The Mafia Boss Caught His Pregnant Ex at His Wedding, and the Truth Made His Bride Walk Away

The air in the green room seemed to congeal.

Vincent slowly released the pressure on Michael’s throat, but the barrel of the Sig Sauer never wavered from the center of his forehead. Michael collapsed onto his knees, coughing violently, clutching his neck as he sucked in ragged lungfuls of air.

"Carmine Valenti," Vincent repeated, the name dropping like lead. "You brought the Valenti family into my business?"

The Valenti syndicate controlled the south side of Chicago and the illicit distribution networks running through northwest Indiana. For twenty years, the Morettis and the Valentis had maintained an uneasy, heavily armed truce, separated by the boundary of the Stevenson Expressway. Carmine Valenti was a sadistic, old-school racketeer who viewed business treaties as temporary suggestions.

"I didn't give him our operations, Vincent!" Michael choked out, staring up from the floor with terrified, bloodshot eyes. "I just needed him to provide an untraceable banking routing number through his shell company in Cyprus. I needed to move fifty thousand dollars without your forensic accountants flagging the withdrawal! But Carmine... Carmine had someone watching my accounts. He asked why I was routing money to a medical clinic on Michigan Avenue. He put a tail on Grace!"

Vincent looked over his shoulder at me. The wrath in his eyes was instantly eclipsed by a sudden, sickening panic.

"Grace," Vincent said, his voice taut as a wire. "Where have you been staying?"

"My... my apartment in Lincoln Park," I stammered, my heart thumping wildly against my ribs. "On Belden Avenue."

"Who has your spare key?"

"Just... just my landlord. And my business partner, Sarah."

Vincent lowered his weapon, decocked it with a flick of his thumb, and slid it back into his shoulder holster. He stepped over the scattered books, grabbed the house phone on the desk, and dialed an internal extension.

"Dante," Vincent ordered. "Bring the armored Suburban to the backstage alley. Bring six men. Tell Marco to take two squads and secure 214 Belden Avenue immediately. If anyone is watching the building, take them alive. If they resist, neutralize them. Go."

He slammed the receiver down, then turned back to Michael.

"Get up," Vincent commanded.

Michael scrambled to his feet, leaning against the ruined bookshelf for support, his hands trembling violently.

"You are alive right now, Michael, for one reason only," Vincent said, his voice chillingly devoid of emotion. "Because I need to know every single word you spoke to Carmine Valenti. If a single hair on Grace's head is harmed, if my daughter is exposed to even the shadow of a threat, I will personally flay you in the basement of the Calumet freight terminal. Dante will take you to the safehouse on 31st Street. You will stay in the cell until I come for you."

The door unlocked from the outside, and Dante stepped in, his expression grim. Behind him stood two junior enforcers wearing tactical jackets over their suits.

"Take him," Vincent said, not even looking as his oldest friend was shoved forward, cuffed behind his back, and dragged out into the corridor.

When the door closed again, Vincent turned to me.

He looked down at his bleeding hand, then pulled a clean linen handkerchief from his pocket and wrapped it tightly around the cut, tying it off with his teeth. He walked over to the sofa, dropped to his knees before me, and reached out to take both of my hands in his.

"Grace," he whispered, his face drawn with an agony I had never seen in him before. "I am sorry. I am so Goddamn sorry."

"Vincent, what is happening?" I asked, tears finally spilling over my cheeks. "Who is Carmine Valenti? Why does he care about me? I’m an architect! I spend my days looking at blueprints and preservation permits!"

"He cares because you are carrying my blood," Vincent said, lifting my hands to his lips, kissing my cold knuckles with fierce, trembling intensity. "In my world, an heir is leverage. A pregnant woman is a target. Carmine has been looking for a crack in my armor for ten years. If he knows you exist, and he knows that baby is mine, he won't stop until he controls you."

"I can't go back to my apartment, can I?"

"No," Vincent said flatly. "You are never going back to that apartment. You are coming with me to the estate in Lake Forest."

"Vincent, we broke up five months ago! You were standing at an altar ten minutes ago!"

"I don't care about the altar," he growled softly, his dark eyes blazing with an unyielding, possessive fire. "I don't care about the wedding. I don't care about the Whitmores. The only thing in this miserable city that matters to me right now is sitting on this sofa. You and my daughter."

Before I could protest, the private door to the alley swung open, and the cold November wind rushed into the room, bringing the smell of rain-slicked asphalt and exhaust fumes. Two armed guards flanked the doorway, their automatic rifles concealed beneath long overcoats.