Page 30 of Banished and Pregnant by Her Sicilian Billionaire Husband

“Y-You do?” She looked relieved. She even started to smile—

“And I want you out of sight. For good.”

—until she heard the rest of his words. He watched her smile fade, her body jerking as if he had struck her, but he told himself that he didn’t give a damn. Shouldn’t.

Because this was the last time...

The last time, dammit.

“M-Marcello, I d-don’t...Please just listen.” She was suddenly speaking in a rush, and that just made things worse. “I don’t know why you...” Didn’t she realize how guilty this made her seem? How all of these protests were just her digging a deeper grave for herself? “But it’s not...it’s not—”

“Get out.”

“Marcello, please—”

She rushed forward and placed a crushed sheaf of papers on his desk.

“It’s V-Vico, I’m t-telling you—”

“Will you just stop?”

The viciousness of his tone had her stumbling back, but he no longer cared.

“Do you know what you’re asking me to do?” His own voice had gone unfamiliar. “To take a man who came to this house at nine years old. Who carried our daughter on his hip. Who stood at my father’s grave and held my mother up when her legs went.” He leaned on the desk. “And put him in front of the family as a traitor. On your word.”

“Not on my word.” She was crying now, but she didn’t seem to know it. “On the evidence—”

“Your evidence! Against my flesh and blood—”

“And I’m your wife,” she choked out. “I’m Rica’s mother! D-Doesn’t that count for anything?”

It did.

It always did.

Because even now...

Even now, he loved her.

Even now, he still remembered the girl she was over a decade ago, the one who had cried in the stockroom because she believed he had someone else.

But because he also remembered the lessons his own father had taught him—

The lessons that his own father had to learn the hard way.

Trust the evidence, not your heart.

Trust your blood, not your heart.

Trust everything but your heart.

And that was why, even though his chest felt as if it was about to explode with pain—

Enough.

Marcello found himself doing the same thing he had done years ago. He slammed a mental door shut on all the things that his heart wanted to say and focused on what he knew to be right.

Vico had warned him.