessa behind him. His gaze swept the gathering, and every word came out razor-sharp.

"Vanessa is carrying my child. A Moretti heir. I brought her here today so every man under this roof acknowledges that."

The teacup slipped from Adriana's fingers. It shattered against the marble, hot tea splashing across her legs. She didn't feel it.

Lorenzo's expression was hard as stone as he drew a folded document from inside his jacket.

"Adriana cannot bear children. The child Vanessa carries is the only heir this bloodline will get."

Carmela stumbled back a step. She snatched the report with trembling hands, her face white with shock. The relatives broke into chaos, voices overlapping, gasps rippling down the long table where Sunday wine still sat untouched.

Adriana steadied herself. She stepped forward, her gaze locked on Lorenzo like a blade.

"Where did you get this report?"

Lorenzo's voice shook.

"If Vanessa hadn't found out, were you going to hide this from the famiglia forever? Let the bloodline die out?"

Adriana let out a bitter laugh. No words came. Beneath the table's edge, her thumb found the slim band she had designed herself and turned it, slow, a quarter-rotation.

Vanessa turned to her, eyes glistening with tears.

"I know my blood isn't good enough. I know I'm not worthy of Lorenzo. But this baby is innocent. All I want is to keep it." Her answer came a beat too quick, her trembling smile stretching a fraction too wide.

"This family does not recognize that child, and it certainly does not recognize you."

Carmela's voice cut through the room like a whip. She crossed to Adriana's side and stood there like a wall built of forty years of being a Don's wife.

"Anyone who tries to set foot in this house with that woman answers to me first."

Lorenzo raised his voice.

"Mamma. Vanessa carries a son."

The room went still. Even the soldiers along the wall stopped breathing.

"I'll see Vanessa deliver this child safely. He's my only heir. As for you, Adriana, you'll always be the Don's wife. Once the boy is born, he'll be handed to you to raise. That should be enough."

Let Vanessa bear the child to carry the bloodline. Keep Adriana as the legitimate wife to preserve the Family's honor and its clean face to the world.

Adriana laughed. A cold, hollow sound.

Enough?

"What a tidy little arrangement, Don Moretti. You really do mean to have it all."

Across the room, old Vittorio Moretti heard every word. His whole body trembled. He clutched his chest and sank into his chair, one hand white-knuckled on the head of his cane.

Adriana looked at the grotesque farce unfolding before her. She drew a long breath, forcing the storm inside her down, and turned to face Salvatore Moretti, Carmela, and Vittorio. She bowed deeply, the way one bows to a bloodline one is leaving forever.

"The affairs of this Family are no longer my concern."

She turned and walked away.

"Wait. Please, wait."

Vanessa rushed after her, catching her by the arm. Tears streamed down her face, the picture of fragile, rain-soaked beauty.

"Please, I'm begging you. Let me have this baby. I'm begging you."

"Let go of me."

Adriana wrenched her arm, trying to break free.

Vanessa only gripped tighter. She leaned in close, her voice dropping to a whisper meant for Adriana's ears alone.

"Adriana Falcone. I never thought he'd still insist on keeping you as the Don's wife."

The words landed. In the same instant, the grip on Adriana's arm vanished.

Vanessa's body pitched backward. She hit the stone steps with a sickening thud, and a piercing scream tore through the courtyard.

"Ahhh!"

"Vanessa!"

Lorenzo burst through the doors to find Vanessa crumpled on the steps, both hands clutching her stomach, her face chalk-white.

"Lorenzo, she pushed me. My stomach, it hurts so much, the baby, my baby."