Chapter 0001

Layla

“I’m pregnant.” I gripped the thin purple test stick, fingers white against the flimsy plastic. Shaking a little, from shock and another emotion I couldn’t quite name. “Holy shit. I’m pregnant.”

And what a time to find out: twenty minutes before my wedding ceremony. The day my family would officially meet my husband—and the future father of my child, too, I supposed.

Holy shit.

I braced a hand against the bathroom vanity’s granite countertop. My whole body felt a bit … rubbery. Pregnant. I was pregnant with Vasco’s child.

What a trip.

Sure, we’d been legally married exactly a year today. But since we hadn’t yet held the ceremony, my family hadn’t met him, not with how much of a whirlwind it’d all been. Craziest decision of my life by a long shot, eloping with a man I’d met just three weeks prior, then leaving behind my glistening New York City for the wilds of Alaska.

But I’d known, always. From the first moment I’d set eyes on him that night outside the restaurant. He was mine.

Rain running rivulets down his angled cheekbones, clumping dark lashes, slicking black curls against glowing golden skin, he was the most beautiful man I’d ever seen. Even before his bowed lips had curved into a soft, white smile.

From that moment, I’d known. He was the one. Maybe that’s why I’d offered him my umbrella. Give him my phone number, too, when he’d asked in that lilting Italian accent. Agreed to a date the very next day.

Mine.

Today, perched in my guest bathroom, the pregnancy test balanced in my fingers, I had no doubt. I’d wanted him then for my husband, and I wanted him now for my future family.

Shit, I was going to be a mother.

I exhaled a shaking breath and lifted my gaze from the little plus sign in my fingers to the sprawling mirror. The face that stared back wasn’t shockingly different from my norm—my white-blond hair nestled in a braided crown sprinkled with white lilies; blue eyes lightly lined in kohl; lips softened to pink. The dress itself was simple: plain white that clung to my lean frame in a flattering sweep, ending above the knees.

Yet the simple, feminine touches rendered my reflection almost unfamiliar. Or maybe it was the glowing radiance of the girl in the glass. I smiled, and she beamed back.

That girl, the one effervescent in white, she looked fit to be Vasco’s queen, and definitely the mother of his child. Hell, she looked like the luckiest damned woman alive.

I exhaled another, surer, breath, letting the shock give way to the other feeling bubbling inside me. One I could now name—joy. Hesitant, uncertain, almost fearful joy, sure. But joy all the same. Vasco’s baby would be as beautiful as its father, I had no doubt.

Vasco himself would be overjoyed. But first, I had to make an appearance at my wedding ceremony. Get the introductions over with. Smile, nod, shake hands. The whole nine.

I smiled at the woman in the mirror again. She looked perfect, just like today would be. “Let’s do this, girl.”

I tucked the test into the top drawer of the bathroom vanity, nestling it under a tissue so it wouldn't be found before I was ready. Then, without further thought, I swept from the bathroom, down the hall, and into the backyard.

Past the French doors, our property sprawled in a breathtaking expanse of rolling lawn and manicured gardens. A white-stone path wound its way through rosebushes and daylilies, brushed alongside oleander and cherry blossoms fringing the edges of our fields. Behind it all, a backdrop of ragged mountains tore through the sky with the elegant violence only nature can achieve.

“She’s here!” A child’s squeaked voice drew my attention from the skyline—so vastly different from my Manhattan—to the small group of people assembled beneath a copse of flowering magnolias. “Layla!”

A smile bloomed over my face at the sight. My feet carried me down the white stone without hesitation towards the waiting group. “Hi! I’m so glad you’re all here!”

All the people I loved most in the world—right here. For me.

There was my childhood best friend, Danielle, with her kids and husband in tow. My older cousins, Nikki and Braden, each with their slew of tagalongs. My grandmother, of course, beaming at me from beneath a wide-brimmed pink hat.

Some of my fellow hospital interns had clearly come straight from work; I couldn’t help but smile at the white coats and colorful scrubs. That they’d made the effort almost had me—of all people—blinking tears from my carefully mascara-ed lashes.

Or maybe it was the thought of who wasn’t here, who’d never get to meet my husband or our child. My throat tightened against a sudden wave of sadness. My late parents would never meet their grandchild.

“Here’s your flowers!” Nikki’s tiny daughter thrust a bouquet of white lilies up over her head. The wispy blonde seven-year-old shared so few similarities with her big-bad-buff mama—nothing like the wild half-dressed hooligans we’d been as kids, tearing through upstate New York on dirt bikes and ATVs.

I wondered what of myself I would see in my own child. How much of me, and how much of Vasco?

“Thank you.” I lifted the bouquet from her fingers to inhale the sweet scent of my favorite bloom. Vasco, I’d no doubt, had picked these specially. “They’re beautiful.”

A bit sobering, however, was the lack of unfamiliar faces. Vasco had never mentioned his family. Never spoke about them or to them. Never so much as mentioned them. Once, I’d unearthed a photo from his wallet—every man dressed in neat black suits, a glowing brunette woman at Vasco’s side—but he’d brushed aside my questions.

I knew nothing of his past, and until this moment it’d never mattered. It was too much to hope, I supposed, that any of them might have showed to celebrate our special day.

But now, even more noticeably absent from the crowd was—

“Where is Vasco?” I leaned in close to Nonna to murmur in her ear. She alone had met my husband—of course she had, she was so much more than my grandmother—and would know his whereabouts. She'd be first to know about the baby, too.

Nonna didn’t have to answer; the faint lines drawn in alongside the deep grooves of permanently etched concern told me enough.

He’d left.

Sudden unease clenched my stomach in a tight fist. I didn’t bother to excuse myself, just turned and hurried back towards the house. Twice as fast as I’d left it. Vasco’s Italian heritage lent him no shortage of romantic notions and grand gestures, so for him to be absent at his own wedding …

Something was wrong.

My stomach clenched tighter. Something was wrong.

I slipped back through the French doors, into the sprawling living room. Could his family have something to do with this? Maybe he missed them, wanted them here. Wished they could be.

Just inside the living room, I paused. Handcrafted peach tile, vast picture windows framed in dark wood, and soft white walls leant the room a Tuscan ambiance. The fireplace on the far side of the room, however, brought in a sense of warmth—critical on cold, dark Alaskan winter nights.

Beside that fireplace, my husband leaned against the carved mahogany mantle. His back to me. A tailored navy suit highlighted the breadth of his muscular shoulders, contrasted it beautifully with the sharp V-cut of his waist.

Beautiful. Just like that night in the rain.

But this time, I couldn’t help but notice the hard-edged bump in the back of his fitted suit jacket. A gun, stuffed into the waistband of his dress pants. A reminder of his ceaseless caution.

He always had one in reach, like danger could strike at any moment. As a gun-owner myself, it’d never bothered me. Plenty of people had guns; maybe he’d been in the service before turning to business.

But today?

Today was us. Family. Friends. Not danger. Not here, in the home where we'd raise our child.

It struck me—suddenly and sharply—that I didn’t truly know Vasco. My husband, the man I’d chosen, married, the future father of my unborn child, was a mystery. Maybe there was a good reason for his family’s absence.

Still, I crossed the room to him. Wrapped my arms around his waist. Burrowed my face into his hard shoulder. Mine.

If my sudden presence surprised him, he didn't let it show.

I melted into his warmth. Strength. Into the hardness of his muscled body and his familiar smells of sandalwood and cinnamon. Everything would be all right, as long as I had him. “The wedding’s about to start, my love. We need to—”

Without warning, he turned in my embrace.

Pushed me suddenly and forcefully away.

The face that looked down on me—the face I so loved, had loved every day since I’d first seen it scrawled in the tears of the heavens like an avenging angel—that face was a cold, empty mask of emotionless lines. Unrecognizable.

Foreign. Unfamiliar.

A stranger’s face.

His words, a lance. “We should get a divorce.”

The bouquet tumbled from my fingers, scattering white lilies across the peach tile.