Page 17 of Forbidden Vengeance

“Smart girl.” My fingers trace patterns on her hip, and she shivers. “But you’re missing one piece of the puzzle.”

She pulls back, eyes sharp despite her swollen lips and messy hair. The strategist replacing the lover, just like that. “What piece?”

I smile against her throat, breathing in that intoxicating scent. “You’ll figure it out. You always do.”

A car door slams somewhere in the garage, the sound echoing off concrete walls. Elena tenses beneath my hands, reality crashing back. We break apart slowly, reluctantly, like magnets fighting their natural pull.

She smooths her dress, fixes her hair with practiced efficiency. Within seconds, she’s put herself back together—theperfect event planner, trusted confidante to New York’s most dangerous family.

Only her lips, still swollen from my kisses, betray what just happened.

“I should get back,” she says, voice steady now. “Bella will be asking for me.”

I step back, letting her slip past. But I catch her arm at the last moment, pulling her close one more time. “Watch your back with Anthony,” I murmur against her ear. “He’s not as stupid as he pretends to be.”

She pulls away with a smile that promises trouble. “Neither am I.”

I watch her walk away, heels clicking against concrete, back straight and head high. My little planner, playing both sides like a virtuoso. The taste of her lingers on my tongue, a reminder of promises we’ll both probably break.

The garage feels colder without her. I light another cigarette, watching the smoke curl in the fluorescent light. Somewhere above us, my brother paces hospital corridors while his wife fights for their unborn children.

Somewhere in Boston, Siobhan O’Connor plays her own dangerous game. And somewhere in Manhattan, Anthony Calabrese thinks he’s about ten steps ahead of everyone else.

Let them all play their games. I’ve got the only piece that matters—the queen who can move in any direction she chooses.

The only question is whether Elena will burn everything down herself, or if I’ll have to do it for her.

7

ELENA

The pregnancy test stares back at me like an accusation, two pink lines that turn my carefully orchestrated world on its axis. I shouldn’t have even tested—my period’s only five days late, and I’ve always been irregular.

But something felt different.

My breasts are tender, certain smells make me nauseous, and there’s a bone-deep exhaustion I can’t shake.

Still, I told myself it was stress, the weight of too many secrets finally catching up with me.

But these two pink lines don’t lie.

My hands shake as I reach for the box, reading the instructions for the fourth time. Maybe I did it wrong. Maybe morning urine would show different results. But three other tests from different brands show the same damning truth.

How the fuck did this happen?

I sit on the edge of my marble bathtub, the cold stone seeping through my silk robe as memories assault me. Anthony’s penthouse three weeks ago, his hands surprisingly gentle as he undressed me, while all I could think about was the shipping manifests I glimpsed on his desk.

Then Mario in the hospital parking garage just days ago, that kiss that felt like drowning and breathing all at once.

The timing makes my throat close with panic. There’s no question about paternity—this is Anthony’s child growing beneath my heart, conceived during one of our calculated encounters while I was hunting for information about the Irish mob’s trafficking routes.

I’ve always been so fucking careful. Even when Anthony would whisper in my ear how much better it would feel without barriers, how he wanted to feel all of me, I never wavered. The pack of pills in my bathroom drawer is meticulously marked, each one taken at exactly the same time every morning. The calendar on my phone tracks everything—my cycle, our encounters, the lies I tell.

My mind races through every meeting with Anthony over the past five months. The night in his penthouse when a storm knocked out power across Manhattan, and we fucked by candlelight while I memorized the contents of his safe.

The quickie in his office before a board meeting, where I planted a bug under his desk. The weekend at his Hampton’s estate, where I copied the contents of his laptop while he slept.

I was always protected. Always in control. The pills, the backup methods, the morning-after insurance when I felt especially paranoid—it was a system as carefully planned as every other aspect of my life.

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