The air in this room is like a wall of solidified oppression. Alexius’ scowl can crack through titanium while Isaia’s and Caelian’s stares are so intense it’s practically burrowed inside my skull. I know this meeting isn’t going to end well. How could it? I haven’t even said what I needed to say, and already the tension is so thick, I’m choking on it.
Maximo leans against the wall with his arms crossed firmly, the crease on his forehead clearly indicating just how pissed off he is to be here. He was on this Briana woman’s heels when I called this meeting, insisting he be present. And the mere fact that I expected him to put his manhunt on pause for this should be enough for him to know that I’m about to pull the rug right from under them all. Everyone knows that for me to call a meeting means either the world is about to end or the devil’s about to move in.
Caelian’s eyes narrow, his fingers drumming an impatient beat against the arm of his chair. “Well?”
I clench my jaw, my heart chipping away at my ribs like a jackhammer. For the first time in my entire goddamn life, I don’t have words. I have no idea how I’m supposed to say this out loud and not kill something. But I have no choice. This has to be done.
“Mira’s pregnant.” My gaze darts all around the room except at their faces. Usually I’m a fan of ‘oh-fuck’ expressions, but today? Not so much.
Silence lingers in the room as my words sink in, and it’s as excruciating as a kick to the balls.
“Are you shitting me right now?” Isaia glares at me. “That’s it? You called all of us here, insisted on us being in this goddamn room within the hour just to share the news that your wife is pregnant?”
Alexius leans back in his chair, and I’m sure I hear him let out a sigh of relief. “I think what our youngest brother here is trying to say is that, I mean…congratu-fucking-lations, but we all sat here thinking you were about to tell us that hell’s asshole just opened up in our goddamn living room.”
“Believe me,” I mutter. “I wish that were the case.” I shoot Maximo a look, and his eyebrows slant inward.
Caelian places his arms on the table, squaring his shoulders. “What the fuck is going on, man?”
I walk over to the minibar and pour myself a shot of bourbon, throwing it back, appreciating the sting, even if only for a second. I’m starting to think a little kick to the nuts might be less painful. In fact, I’m pretty sure I’ll fucking volunteer if it means avoiding this altogether. This isn’t something I ever dreamed I’d have to do, words I never thought would come out of my mouth. It’s possibly one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do, telling my brothers of how this nightmare just turned into a goddamn horror show.
When I turn around to face them, my gaze finds Alexius’. “There’s a…” I swallow hard, shutting my eyes for a moment as the words burn my tongue.
“Jesus, Nicoli.” Caelian smirks. “You look like you’re about to tell your grandparents you just smoked pot in their bathroom and fucked the sink.”
“Seriously, Caelian,” Alexius scolds. “I swear to God, sometimes I struggle to believe we’re blood-related.”
“Hey, it’s not my fault all you got blessed with are blue eyes, plump lips, a sharp jawline, and high cheekbones with zero fucking personality.”
Isaia rolls his eyes. “Can you take nothing seriously?”
“Not when we get summoned like Armageddon’s about to go down, only to be told that our brother here knows how to fuck a baby into a goddamn womb.” Caelian glowers at me. “Well done, brother. It seems like you can aim after all.”
“There’s a chance Nunzio might be the father.”
And just like that, I drop the motherfucking bomb on all of them, and I pin Caelian with a pointed stare. “Nunzio might just be the one with the perfect aim, brother. Now if you can add sarcasm to that and make it even remotely funny, I’ll kiss your fucking ass right here, right now.”
The room falls silent, and I continue to stare at Caelian’s stunned expression, shock rippling through the air. It’s toxic, suffocating, and I have to clench my jaw as I gather the strength to say it again.
“My wife is pregnant, and there’s a chance that Nunzio might be the father.”
As the words leave my mouth, my control breaks, and I launch my glass across the room. Shards of glass explode, shattering on impact, mirroring the chaos that’s been warring inside me ever since the conversation Mira and I had in the middle of the goddam night.
All levity is drained from my brothers’ faces and the room is silent for several moments as they struggle to process this information.
“Please say that again,” Alexius says in disbelief.
I bite my bottom lip, snarling as my insides crawl with rage. “My wife might be carrying Nunzio Ferrero’s baby, and not mine.”
“How the fuck is that possible?” Caelian mutters.
“He raped her, Caelian,” I sneer. “Repeatedly. And now she’s pregnant, and we have no idea whether it’s his or mine.”
Isaia’s confusion is evident in his furrowed brow and how he awkwardly rubs the back of his neck. “But isn’t there some way to figure it out? Like if she counts her…umm…cycles or something?”
“The doctor says she’s almost eight weeks along, which matches the timeline.” My throat burns as if laced with acid, burning its way through my insides.
“Jesus Christ,” Alexius curses. “There really might be a chance this baby is his?”
“I’m afraid so.”
“Motherfucker!” He slams his fist into the table, but no one flinches. Everyone is too wrapped up in the magnitude of this ginormous fuck-up to notice if a goddamn bomb went off in the goddamn hallway.
Maximo remains silent on the other side of the room. He hasn’t moved an inch since I shared the news, and I can only imagine the chaos raging through his thoughts.
“Just when we think all this can’t get more fucked up.” Isaia falls back in his seat. “How is she?”
“That’s a stupid fucking question, you asshole. How the fuck do you think she is?” I pull out a cigarette, light it, and inhale as deep as my lungs allow me, reminding myself that my brothers aren’t the enemies here. I release the lungful of smoke across the room, watching as the bitter-tasting cloud dissipates. “She’s a fucking mess.”
“Understandably so.” Alexius gets up and goes to pour himself a glass of bourbon.
“Pour me one of those, would you?” Caelian says before he, too, lights himself a cigarette. “Jesus Christ. This is insane.”
“But there’s still a chance it could be yours?” Alexius retakes his seat. “You can still be the father?”
I nod as I stub out the cigarette in the large glass ashtray on the table. “There is a fifty-fifty chance, yes.”
“There’s tests that can be done to determine this?”
“There’s a non-invasive prenatal paternity test they can do.”
“Great,” Caelian exclaims. “Then let’s do that. Get that shit done asap because God knows there is no way any of us will survive the fuckton of pressure and tension that will descend on this house for nine fucking months.”
“Seven.”
“Seven fucking months.”
“I know you probably know this,” Alexius starts. “But this has the potential to change everything, you know? Between our family and the Ferreros.”
I lift a brow. “Believe me. I’m well aware.”
“Pardon my motherfucking ignorance, but explain to me how this will change anything with those assholes.” Caelian seethes.
“If this baby is…not Nicoli’s,” Alexius says, meeting my gaze, “some will see it as a union of our families.”
“You’re fucking kidding me, right?” Caelian’s eyes go wide. “Tell me you’re shitting me. That fucker raped our sister-in-law, and if she’s pregnant with his kid some will see it as a what? An alliance?”
“Some, yes.” Alexius rolls his shoulders. “Especially those who will stand to gain from it.”
“Only the Ferreros stand to gain anything from this shit-show.”
“Exactly,” I say, leaning back against the wall. “They will influence their allies, put the pressure on us to declare a ceasefire if a child is involved.”
Caelian leaps from his seat, his forehead creased with confusion. “So, you’re telling me, if this baby is Nunzio’s, we’ll be forced into a corner, not allowed to retaliate?”
“Yeah.” I rough a palm through my hair, pressing my fingers into my neck, squeezing. “It’ll come down to two choices. Call a ceasefire, lay down our guns like a bunch of pussies, or we see this through, bury that motherfucker, but risk losing the respect of others and making new enemies.”
“In other words, we’re fucked?”
The look Alexius gives him confirms it.
Caelian throws his hands in the air. “Well, in that case, I say we kill this cocksucker and every other stupid cunt who thinks they have a horse’s ass of a chance to take us on and live.”
“Unless there’s zero chance Nunzio is the father.” Everyone’s gaze snaps to Isaia. “No one has to know that there’s a chance Nunzio might be the father. If we don’t say anything, how would they know?”
Caelian snaps his fingers. “That’s right. If this baby is Nunzio’s, no one has to fucking know, and we still get to kill his ass.”
Concrete fills my gut, ice stacking up my spine. Alexius notices.
“What are you not telling us, Nicoli?”
I suck air through my teeth, pulling my lips in a thin line. “He already knows.”
“What? Who?”
“Nunzio.”
Caelian frowns. “Please explain that like I’m a two-year old.”
“Nunzio,” I repeat. “He already knows that there’s a chance she might be pregnant.”
“How?”
“Mira had a pregnancy test delivered to the house, and there was a note in the bag.”
Caelian shrugs. “What note? Jesus, Nicoli, talk faster.”
“A note!” I snap. “A fucking note, okay. It said ‘is it mine.’” I’m two breaths away from slamming my fist into the wall, every drop of blood in my veins charged with rage.
Alexius curses while Caelian sits back down, a faraway look on his face. “How does this fucker continue to be one step ahead of us?”
“I’ve been asking myself that for the last two months,” I mutter.
“I hate to be the one to ask this.” Isaia rubs his temples. “But if the worst happens here and it is his, are you keeping it? You know…the baby?”
Bile pushes up my throat. “That, um…” I hold my breath. “That will be for Mira to decide.”
Maximo’s eyes almost pop out of their sockets. “You’ll let her keep it if it’s not yours?”
“I don’t let her do anything,” I grit out. “As much as I wish I could control my wife, I don’t. And that ‘it’ you’re referring to is my wife’s baby, irrespective of who the goddamn father is.”
Maximo takes a threatening step toward me, his expression hard. “Nicoli, I love you like a brother. But think about this.”
“I’ve done nothing but think about this since she told me.”
“Then you know, if this baby is his, and Mira chooses to keep it, she would be reminded every day of what that son of a bitch did to her. You will be reminded of it every goddamn day.”
My pulse starts to go apeshit, the ice in my spine splintering and shattering, piercing my insides like poisoned arrows.
“What if that child grows up to look just like its psychopath dad, huh?”
“Maximo,” Alexius warns, but he doesn’t even flinch or attempt to back down.
I pull my palm down my face. “Trust me when I say I’ve gone through every fucking scenario a thousand times over.”
“Then you fucking know as well as I do that if this baby isn’t yours, Mirabella can’t keep it.”
“It’s not up to me.”
“Like fuck it isn’t!” His voice thunders through the room, his anger slamming into the walls with a force that vibrates against every bone in my body. His eyes are two dark storms hungry to wreak havoc on everything they can rip apart. “She can’t keep this baby!”
“Nicoli is right,” Alexius says coldly, sternly. “It’s not up to him, or any of us, for that matter. Whatever the outcome, the decision is hers.”
“Bullshit!” Maximo seethes. “Bull-fucking-shit. Are you going to sit there and tell me that if this baby is Nunzio’s you’d want that kid around this house? That you won’t once look at that boy and think of the blood that runs through his veins or listen to that girl laugh and hear her dad’s evil laughter?”
Alexius shakes his head. “It’s not up to us.”
“And what about the two families?” Maximo snarls. “Think about that for a second. Like you said, this baby will mean a forced alliance between the Del Rossa and Ferrero families. It will mean that that fucker gets to walk around freely knowing he can’t be touched for doing what he did to my sister. What, are we going to play house with those fuckers, drink a beer and have a barbecue every second Sunday? Over my dead goddamn body.”
All I can do is stand there and watch, witness Maximo lose his shit. It’s warranted. Everything this man has said makes sense. I have had a thousand similar thoughts, thinking of the consequences—thinking of how it would affect each and every one of us if it were true. But no matter how angry the thought makes me, nothing would be able to change it. Nothing.
“Maximo,” I say, trying to remain calm, “it is what it is, man.”
Maximo storms toward me, and I stand my ground, not blinking when he shoves his face so close to mine that I can feel the fire in his breath. “If this baby is his, you will man the fuck up and you will take control of the situation.”
“And what situation is that?” Mira’s voice is like a punch to the gut, and I close my eyes, exhaling as I prepare myself for the mother of all fuck-ups to go down.
Maximo’s nostrils flare as he turns to look at his sister while she stands in the door. No one noticed her come in; everyone too wrapped up in the chaos.
Maximo squares his shoulders, anger seeping from his pores. “If this baby isn’t your husband’s, you can’t keep it.”
“If this baby isn’t Nicoli’s, it’s a decision we’ll make together. Just the two of us.”
“You’ll seriously consider keeping it even if it’s the child of the man who raped you?”
Mira walks up to stand next to me and laces her fingers with mine, pressing herself tight against my side. “It’ll be up to Nicoli and me to decide. It has nothing to do with you, Maximo.” She glances at my brothers. “It has nothing to do with any of you.”
“Mira,” I warn softly. “You shouldn’t be here.”
“Why not? Since you’re all here discussing me and this pregnancy, I think this is exactly where I have to be.”
I turn my back on my brothers, leaning close to her, my lips almost touching her ear. “I told you I’ll take care of this.”
“And I told you I want to be involved in this.”
“That’s not an option.”
“When it comes to me and this baby, it’s the only option, Nicoli.”
“Mira. I’m asking you to leave this to me. To let me handle it. Please.”
She purses her cherry-red lips, her eyes conveying the depth of her determination. “I told you, I want to be a part of this.”
“Goddammit, woman,” I grit out softly.
“A part of what?” Maximo demands, his presence a force that takes up all the oxygen in the room.
Mira lets go of my hand and moves to stand in front of her brother, and I’m trying my best not to pick her up and throw her over my shoulder while hauling her sexy as fuck ass out of here. “I want to be a part of your plan to find Nunzio.”
Maximo scoffs. “That’s not happening, Mira.”
“Why not?”
“Because this is Dark Sovereign business,” Alexius chimes in, and she practically decapitates him when she cuts her glare in his direction.
“Dark Sovereign business? Tell me, Alexius, how finding the man who tortured and raped me—not you, me—is Dark Sovereign’s business and not mine?”
He sighs. “Mirabella—”
“Tell me how catching the man who used me as bait for some sick fuckers to hunt is more Dark Sovereign business than it is mine?”
“Okay.” Caelian rises to his feet. “Everyone just calm the fuck down.”
Isaia leans his head back. “Caelian, shut the fuck up, man.”
“You shut the hell up.”
“I swear to God, I will kick your ass so hard you’ll think it’s fucking Tuesday.”
“It is Tuesday, you dumb fuck!”
Glass shatters in an ear-piercing explosion that silences everyone instantly, and Mira stands at the edge of the table, her chest rising and falling as she stares at the broken ashtray she just threw across the room.
“You can all bicker and fight and threaten all you want, but it won’t change the fact that this baby is mine. No matter who the father is, the baby is still mine. And in the end, I will be the one who makes any and all decisions when it comes to this matter. Not you.”
Alexius gets to his feet, his authority reaching every corner of the room. “We have a way of doing things.”
“I know the rules of this world, Alexius. Better than you think. I know that if he’s the father it will force us into some twisted, fucked-up alliance with that family. That he’ll be untouchable and never pay for what he’s done.”
Alexius shoots me a warning look, a silent way of telling me to get a grip on my wife, but clearly, my brother has forgotten that there is no getting control over Mirabella.
“I also know the Dark Sovereign isn’t what it is today without breaking a few rules,” she continues. “This family does what needs to be done even if it means bending the rules to our benefit.”
Alexius narrow his eyes. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying that a paternity test will be done…after Nunzio is dead.”
Alexius stares at her for a moment, then slowly moves his gaze toward me as realization dawns on him. “If we find out he’s the father after we’ve killed him, there’s no alliance.”
I nod.
“There’s no risk of losing the respect of others,” he continues. “And zero risk of potential new enemies because of it.”
“Brilliant!” Caelian exclaims with a huge smile on his face. “That’s fucking brilliant.”
“It’s risky,” Isaia chimes in. “Especially since he knows she’s pregnant.”
I shake my head. “It only means we have to find him faster.”
“Fuck, yeah,” Caelian exclaims. “And plant some lead in his skull right after we pull his spine out his ass.”
“You’re not killing him.” Mira’s voice rings through the room, stunning everyone speechless.
Alexius leans with his hands on the table. “Excuse me? You just said—”
“I know what I said.” She stalks closer to him, her jaw firmly set, her eyes haunting, cold and fucking beautiful. “You’re not killing him.”
“Mirabella.” I stomp closer, placing a hand on her shoulder, but she shrugs me off while keeping her gaze etched on Alexius’.
“Up until now, all of you have controlled this entire situation. Refused to include me. Kept me hostage in this house. But that stops today.”
My twin brother sighs, and I know he’s at the end of his rope with her. “We have rules. We have a code. We can’t let him live, especially if this baby turns out to be his.”
“And I’m pretty sure that somewhere in your goddamn rule book, it says that you will not harm the father or mother of a family member’s child. Not without that family member’s permission. And while we can’t be sure whose baby I’m carrying, I’m that person.” She leans closer, her green eyes gleaming. “And I’m telling you now…you will not hurt him, Alexius.” She looks at all of us. “None of you will.”
As she speaks, I silently marvel at the strength my wife possesses. How, after everything she’s been through, she can still confront the darkness of her past head-on and use it to challenge others. Her confidence is fucking exquisite, and my heart swells with pride.
“That fucker needs to die, Mirabella,” Isaia says as if Nunzio’s death is some biblical prophecy.
“And he will,” she responds with a venomous tenor in her voice.
Caelian rubs his eyes with his palms. “I’m so confused.”
“Nunzio will die,” Mira continues. “But none of you assholes will get to kill him.”
A deafening silence drapes over the room, and the moment serves to highlight the exquisite resilience and strength my wife wears like a motherfucking crown.
Her gaze settles on mine. “You won’t kill him…because I will.”
