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Marius laughed, a short, sharp, bitter laugh.

“The better question is who didn’t she poison? Don Bianco’s housekeeper and me are the only ones who fucking lived, because we’re the only ones who didn’t eat the honey.” He laughed again, utterly mirthless. “She got half of us in one night and the rest went down over the next day.”

“What is going on?” Don DiNardo asked. He passed by me to stand beside Tomas, though not before giving me a sharp glance. I knew he’d heard everything, despite his question. Clearly, he realized the room was in a standoff, but he was so casual he could have been asking about the weather. “Bianco. You’re early.”

“My apologies, DiNardo,” Don Bianco replied, without sounding at all apologetic. “It did not take us as long to sort out the trip as I anticipated, and I didn’t want to be in New York without stopping by to let you know I was here.” Now that the don was beside Tomas, I dared to peek between the two men. Don Bianco didn’t look apologetic either.

His blue eyes met mine, piercing and a little too knowledgeable. I sucked in a breath that settled in my gut like a lead ball, and I shifted back behind Tomas again to escape his gaze. As if realizing what had happened, Tomas shifted closer to Don DiNardo at exactly that moment anyway, cutting off my chances of peeking at him from that side again.

Clara and Hailey flanked me, as Jack joined his father. Both of them looked at me suspiciously. I widened my eyes at them, trying to appear confused. If I could reach ‘fragile,’ even better.

“I see.” Don DiNardo definitely wasn’t taken in by Don Bianco’s smooth lies, but he didn’t call the other man out on them either. “I appreciate knowing who is going in and out of my city.”

“Did he say you poisoned people?” Clara whispered in my ear, though she had to go up on her toes to do it. I gave her a helpless glance as she narrowed her eyes at me. On my other side, Hailey threaded her arm through mine.

“I promise I’m not mad if you poisoned my grandfather’s men,” Hailey murmured. “I didn’t consider them family even before I knew my grandfather and cousin murdered my parents. But how did you miss Marius out of all of them? Couldn’t you have gotten him and missed one of the others?”

It was a good question. I hadn’t just helped the housekeeper provide them all with Oleander honey, I’d also ensured rat poison ended up in their stew for that evening. The former Don Bianco had kept me in the cage whenever he had no need for me, but he’d felt that a woman’s place was either in the kitchen or in his bedroom… foolish man.

That had given me all the opportunity I’d needed.

“I have no idea what they’re talking about,” I whispered back, shaking my head. I let my arms tremble a little. It didn’t require much acting. My heart was pounding madly in my chest.

Living with the DiNardos, fixing up the conservatory, being Tomas’ wife, calling him Daddy, even being spanked by him when I was naughty… I hadn’t known it until this moment, when it was all coming crumbling down around me, but I’d been happy. I liked this new life that I’d somehow stumbled into.

I didn’t want it to be taken away from me.

Both Hailey and Clara looked at me.

They didn’t believe me.

That blasted Marius.

If I didn’t die here today, I’d find a way to take him out. Somehow. Someday.

But what I really wanted, right now, was to curl up in Daddy’s arms and close my eyes and shut out the rest of the world. Unfortunately, his back was to me, and I was trapped between Hailey and Clara.

And I was pretty sure everyone in the room knew Marius was telling the truth.

Including Daddy.

Forget being held by him, I wasn’t sure he was going to want anything to do with me after this.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Tomas

Ivy had poisoned the Biancos.

I knew the truth of that statement in my bones.

Which meant I couldn’t step away from my position between her and them. The new don hadn’t known until this moment, but now that he did, she was in grave danger. I wasn’t going to let the Biancos have her, no matter how much they might want revenge for how she’d decimated their numbers.

“If you’d like, Anthony can bring your man to the doctor.” Don DiNardo gestured.

“I don’t want a fucking doctor; I want that bitch dead.” Marius got to his feet, obviously seething, glaring at me though he couldn’t quite meet my eyes as he did it. He was still cradling his arm.

“That’s my wife.” My voice came out as a low growl. “Try and touch her again and you won’t have to worry about your arm being broken, because I’ll rip it off and beat you to death with it.”