Page 57 of Forbidden Vengeance

“Friends don’t betray each other like this!” Her voice rises, raw with pregnancy hormones and hurt. “Friends don’t sleep with the man who—who?—”

She breaks off, and I hear the telltale gasping that signals a panic attack. Years of friendship means I know exactly what she’s experiencing—the tightness in her chest, the way the world starts to spin.

My hands itch to comfort her, the way I have countless times before. Muscle memory screaming at me to help, even as the impossible distance between us grows wider with every breath.

“The man who what?” Mario’s voice cuts through my guilt like a blade. He’s moved closer, pressed against my back now, close enough that Bella can probably hear him. “The man whosaw through Giuseppe’s lies? Who tried to stop Matteo from becoming exactly what the old man wanted?”

“Mario, don’t—” I try to pull the phone away but he catches my wrist, his touch gentler than his voice.

“You want to talk about monsters, Bella?” he continues, and I feel the tension thrumming through him. “Ask your precious husband what really happened the night Sophia died. Why he’s so desperate to protect Bianca.”

“You fucking bastard,” Bella snarls, and I hear the raw fury beneath her tears. The sound of her transformation from my sweet artist friend into Matteo’s donna. “You think I don’t know what you are? What you’ve done? Elena might be fooled by your act, but I know better.”

“Bella, please,” I beg, tears falling freely now. “It’s not that simple?—”

But it is that simple, isn’t it? I’ve betrayed my best friend. Slept with the man who tried to destroy her family. Carried Anthony’s child while falling for her family’s greatest enemy.

There’s no coming back from this, no way to make her understand that both versions of me were real—the loyal friend and the woman who chose Mario anyway.

“Itisthat simple!” Bella’s voice breaks. “You chosehim. After everything he’s done, everything he’s still doing, you chosehim. And now you’re carrying Anthony’s baby—oh yes, Elena, I know all about that and so does Anthony—while sleeping with the man who?—”

She stops abruptly. The silence that follows is deafening, pregnant with realization. I stop breathing entirely, knowing what’s coming.

When Bella speaks again, her voice has gone cold. “That wasn’t really your cousin at the hospital, was it? The night we tried to take you home?”

I clutch at the toilet bowl, fingers white-knuckled against the porcelain, searching for anything to anchor me in this moment. Mario’s breathing stills.

“Bella, you have to understand. I couldn’t?—”

“Yes or no.” Each word falls like an executioner’s blade. “Was that your cousin?”

I close my eyes. “No.”

“You fucking bitch.” The words explode from her. “You let some stranger walk into that hospital—into my husband’s territory—and lie to our faces? Do you have any idea what could have happened? What if she’d been sent by our enemies? What if?—”

She cuts herself off again, and her voice is pure ice when she speaks again. “Matteo’s on his way to you right now.”

The world tilts sideways. Black spots dance at the edges of my vision as panic claws up my throat.

“What? How?—”

“The Cartier bracelet,” she says flatly. “The one Anthony gave you for your birthday. Did you really think those diamonds were just diamonds?”

My hand flies to my wrist where the bracelet gleams innocently in the morning light. I’d been wearing it for months, so used to its weight I barely noticed it anymore. Anthony’s voice echoes in my memory:“Every beautiful thing deserves protection,cara.”

Protection. Or surveillance.

Mario’s already moving, that lethal DeLuca grace returning as he shifts into tactical mode. His gun appears in his hand like magic, and he’s already speaking rapid-fire Italian into his phone. The transformation from the man who held my hair minutes ago to this deadly predator is jarring.

With trembling fingers, I unclasp the bracelet. The diamonds mock me as I hurl it across the room like it’s burned me. Such a beautiful cage I’ve been wearing all this time.

“Bella,” I try one last time, desperation making my voice crack, “I never meant?—”

“To what? To betray me? To help the man who tried to destroy everything I love?” Her words cut deeper than any knife. “Save your explanations, Elena. I trusted you with my life, my family, my children. And you—” Her voice breaks, and the sound shatters something inside me. “You were the one person I thought would never hurt me like this.”

A sob tears through her words, raw and broken. Then her voice hardens into something terrible. “I hope you and Mario get exactly what you deserve.”

The line goes dead.

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