Chapter 1 - THE ASHES IN THE DRAINThe air in the Boston basement apartment was thick with the scent of old paper and damp brick.
My breath caught in my throat as Dominic Valente stepped through the shattered frame of my front door, smoke curling from the muzzle of his weapon. The man who controlled the shipping lanes of Lake Michigan and the underworld of Chicago looked like a ghost—thinner, his eyes hollowed out by months of sleepless agony, his bespoke coat stained with travel and rain.
When his dark gaze swept the room and locked onto the curve of my swollen five-month belly beneath my oversized sweater, his weapon lowered instantly.
He didn't look at the stranger who had pinned me against the wall. He didn't look at the broken lamp or the wrecked furniture. He reached slowly into his pocket and pulled out a small, sealed evidence bag. Inside it were charred, blackened flakes of paper.
"I found them in the U-bend of your kitchen sink in Wicker Park, Meline," Dominic whispered, his voice trembling with a raw, shattered vulnerability I had never heard in him before. "A hospital logo. A gestational date. Six weeks and four days."
My heart hammered against my ribs like a trapped bird. "Stay away from me, Dominic. You chose Seraphina. You chose your empire."
"I chose to keep you alive!" Dominic shouted, stepping forward with a fierce, desperate intensity that made the other man shrink back. "The Duca family was hunting everyone connected to me. If I had let Seraphina know you were carrying my child, she would have had you killed before sundown! The words I said in that hallway were a lie to protect you until I could crush them!"
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Before I could answer, a cold voice interrupted from the doorway.
"Too bad you were too late, Valente."
