Chapter 1

I was going to die.

Bullet or cancer — the only question was which would kill me first.

My husband loaded his gun at the breakfast table, and my mother-in-law poured coffee like it was Sunday morning.

"Valentina, be a good girl and hold still."

——

Three weeks earlier, I married Dominic Ferro, the most dangerous man on the Eastern Seaboard.

Not by choice.

My father owed the Ferro family eleven million dollars and a blood debt. I was the payment.

The wedding was beautiful. Four hundred guests. White roses imported from Ecuador. A Vera Wang gown that cost more than my mother's house.

My mother cried at the altar.

Not because she was happy.

Because she knew she'd never see me again.

"Think of it as an honor," my father said, straightening his tie. "The Ferros don't marry just anyone."

He didn't walk me down the aisle out of love. He walked me down to settle his tab.

Dominic didn't look at me once during the ceremony.

Not when the priest read the vows. Not when I said "I do." Not when he slid the cold platinum band onto my finger.

He looked at his phone.

After the reception, I was taken to the Ferro estate — a fortress of black marble and surveillance cameras on the cliffs above the Hudson River.

A maid showed me to my room. Not our room. My room.

It was in the east wing, as far from Dominic's quarters as architecturally possible.

"Mr. Ferro prefers not to be disturbed," the maid said, eyes on the floor. "Breakfast is at seven. Don't be late. Mrs. Ferro Senior does not tolerate tardiness."

The door clicked shut behind her.

I sat on the edge of the king-sized bed and pressed my palms against my stomach, where the dull, grinding pain had lived for months.

Late-stage ovarian cancer.

Diagnosed four days before my father sold me.

The doctor had said, "With aggressive treatment, you could have two to three years. Without it — four months, maybe five."

I told no one.

What was the point? My father would have sold me anyway. Damaged goods or not, a debt was a debt.

And my mother — she would have cried harder, but she still would have let him do it.

So I swallowed my painkillers dry and unpacked my suitcase into drawers that smelled like cedar and old money.

The first morning, I arrived at breakfast at 6:58.

Dominic was already gone. His chair was empty, his coffee untouched.

But his mother, Cecilia Ferro, sat at the head of the table like a queen holding court.

Across from her sat a girl my age — maybe younger — with honey-blonde hair and a smile so sweet it could rot your teeth.

"You must be Valentina." The girl extended a delicate hand. "I'm Sera. Sera Marchetti. Dominic's... well." She laughed softly. "We grew up together."

Cecilia's eyes swept over me the way a butcher examines a carcass.

"You're thin," she said. "Too thin. The Ferro family needs heirs, not coat hangers."

"I —"

"Sit down. Eat. And fix your face. You look half-dead."

I sat.

Sera passed me a plate of eggs, her fingers brushing mine.

Her smile never wavered.

But her eyes — her eyes were ice.