My mafia-boss ex fell to his knees when he realized my unborn baby was his—but seconds later, the doctor hit the emergency button.

That was what Lucia had meant.

Do not trust the badge, the coat, or the collar.

He came through the chapel entrance with two older women and a bouquet of white lilies. Security footage later showed him dipping his fingers in holy water, bowing his head, and walking past two guards who never thought to stop a priest going toward the maternity floor.

He was not a priest.

He was Adrian’s older brother.

The brother erased from every family photo.

The brother Adrian had been told died as an infant.

The brother Vittorio had apparently kept hidden, shaped, and sharpened into the kind of man Adrian had spent his life refusing to become.

I did not see him first.

Adrian did.

He had been standing outside the NICU glass, watching Isabella sleep inside an incubator, one tiny fist resting beside her face.

For ten minutes, he had not moved.

I watched from a wheelchair because Rebecca refused to let me walk and I refused to stay away from my daughter. My body felt hollowed out, stitched together by medicine and stubbornness, but the sight of Isabella breathing made every pain bearable.

“She has your mouth,” Adrian said softly.

“She has your frown.”

“She is judging everyone.”

“She should.”

He smiled faintly.

Then his expression changed.

I followed his gaze.

At the end of the corridor stood a priest.

Tall.

Dark-haired.

Still.

For one impossible second, I thought I was looking at Adrian through warped glass.

The same height.

The same eyes.

But where Adrian carried pain beneath control, this man carried emptiness.

Lucia appeared from the family room behind us and stopped dead.

The color drained from her face.

“Matteo.”

Adrian looked at her slowly.

The priest smiled.

“Hello, Mother.”

Nico’s hand moved beneath his jacket.

Matteo lifted both hands. “Careful. This is a hospital.”

Adrian stepped in front of the NICU doors.

Matteo’s eyes flicked toward the glass.

“So that is her.”

“No,” Adrian said.

Matteo smiled wider. “No?”

“That is the closest you will ever get.”

Something amused moved through Matteo’s face.

“You still think distance protects people.”

“And you still hide behind costumes.”

“I learned from the best.”

Lucia’s voice shook. “I thought you were dead.”

“For a while, so did I.”

Her hand lifted to her mouth.

Matteo looked at her without softness. “Did you mourn me?”

“Every day.”

“Convenient.”

Adrian’s voice cut between them. “Why are you here?”

Matteo reached slowly into his coat.

Nico raised his weapon halfway before Matteo pulled out a folded document.

“Relax. I brought paperwork.”

He tossed it onto the floor between them.

Adrian did not move.

Nico picked it up and read.

His face darkened.

“What?” I asked.

Adrian took the document.

His eyes scanned the page.

“It’s a custody petition,” he said.

My stomach turned.

Matteo tilted his head. “Filed under emergency protection statutes. Anonymous evidence claims the mother is medically unstable, the father is a known organized crime figure, and the child is in immediate danger.”

I almost laughed.

The cruelty was perfect.

They created the danger, then used it as evidence.

Adrian tore the paper in half.

Matteo sighed. “That was a copy.”

Lucia stepped forward. “Matteo, listen to me. Vittorio used you.”

“Of course he did,” Matteo said. “He uses everyone. The difference is, I learned to benefit from it.”

“You are his son.”

“No. I am his instrument.”

Adrian’s eyes hardened. “That is a choice.”

Matteo looked at him. “Easy for the son who got the name.”

“You think I wanted it?”

“I think you got the empire, the mother, the wife, and now the child.”

Adrian’s voice dropped. “You know nothing about my wife.”

Matteo’s gaze moved to me.

It was not lustful.

Not warm.

Assessing.

As if I were a locked door he had already found the key to.

“Sienna ran well,” he said. “Better than expected.”

Adrian moved so fast Nico had to step in front of him.

Matteo smiled. “There he is.”

I wheeled myself forward despite the pain. “What do you want?”

Everyone turned toward me.

Matteo’s smile shifted.

“I want what should have been mine.”

“You want a premature baby in an incubator?”

“I want the future she represents.”

“She represents herself.”

“Spoken like someone who has not met the families waiting for her.”

Families.

Plural.

A cold understanding spread through me.

“The Covenant,” I said.

Matteo inclined his head.

Adrian turned sharply. “What families?”

Matteo looked almost delighted.

“Oh, little brother. You really thought Father’s empire was just Chicago?”

Nico cursed quietly.

Matteo continued, “There are judges, bankers, shipping families, political donors, men with clean hands and dirty foundations. They have waited years for the next Moretti heir to bind the old agreements. A daughter is especially useful.”

Lucia whispered, “Marriage alliance.”

My hand tightened on the wheelchair arm.

Adrian’s face went lethal.

“She is a newborn,” he said.

“She is an asset,” Matteo replied.

That was when I understood something Adrian had not yet accepted.

Vittorio did not simply want Isabella.

He needed her.

And need made powerful men careless.

I looked Matteo in the eye.

“Tell Vittorio I’ll sign.”

Adrian turned on me. “No.”

Matteo’s smile froze.

Lucia stared.

I kept my voice steady.

“But only in person. I want to see the man who poisoned me before I decide whether to hand him my daughter.”

Adrian’s eyes burned into mine.

He understood half a second later.

So did Matteo.

His expression sharpened.

“You think you are setting a trap.”

“No,” I said. “I think I’m accepting an invitation.”

Matteo studied me for a long moment.

Then he laughed softly.

“Maybe you are Moretti after all.”

He turned to leave.

Nico stepped forward.

Matteo paused. “If you stop me, the petition goes public. Reporters arrive. Police arrive. Child services arrive. Every enemy Adrian has ever made learns which room holds his daughter.”

Adrian’s hands curled into fists.

Matteo walked backward, smiling.

“Midnight. St. Bartholomew’s. Come alone, Sienna.”

Adrian said, “She won’t.”

Matteo looked at me.

“She will. Mothers always do foolish things for their children.”

Then he disappeared into the stairwell.

Adrian rounded on me. “Absolutely not.”

I looked through the NICU glass at Isabella.

Tiny.

Breathing.

Hunted.