He’s made me promises. The clinic he’s going to help me build, the additional schooling he’s committed to financing. He’s planning our future with my input.
Is it real? Isanyof it real, or have I convinced myself my captor actually cares?
No, not my captor. Myhusband.
But then I remember last night. The way he held me after we made love, his face buried against my neck, his voice rough when he whispered, “I don’t deserve you, Gigi. I don’t deserve any of this.”
That didn’t sound like a performance. That sounded like a man in love. Which is a good thing because…
I’ve fallen for him. Completely, irrevocably, stupidly, but I’ve fallen in love with Luca Marchetti. The man who tore apart my life and forced me into marriage has somehow become the man I look for when I wake up, the one whose approval makes me warm with pleasure, whose touch I crave even when logic says I shouldn’t.
I’m in love with him.
But instead of scaring the shit out of me, it feels like the most honest thing I’ve acknowledged since I came here.
And now there might be a baby. His baby.Ourbaby.
The possessive thought makes my breath catch.
I need to know for sure. I need to confirm this before I let myself spiral further into what-ifs and maybes.
But where the hell do I get a pregnancy test when I can’t even leave the estate without Luca knowing? I tap my foot anxiously against the floor, thinking.
I bolt upright a moment later. A conversation plays through my mind that I’d half-listened to while passing through the service wing last week. Two young maids, probably in their early twenties, talking in hushed voices about keeping “supplies” in their shared bathroom. One of them had laughed and said something about not wanting to make pharmacy trips when you work for someone like Luca Marchetti, how the staff had pooled resources for emergency contraception and pregnancy tests so no one had to risk the awkward questions.
At the time, I’d felt a pang of sympathy for them—these young women working in a crime lord’s household, navigating all the complicated risks that came with that. But now?—
Now their foresight feels like providence.
I check my phone. It’s barely past nine, which means Luca will be in meetings until at least noon. The staff is busy with morning routines—Ramirez in the kitchen supervising lunch prep, the groundskeepers outside, most of the maids, including Linnea, cleaning the upper floors.
If I’m going to do this, now is the time.
My heart pounds as I make my way to the service wing, trying to look casual, like I have every right to be here. Which I do, technically. I’m Mrs. Marchetti now, this entire estate is supposedly my home.
But it doesn’t feel like it. Not this section where I’m still the boss’s wife rather than just Gigi.
The shared bathroom is empty when I slip inside, thank god. It’s small but clean, utilitarian in a way the main house isn’t. I lock the door behind me and start searching, trying not to disturb things too much.
Behind the cleaning supplies under the sink, I find it. A small cardboard box, the kind that comes in multipacks from drugstores. There are three tests left inside.
I stare at the box, my hands shaking. This is theft. I’m stealing from the household staff who probably can’t afford to replace this easily.
But I need to know. I need to know before I see Luca again and have to look him in the eye and pretend everything is normal when everything might actually be imploding.
I take one test, carefully rearranging the box so the missing item isn’t immediately obvious. I’ll replace it. I’ll change things for the staff so they don’t have to worry about buying their own supplies. But first, I need to do this for myself.
I slip the test into my pocket and make my way back through the estate, my heart hammering with every step.
What if someone saw me? What if they ask questions? What if word gets back to Luca before I’m ready?—
But I return to my old suite without incident and lock the door. I stand in the bathroom with the test in my trembling hands and realize I have no idea what I’m hoping for.
Do I want it to be positive? Do I want there to be physical proof that Luca and I have created something new?
Or do I want it to be negative? To have more time, more space to figure out what we are to each other before bringing an innocent life into this complicated mess?
I don’t know. Igenuinelydon’t know, and that scares me more than anything. I take a deep breath and rip open the blue plastic packaging to reveal the test and folded instructions. I snatch up the instructions and quickly read them, eyes darting over the page, half-reading it.
