"Gold-digger or murderer?" Nico asked flatly. "I'll give you four seconds to make a case for gold-digger. It has a longer sentence."
"Neither," Mara said.
"One."
"He collapsed on his own. I didn't touch him."
"You're standing over a dead man in his bridal suite." His gaze dropped briefly to the shattered wine glass, then came back to her face. "Two."
"I'm telling you. He just grabbed his chest and fell. Maybe he had a heart attack ot stroke or something."
"Men like my father don't die of natural causes on their wedding night. It's bad for business."
"Well, his heart didn't get the memo," she said. "Look at the room; there's no sign of struggle, no weapons. I'm standing here in a dress that weighs twenty pounds. Does this look like an assassination to you?"
"Three. A dress doesn't stop a poisoned needle or a spiked drink."
"The wine is still sealed." She nodded toward the side table. "We walked in two minutes ago."
"Then maybe you gave him something at the reception." He pulled the hammer back, and the click sound filled the room. "Four."
"Wait." She kept her hands visible and shifted slightly to the side. "Shoot me and you have to explain to your Council why the new bride is bleeding out on your father's carpet the same night he dies. You don't want that noise."
Nico paused. His eyes moved slowly across her, assessing. "You're Dario's niece. The gambling debt."
"Mara."
"I don't care what your name is. Did your uncle slip something to my father before the ceremony?"
"My uncle is a coward," she said evenly. "He wouldn't risk crossing the Ferrante family."
"Then who paid you? The Morozovs? The Grecos?"
"Nobody paid me." Her jaw tightened. "I was sold."
"Tragic," Nico said with zero sympathy. "But useless to me. Move against the wall."
"What are you going to do?"
"Shoot you," he said calmly. "And then tell the guards I caught you fleeing the scene."
"You think the Council won't ask questions?"
"I think I'm Nico Ferrante and my father is dead, which means I can do whatever I want." He leveled the gun at her forehead. "Wall. Now."
Footsteps echoed in the corridor outside. A voice, breathless and hurried.
Footsteps sounded in the hallway outside, followed by a hurried, out-of-breath voice. "Don Gio? The guards let me through, I brought the…" The doors swung open. "Oh God."
The family lawyer stumbled into the room, holding a thick leather briefcase close to his chest, but stopped suddenly when he saw the body, his face losing all color.
"Valerio," Nico said, without turning around. The gun stayed exactly where it was. "You're working late."
"Nico?" Valerio's voice climbed an octave. "You're supposed to be in Belgrade. What are you… is he…"
"Dead? Yes." Nico's tone didn't shift at all. "What's in the briefcase? You don't visit the bridal suite this late with a briefcase to offer congratulations."
"The will." Valerio swallowed, his eyes darting between the gun, the body, and Mara. "The final signed copy. Don Gio called me this afternoon. He wanted it placed in his private safe tonight, after the ceremony."
"Read it."
"Nico, we need to call the doctor. The Council will need to be…"
Nico moved the gun an inch to the left. Not at Valerio. He didn't need to. "Read the fvccking will, and skip the preamble."
Valerio's hands were shaking so badly he dropped his pen. It spun across the marble and vanished under the bed. He pulled out a thick stack of papers, flipped to the final pages, and began.
"Per Don Gio's instructions," Valerio babbled in a panicked voice. "The will states simply: the empire and all Ferrante holdings, alliances, and Council seat pass to Don Gio's direct bloodline."
"There is a contingency," Nico said. Not a question.
"Yes." Valerio swallowed hard, a drop of sweat rolling down his temple. "If no blood heir exists at the time of death, the estate enters Council receivership pending a vote on new leadership."
A pause.
Valerio glanced at Mara. Then back down at the page. "If the widow is with child at the time of death, she rules as Regent until the child reaches eighteen."
The room went very quiet.
Nico looked at Valerio, then at his father's body, and finally at Mara. She could see the wheels turning behind his eyes: the recalculation, the options narrowing, the cold focus of a man turning bad news into a problem to solve.
"Council receivership," he said, mostly to himself. "Which means a vote. Which means war before the week is out."
He took a step toward her. "The marriage was never consummated. There is no Regent. Which means you are nothing but a liability standing in my father's bedroom."
"I can leave," Mara said quickly. "Tonight. I won't say a word to anyone."
"You're right. You'll say nothing." He raised the gun and aimed it squarely at her chest. "I don't leave loose ends."
Her back was already against the wall. There was nowhere to go.
She had two seconds. Maybe one.
"Don't shoot!" The words left her mouth before she had consciously decided to say them. "I'm pregnant!"
Valerio dropped the papers, scattering them across the floor in every direction. "What?" he whispered. "But… the wedding was today…"
"I'm pregnant," Mara said again, louder, staring straight down the barrel. "With the heir. You shoot me, you shoot the Ferrante bloodline."
Silence.
Then, slowly, Nico lowered the gun.
He didn't put it away. He held it at his side as he leaned in, leveling his face with her neck. Mara stopped breathing, every muscle in her locked in place as she waited for what he would do next.
When he spoke, it was barely a whisper. "My father has been impotent for ten years."
The blood drained from her face.
"I have his physician's records," he continued in a calm voice. "That sick fvck has not been capable of fathering a child since 2014."
Mara wanted to step back, but there was no space between her and the wall.
Nico tilted his head back just enough to look directly at her.
"So, that makes you a liar, young lady." he said flatly. "Or should I call you..." The corner of his mouth moved, but it wasn't a smile. It was something much colder. "Stepmother."