Total pages in book: 25
Estimated words: 24323 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 122(@200wpm)___ 97(@250wpm)___ 81(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 24323 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 122(@200wpm)___ 97(@250wpm)___ 81(@300wpm)
Why, dammit?
Why did she matter to him so damn much even when she had chosen her worthless parents over him?
When Keiran finally returned to the penthouse, it was with a weight on his shoulders that felt heavier than any he'd carried before.
As soon as he stepped into the living room, he stopped dead in his tracks.
Giancarlo was seated on the couch, looking perfectly at ease. Cadence sat across from him, her face drained of color.
Keiran's blood ran cold. One look at her face and he knew exactly what Marchetti had told her.
"Is what he's saying true?" Cadence asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
FUCK.
How did one explain just because he was famiglia did not mean he was a monster...or had to stay one at least? How to explain that it was not his choice to be born in a different world, and one that was soaked in blood and scarred by sin?
"Cadence—-"
"Just answer me. Yes or no."
His heart thudded against his chest. What would he do if she couldn't accept him? If she asked—-
"Are we still married?"
Cadence
PRESENT TIME
My mind is still blank when Keiran comes back to the living room, alone.
"Giancarlo?" I hear myself asking.
"Gone."
We look at each other. The silence stretches between us, suffocating in its weight.
"It's true," he says curtly.
"H-How?" My voice comes out shaky, alien to my own ears.
"You signed the papers, I didn't. You only presumed I did."
I try to process this. All this time, I thought we'd been divorced. That our brief, intense marriage had been legally dissolved. That the only thing binding us was the lingering pain of what might have been.
"But you asked me to be your mistress."
"You are one in other people's eyes." His voice is flat, emotionless.
"But I'm also your wife."
"For now."
"Stop that," I whisper.
Because I think...I think I have enough of his insinuations. Enough of his games and half-truths and the way he keeps me dangling between hope and despair.
"I was wrong to believe Dad over you. I was just so guilty about loving you more that I felt I should believe him, because he was with me longer." The words pour out of me, unstoppable now. "But you...you made it so easy, too!"
"I never cheated—"
"But you were gone almost every night and you never told me where you were going!" My voice rises, years of suppressed hurt finally finding its voice. "You told me you didn't leave on our wedding night but I..." My voice breaks down. "I saw you, Keiran. With a woman. And she kissed you."
Keiran whitens. "Why didn't you tell me?"
"I asked you, and you lied!"
He takes a step toward me, but this time I step back. I've spent three years blaming myself for our relationship falling apart. Three years wondering what I could have done differently. And all this time...
"Who is she?" I ask again.
"Bex." His voice is strained. "Her name is Bex and she works—she used to work for your brother."
I don't remember sitting down after that. Actually, I don't remember much, don't remember anything beyond all the things that Keiran told me.
My half-brother used to be a mafia boss.
And so was Keiran.
Giancarlo was another one and oh, there's a fourth one who might want me dead because of my adopted parents.
It's all so confusing, and I'm tempted to laugh and cry at the same time.
Maybe I would have if not for that one thing which I'm sure of—-
One painful truth that's about to rip me apart from within.
"Cadence—"
He tries to hold my hands but I can't.
Not just yet.
"I need some time alone."
He whitens.
"P-Please."
He leaves.
And that's when I cry.
Because the greatest lie of all was the one we didn't talk about.
I thought he married me because he loved me.
But now it turns out he was only forced to marry me because of a debt he owed my blood brother.
Keiran
PRESENT TIME
The door closed behind him with a soft click, but it might as well have been the sound of a coffin lid sealing shut.
Keiran stood in the hallway of his own penthouse, more lost than he'd ever been. Inside that room was his wife—legally still his wife—crying because of him. Because of lies that had seemed necessary at the time but now felt like poison that had seeped into every part of their relationship.
"You see it now, don't you?"
It was Giancarlo.
Standing outside his apartment.
Bex was right, he thought numbly. The man had changed. He was Boston's most powerful mafia billionaire. But all the man cared about was a girl's heart shattering to pieces.
"You love her," Giancarlo spelled out grimly.
Keiran wanted to deny this. But how could he when all he saw was the look on her face?
And the moment he started seeing the past in her eyes—-
God, what have I done?
It was Keiran's first time to call out to God.
Because his whole life, he had been too ashamed to ask for God's help because he had believed he was beyond saving.