Page 109 of Wicked Rivals

“I know I would rather be Stefano’s whore, fucking him in his marital bed night after night, than be with you. You are nothing. Benedetta knows about me. She knows about Stefano’s son. And even she would rather share Stefano than be stuck with a sniveling little worm like you.”

The wedding had been called off, but this lunatic didn’t know that. So I baited him, to make him yell, scream, hit something. Anything to get the security guard’s attention, so he would come and investigate.

Luka sneered, leaning in as he opened and closed his fists, and his breath came out in small bursts.

“You’re going to regret those words, you stupid bitch. Don’t you know who I am?”

“I know who you aren’t. You aren’t the man Benedetta would ever choose. You aren’t the man I want or the man I love. At this point, I question if you’re a man at all. You talk about me having your children, but are you even man enough to get it up? I bet your tiny little dick can’t even get hard.”

My grandmother once said if I ever needed to defend myself against a man, go for what hung between his legs.

But since I literally couldn’t get there, I applied her advice using verbal assaults instead.

Luka’s eyes got wider, his pupils like pin pricks surrounded by muddy irises and red-streaked whites. A deeper flush pumped crimson into his face and neck. Spittle flew from his mouth, not only when he spoke but also with his panting.

He was close to snapping.

I needed to push him a little further.

“How were you planning to get me pregnant? Maybe you expected me to be unsatisfied and run to fuck Stefano? He could get me pregnant again, that’s for damn sure. Who knows? It’s possible I’m carrying his second child right now.”

I touched my stomach, smiling, while the idea took root.

Oh shit. Could I really be pregnant?

“You are such a fucking whore!” he screamed.

Yep. That did the trick.

With another fake smile, I backed a few feet away, waiting for a door to open or to hear footsteps racing this way after an exclamation like that in the middle of an elementary school.

Nothing happened.

Where the fuck was that security guard?

“I’m not yours,” I said. “I’ll never be yours. And Benedetta Capaldo will never be yours either.”

I could blame the head injury, or the duress caused by the situation, but it really came down to one simple fact…

I had underestimated how unhinged this man had become.

How far he would go.

I hadn’t even realized he carried a gun with him, not until he jerked it out of his pants.

“You should’ve behaved like a nice Italian girl,” he snarled.

Then he aimed his pistol at me.

“This would’ve been so easy if you’d just been nice to me.”

CHAPTER 23

STEFANO

“Take my son to his room,” I snapped at the doctor. “And the rest of you, get the fuck out. Give me a few minutes.”

“I’ll stay with the boy,” Tony said.

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