Chapter 1 - The Pregnant Interruption at the High-Society Engagement Gala
“You have exactly ten seconds to explain why you’re carrying my child before I forget the woman I’m supposed to marry.” Dante Moretti’s voice cut through the hush of the ballroom. Two hundred guests in evening wear froze beneath the golden chandeliers. Isabella Bennett stood in the doorway with rain still clinging to her oversized coat, her burgundy dress stretched across the full curve of her eight-month belly. Every pair of eyes turned toward her at once.
Someone near the champagne fountain whispered that the pregnant woman looked as if she had wandered into the wrong building. Vanessa Sterling, silver gown catching the light like ice, stepped closer. “Security should remove this woman immediately. She’s clearly looking for money.”
Isabella’s fingers tightened over her stomach. She had driven nearly three hundred miles through freezing November rain because a note had been left under her apartment door in Milwaukee: Your baby will never be born. She wasn’t here for money. She just needed five minutes.
Dante did not move. Eight months ago a waitress working nights at a neighborhood diner had made him laugh for the first time in years. Then she had vanished. His gaze dropped to her belly. “You shouldn’t have come here.”
“I know,” she answered. “Especially not like this.”
Vanessa’s fingers closed around Isabella’s wrist. The coat slipped from one shoulder. A fading yellow-green bruise showed against the pale skin of her upper arm. Dante’s expression changed.
“Who did that?”
Before Isabella could answer, a tightening band gripped her lower belly. She stumbled, catching the edge of a marble table. A crystal glass shattered across the floor. Dante was already beside her, one hand supporting her back, the other resting carefully against the curve of her belly.
“Look at me,” he murmured. “Breathe slowly. I’m right here.”
She stared at him through tears. “You said you’d never want a family, Dante.”
His jaw tightened. “That was before I knew what losing you felt like.”
Across the room Vanessa’s face drained of color. Dante looked toward his security chief. “Close the doors. Nobody leaves until I say so.”
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Isabella caught his sleeve. “Dante, there’s something you need to know. The night I disappeared, someone showed me proof you ordered me killed.”
Dante went completely still.
