Carol knew now or at least she knew enough. She remembered their conversation in Singapore—remembered the grief in him then. She had wondered who exactly had broken his heart. Now she had her answer standing right in front of her with bright eyes and a pregnant stomach tied to another man.
She had finally found the source of her son’s heartbreak. But still... He did not seem heartbroken. Not anymore. She studied him as he leaned into the open car door to say something to Valentina that made her smile.
No, heartbreak was not what sat on him now.
*****
Bianca stood on the back balcony of her suite and watched the preparations below. The suite she once shared with her husband no longer felt like a room. It felt like a sentence.
The back courtyard had been transformed into a sprawling war zone of domestic celebration. Long tables. Crates of ingredients. Steam lifting into the air. Massive pots set over flame. The head chef moved through it all like a furious general, barking instructions, pointing with a wooden spoon, shifting from one cooker to the other as assistants scrambled in his wake.
Tears stung Bianca’s eyes. It was wicked to keep her there for this. The back courtyard had been turned into a festival of abundance.
And all of it—for her. For Veronica Scalese. Bianca gripped the balcony rail harder. She had not had an engagement party.
She had not had flowers, anticipation, or a courtyard transformed into celebration. She had not even really spoken to her husband until the wedding day itself, when they stood before God and family and exchanged vows that had meant everything to her and apparently almost nothing to him.
That was all. A ceremony. A signature. A name. And almost immediately after, Luca had gone back to New York as if marriage were an obligation to be completed and then filed away. She had remained behind with all the weight of the title and none of the tenderness that was supposed to come with it.
Her whole life—her entire life—had been shaped around one future: Luciano Genovese. Bianca Vitale was raised with that certainty stitched into her bones. Taught to wait for it. Prepare for it. Wear it. And when it finally came, Luca had treated her like an inconvenience.
Now this woman had arrived and overthrown her. Just like that. Bianca’s mouth tightened.
It was not as though Veronica Scalese was more beautiful than she was. That much Bianca knew with holy certainty. Her beauty had turned heads her whole life. Men had stared, obeyed, desired, competed. She knew for a fact that her face alone could make men reckless enough to ruin themselves. If she wanted adoration, she could summon it.
So what was it? What did Veronica have that she did not? What had made Luca choose so completely, so stupidly, so absolutely?
This house, this family, this same brutal machine that had fed on her life for years, had somehow made room for sweetness when it came to Veronica.
It did not matter. As long as she was still standing, Veronica would fall. She would fall from grace exactly as Bianca had.
She would be brought down from that glowing pedestal of devotion and family and chosen love.



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