Page 62 of Broken Vows

Standing in the shadows, directing him with hand signals, is another figure. When he steps into the light, my laptop nearly slips from my hands.

Marco Russo.

Vincent's own brother, orchestrating an attempt on my life in the hospital parking garage where I save people every day. Where I've been trying to build something clean.

I rewind the footage, watching Marco's lips move as he gives instructions.

The timestamp shows this was taken three days before Vincent and I met for lunch. Three days before Marco pretended to be surprised by our relationship.

He's been hunting me for months.

My hands shake as I access Vincent's intelligence files, using the passwords I memorized from watching him work. The digital trail unfolds like a roadmap to hell: wire transfers from Marco's personal accounts to mercenaries in Rome. Airline records showing his men arriving in Italy forty-eight hours before the first attempt on my life. Purchase orders for untraceable weapons. Communications with Perezzi family soldiers about "eliminating obstacles to traditional family structure."

But it's the final document that makes my vision go white around the edges.

A detailed dossier on me—my medical school schedule, my rotation times, my apartment building's security protocols, even my fucking coffee shop preferences. Someone had been watching me for years, documenting my life like I was prey to be hunted.

At the bottom of the file, a handwritten note in Marco's jagged script: "Mastroni bitch needs to disappear before she compromises family interests. Pregnancy would complicate things—handle before that becomes an issue."

Marco hasn't just been planning to betray Vincent—he's been actively hunting me for months.

I screenshot everything, encrypt the files, and send them to Maya with a simple message: "Insurance policy. In case something happens to me."

Then I close the laptop and return to the bedroom where Vincent sleeps with one hand still reaching toward my side of the bed. In the soft light from the city, he looks younger, the harsh lines around his eyes smoothed by unconsciousness.

This is the man who chose me over family loyalty. The father of my child. The only person standing between Marco's ambition and our destruction.

I slip back under the covers, pressing myself against his warm skin. He stirs, pulling me closer without fully waking.

"Everything okay?" he murmurs against my hair.

"Fine," I whisper, trailing my fingers down his chest. "Just couldn't sleep."

"Mmm." His hand spans my lower back, thumb tracing circles on my skin. "The baby keeping you up?"

"Something like that." I kiss his collarbone, tasting salt and the faint scent of his cologne. My hand drifts lower, tracing the hard lines of his abdomen. "Vincent?"

"Yeah?" His voice catches as my fingers brush the waistband of his boxers.

"I need you," I whisper, my mouth moving to his throat. "I need to feel you, taste you."

He goes rigid beneath me, breath hitching. "Melinda?—"

"Shh." I silence him with my lips, kissing him deep and slow as my hand slips beneath the fabric. He's already hard, responding to my touch with a groan that vibrates against my mouth. "Let me take care of you."

I kiss my way down his body, pausing to bite gently at his collarbone, to trace the scar on his shoulder with my tongue. His hands tangle in my hair as I move lower, my mouth following the path my fingers traced moments before.

"You don't have to—" he starts, but the words die when I hook my fingers in his boxers and pull them down.

"I want to," I breathe, settling between his thighs. "I want to taste every inch of you."

His cock is thick and hard, already leaking at the tip. I wrap my hand around the base, stroking slowly as I lean down to lick a stripe from root to head.

"Fuck," he hisses, hips jerking involuntarily. "Melinda?—"

I smile against his skin before taking just the head into my mouth, swirling my tongue around the sensitive tip. The taste of him is intoxicating—salt and musk and something uniquely Vincent. I hollow my cheeks, sucking gently as I work more of him into my mouth.

"That's it, sweetheart," he groans, one hand gripping the sheets, the other guiding my head. "Just like that. Fuck, your mouth feels incredible."

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