This was her plan all along. She wanted me dead.
It wasn’t enough for her to snatch out my heart six years ago. Nowshe was here to finish the job, only this time she wanted my heart to stop beating.
Coming to a stop by the great floor-to-ceiling windows, I stared out into the city that never slept.
Jesus, only a few minutes ago, I had been so in love with her. I’d even told her I wanted to fill her belly with my baby. In my head, we had made plans, and this entire time—
My breath shuddered in my chest.
“Matteo, let me explain,” Sophia said in the smallest voice I had ever heard.
All this time, she had been playing me.
Just like she had six years ago.
In the dark reflection of the glass, I caught her eyes, and she stopped dead.
“Explain, then.”
She bit her lip. “It’s not—"
“It’s not poison? Cyanide, if I’m not mistaken. Do you really think I’m fool enough to believe anything you say, Sophia?” My hand clenched into a tight fist
She remained silent. “You don’t understand.”
Her voice was so quiet that I barely heard it. “What don’t I understand, Sophia?” Whirling around, I speared her to the spot with my eyes, and she shrank back. “Did you or did you not bring poison into my home to poison me?”
She opened her mouth and then snapped it shut. Her eyes darted away guiltily, and it was all the answer I needed.
“I wouldn’t have done it,” she whispered. “I didn’t want…”
She froze mid-sentence, like she had just realized what she had said.
“You didn’t want to? Who put you up to this, Sophia?” Not that I needed her words to know.
Gio was behind all of this. For all of his words about friendship and treaties, he had sent his own sister in here to whore herself out and kill me.
“Gio…” I shook my head.
A wild, desperate look flickered into her eyes. “No, Matteo. It wasn’t.” She rushed toward me. “I don’t expect you to understand.”
“Then explain it to me.” My voice was calm, too calm. She stopped dead in her tracks.
“I can’t…”
“You mean you won’t.” I met her in the middle of the rug. My hand closed around her slender throat, and I dragged her to me. “Let me tell you how things are going to be from now on, Sophia, so you know that you will not be able to manipulate me ever again. I’m going to keep you.”
Her eyes widened.
“Now,” I laughed coldly, “don’t think for a second that it means I forgive you. Or that I will ever allow myself to love you. In fact, forget anything I’ve ever said to you that’s made you smile.” I drew her closer still. My lips nipped at her ear. “I am so glad you didn’t have my child, Sophia. Any kid born from you would be cursed.”
She sucked in a startled, pained breath. “You don’t mean that.”
Throwing my head back, I laughed. “Don’t I? Sophia, I am going to keep you, I am going to use you. And,” I dragged the last words out, “I am going to make you watch as I destroy your family. Every single drop of your family’s blood will be wiped from the face of the earth. All of it. It ends with you.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Sophia
