Page 29 of Claimed Through Deception

"Caterina Falco," Elena says, the name dripping with awe. "She’s practically mafia royalty. Have you seen her? She is stunning. And she’s going to be the Don’s wife. The Lady of this house."

"Of course she is," Gia sneers, and I can practically hear her looking in the direction of my quarters. "Did anyone actually think he would marry some street rat? Men like Niccolò Severato play with their food, Elena. But when it’s time to sit at the head of the table, they only marry their own kind. Caterina is his equal. Everyone else is just a temporary stain on the sheets."

I can't breathe.

The air in the hallway turns to solid ice in my lungs. My vision tunnels, the edges of the corridor turning a blurry, static black.

Caterina Falco. Engagement. Wife.

I press my hand flat against my chest, right over my sternum, trying to hold my ribcage together. A sharp, agonizing, violently physical pain tears through my core. It hurts worse than the bruises from the police raid. It hurts worse than Gia’s vile words about my mother.

Why does it hurt?

I squeeze my eyes shut, a hot, furious tear leaking past my lashes.

Why does this hurt?

Because I am an idiot. Because I am a weak, pathetic fool who let a monster play a trick on her mind.

I think back to my pathetic, humiliating fantasies just twenty minutes ago. I was scrubbing his floors, getting wet over the memory of his body against mine. You hate me. Then why is your heart beating so fast?

He made me feel seen. He stripped away the terror and replaced it with this dark, consuming heat. He made me feel like I was the only thing in the room that mattered.

And it was all a lie.

It was a game. A calculated, sadistic manipulation to get me to lower my guard. He isn't my twisted protector. He isn't a savior who recognized the survivor in me. He is an engaged man playing with a captive toy while he waits for his mafia bride to walk down the aisle.

The humiliation is absolute. It burns through my veins like battery acid, destroying whatever fragile, terrifying attraction had started to take root in the dark corners of my mind.

I am a temporary prisoner. I am a maid. I am a body he bought out of a holding cell to keep his bed warm until the real Queen arrives.

I open my eyes.

The blurry, static darkness clears. The tear on my cheek goes cold. I don't wipe it away. I let it sit there as a reminder of my own stupidity.

I reach down and pick up the bucket. My hands aren't shaking anymore. The panic is gone, entirely incinerated by a cold, protective fury.

I turn around and walk away from the staff lounge.

As I walk down the long, empty corridor toward my assigned room, I build back the iron wall. This wall is made of titanium. It is built on reality.

Niccolò Severato is not a man. He is a warden. He is a predator who orchestrated my ruin just to own my time. I will not look at his broad shoulders. I will not inhale the scent of his bergamot cologne. I will not let his dark, obsidian eyes convince me that he possesses a soul. I will not let my body betray me ever again.

I will wake up at six in the morning. I will wear the black dress. I will pour his bourbon and I will scrub his floors. I will endure the cruelty of Gia and the coldness of Marta.

I will survive the next three hundred and fifty-nine days.

And when the contract expires, I will walk out of those heavy iron gates, and I will never look back.

He wants compliance? I will give him exactly that. I will be the perfect, silent, hollow maid. I will give him my labor, but he will never, ever get another genuine reaction from me for as long as I live in this house.

10

Niccolò

It takes three days to drown the South Side in Irish blood.

By the time the convoy pulls back through the heavy iron gates of the Severato estate, my hands are coated in a dark, flaking crust of dried crimson. My knuckles are split. A dull, throbbing ache sits high in my right shoulder from the recoil of a rifle, but the turf war is over. The message was delivered. The streets belong to me.