The family's private clinic was quiet, with only the soft beeping of the machines.

"Six weeks. Your uterine wall is unusually thin, and it's congenital. If you terminate, there's a high chance you'll never carry again."

The doctor paused.

"This is probably your only chance to be a mother."

Twelve years ago, when I was eight, Grayson brought me home from the orphanage to the Moretti estate.

That day, he leaned down and told me: this is your home now. Nobody hurts you anymore.

I pressed my palm flat against my belly.

I pushed open the door to the main hall.

Camille Fontaine was inside, on her toes, fixing Grayson's tie. A cloud of expensive perfume hit me at the door.

The Fontaines and the Morettis had been locked in a cold war in New York for twenty years.

This marriage was a truce hammered out by the two old men at the top, and Grayson was just a piece on the board.

"Grayson, the board's pushing. We're setting the wedding for the sixteenth, right?"

Grayson didn't answer. His eyes went past her shoulder.

"You're back."

He pushed Camille's hand away.

"Oh, Quinn's back," Camille said, turning. She hooked her arm through Grayson's and pressed against him. "Grayson and I are almost engaged. As one of his people, I'll allow you to ask me for a gift."

I looked at their joined arms.

"I'm fine. I don't need anything."

Grayson sat down on the couch and picked up a folder.

Camille turned, her eyes landing on me.

"Quinn, that South Side docks file. I read your draft." Her tone was light. "Detailed, sure, but the Fontaine network down there has blind spots you'd never find. I worked that area for twenty years. Let me run the negotiation. I'll save you three months of groundwork."

She turned to Grayson, smiling, waiting for him to weigh in.

I stopped, half-bent over my shoes.

"That draft took me two weeks. Every block on those docks, every local boss, I mapped them all myself." I looked at Camille. There was contempt in her eyes, smug and cool.

Grayson didn't look up. "Since you're so eager to help, Quinn still runs the South Side. You assist. She gathered the intel, so she calls the shots at the table. You fill in the Fontaine blind spots."

Camille's smile froze for a second. "What?"

Grayson had already picked up his folder again. Not a word wasted. "Do I need to repeat myself?"

My mouth was twitching upward like crazy. I looked at Camille. Her face went gray, but she didn't dare say another word.

I lifted my chin and sauntered out, feeling great. On the way I threw her one last look, the kind that said she'd grab at everything without any idea what she could actually hold.

Back in my room, I contacted a black market broker and ordered a full new set of ID.

The door swung open.

Camille marched in. "Don't think you've won. You're nothing but a tool he keeps around. I'm the one who's going to be the next Donna Moretti." Her eyes dropped to the desk and lingered.

She picked up the appointment slip and read it carefully.

"Abortion appointment."

She didn't say it loudly, but the door was wide open.

The footsteps in the hallway stopped.

I lunged for it. "Give it back."

Camille didn't move. She just tilted her head toward the door.

"Gray, come look at this."

Grayson walked in fast.

He snatched the slip from her and scanned it. His face dropped.

"Who's the man."

His voice was low, like he was barely holding it together.

I didn't say anything, but I knew I was done.

"Quinn. Talk. I'll go handle him right now."

Camille sighed beside us, pitying.

"Gray, honestly, I could tell something was off with Quinn lately. I just didn't think —" She paused. "Forget it. Feelings are messy."

Grayson glanced sideways at her.

"Get out."

Camille smiled. "Sure. I'll leave you two to it."

Grayson turned back and gripped my chin, his fingers digging into my jaw, forcing my head up.

"The Morettis have raised you for twelve years. You see me every day, a man like me, and you let some piece of shit out there talk you into bed? I'm going to gut him right now."

His teeth were clenched. A vein stood out from his neck to his temple.

"You'd debase yourself like this for some bastard's kid? Run to a back-alley clinic?"

Pain shot through my jaw.

I bit the inside of my lip and stared at him without making a sound.

I didn't dare tell him that this "bastard's kid" was his blood. Mafia families lived and died by loyalty. He was this furious because he thought I'd been with some other man. If he ever found out I was the woman who'd played him, he'd treat me as a disgrace, and I'd end up in pieces.

"Talk!"

He squeezed harder.

"Let go."

He shoved my face away. I stumbled two steps back, hitting the edge of the desk with the small of my back.

He looked at how pale my face had gone and yanked his tie loose, agitated.

"Who is he?"

He took another step, blocking the light from the window.

"You'd throw your life away for him?"

"There's no one."

I gripped the edge of the desk and steadied myself.

Grayson let out a cold laugh. He tore the appointment slip into pieces and threw them in my face.

"Fine. Great."

He turned for the door.

At the threshold, he stopped.

"Tell security. Lock down every exit on the Moretti estate. Anyone who lets Quinn out, break their legs and feed them to the river."

I was done.

Shaking, I got hold of Mia. I had to run, and I had to run fast.

She didn't ask, just said, "I'll set it up."

My phone screen lit up on the desk.

An anonymous text.

I opened it.

The image was blurry, but I could still make out myself: drugged, staggering out of the Meridian suite, my back to the camera.

Camille had pulled that night's surveillance from the Fontaine archives, restored it, and was using it to blackmail me.

Quinn, don't even think about taking Grayson from me.

The second he saw a clean version, it was over.

He'd be sick to look at me, and he'd throw me in the East River himself.

Outside, the rain was coming down in sheets.

Eleven-thirty at night. I heard Mia arguing with the guard outside my door.

She smashed a vase to pull the hallway security off.

I shoved the window open, and the rain instantly soaked me through.

I slid down the drainpipe on the second floor. My palm tore open on the metal, blood smearing along it.

The second my feet hit the ground, there was a crash from above. My door had been kicked in.

"Quinn!"

His roar tore through the rain.

I didn't look back. I just ran.

Rain stabbed into my eyes, and I couldn't keep them open.

Behind me, he was screaming my name like a man losing his mind.

I cleared the gate and threw myself into a taxi parked at the curb.

"Drive."

The car cut through the rain.

I leaned back against the seat, shaking from the cold and the fear.

The clinic was tucked deep in an alley in one of the city's roughest neighborhoods, with moss climbing the walls and the air thick with disinfectant and damp rot.

This doctor owed the Morettis his life. He usually patched up the wounds that couldn't see daylight. Tonight, he was going to help me.

The surgical lamp clicked on.

I lay down on the table.

"Wait."

I raised a hand to stop him.

"Take this out first."

I pointed at the inside of my left wrist, where a small scar marked the chip the Morettis had implanted when I was eight, the day Grayson brought me home.

A family tracker.

Every Moretti carried one. Even me, the orphan girl they'd taken in.

Local anesthetic went into my skin. My wrist went numb, and then came a brief sharp pain.

The doctor set the chip on the tray. It was smaller than a grain of rice, and the metal hit the porcelain with a soft chime.

Nobody could find me anymore.

---

At the same moment, the Meridian Hotel, top floor.

The tech screen lit up.

"Grayson. We've got the Meridian footage."

Ryan's voice came through the phone, trembling slightly.

"Whole hallway, that night."

Grayson set his glass down.

The image was gray and grainy.

A figure staggered out of the suite, turned, and ran down the hallway.

Half a profile was all he got, but it was enough.

He knew her.

From the day she'd walked into the Moretti house at eight years old, he'd known her face from every angle.

"Grayson?"

Ryan called from the other end.

He didn't answer.

Another notification buzzed through. It was the family tracking system, and Quinn's chip signal had just gone dark somewhere in the south of the city.

His phone hit the desk.

"Get the car."

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