"Go home to Jordyn," Dante ordered firmly. "You're too pissed off to think properly. If you were, you'd see what you're doing right now, and you would be ashamed. Go."

Lucian's shoulders turned rigid right along with his jaw. "Go home to my wife without my son, you mean. Tell her that his aunt-whoever the fuck she really is-is the cause of this. Right, okay."

"I'll get him back," Catrina whispered. "I will."

"Alive and unharmed," Lucian added darkly. "Because otherwise, I'll fucking kill you."

Dante brushed the threat off, knowing Lucian didn't truly mean it in his state. "Go home. Don't make me ask you again. Call Gio. He's already working on things."

Lucian shot a look behind Dante at Catrina before he grabbed his jacket off the back of the couch and left the condo. The moment the front door slammed shut, Dante felt sick to his stomach.

"I've already talked to the lawyers," Dante explained. "You were lucky there was a witness to the dark sedan running you off the road, because otherwise, that would have been a mess I couldn't clean. The detectives want me in for interviews as well, which is fucking downright ridiculous. I expect you to make sure your business is clean and quiet for a long time to keep the heat off of us."

"I know. I will."

"Who is Michel?" he asked quietly.

"My nephew," Catrina answered.

"The sister I couldn't find information on?"

"Yes."

"Where is she?"

"Dead," Catrina said.

"Why did this man take John?"

"Because I took my nephew-his son-from him, came to America with Michel to keep him safe, and married you to ensure Bruno would stay away. Or at least, that's what I hoped would happen."

Dante felt like someone had just kicked him straight in the fucking chest. Catrina had given him a lot of information in two simple sentences. Dante took his time absorbing the words and what they meant.

Lies.

Lies, lies, lies.

God.

Nausea pounded at his insides.

Dante blew out a harsh breath, turning on his heel to face his wife. "Is everything you told me a lie? All of it?"

"No," Catrina rushed to say. "I never lied, I simply omitted a few facts."

"It's the same goddamn thing!" Dante waved at her, his exasperation taking away his ability to think properly, let alone speak. When he did finally manage to get a few words out, they were angry and bitter. "Who are you, Catrina? I don't even fucking know who you are!"

"I'm your wife, Dante."

"Jesus fucking Christ, I love you, Cat."

Catrina tipped her chin downward, hiding her face from his view. "I know."

"No, you clearly don't," Dante said, pain slicing through his heart. "I love you, Catrina. I share my home, my bed ... everything with you. And you just kept on lying to me like this. All you did was tell me lies."

"Dante-"

"I don't want to hear it," Dante snapped. "Nothing you can say right now will make this better. I can't trust you like I thought I could. More than anything, that fucking kills me. It's killing me, Cat. I thought after everything that I knew you."

Catrina's head snapped up, her stare burning with disbelief and fear. "You do know me."

"I really don't."

"Yes, you do. Nothing I told you was a lie, Dante. I only-"

"Omitted very important, crucial information," Dante interrupted sharply. "Tricked me into marrying you under completely false pretenses. Used my last name and my family's power as a personal shield to protect you from whatever vendetta this Bruno has for you because of this child. In the process, you've put everyone that I care about in danger, Catrina, and you didn't give a single fuck about it, either. That's exactly what you did. Don't try to deny it."

"I won't," she whispered.

"Then how can you possibly stand there and say I know you?" he roared.

God, his insides were ripping apart. Dante had never felt so entirely torn up before. It was like his soul was tearing from his heart because of this goddamn woman. How could a person love someone and despise them at the same time?

"I come from a small village in Italy. My father was an Italian-American my mother met when she first came to the States. When my mother got pregnant with me, they stayed together, but once I was born, that didn't last long. My mother had no choice but to go back to Italy. My dual citizenship was not a lie. Neither was my need to have full citizenship in the States to avoid the possibility of extradition if something were to happen legally."

Dante's jaw clenched. "You've already told me about this."

"So listen again," Catrina responded, anger heating her tone. "All of what I've done now is for my sister."

"Your sister," Dante echoed.

Catrina seemed to pick up on his unspoken question. "She was my half-sister actually, from my step-father and mother."

"Bruno's ... what was she to him, his wife?"

"She was his toy," Catrina said, hurt dimming her hazel eyes.

"Explain that to me."

"I will get there. When I left home, I was not as naive as my sister. I understood how being a woman-a beautiful woman, despite my age-could get me anywhere I wanted to go so long as I knew how to use my beauty and intelligence. It didn't take long for me to catch the eye of an older, wealthier gentleman while I was working in a nightclub. I had lied about my age and they weren't a stickler for rules, anyway."

Dante couldn't help it; sickness rolled in his stomach. "I don't want to hear that-whatever went on with that man, don't even start."

"I wasn't his whore, if that's what you're thinking."

"What, then?"

"It was Bruno's father, Vincenzo. Here, in America, when people hear about the cartel, they immediately think Mexico. In Italy, the cartel is everywhere. There, the cartel is the mafia. It is one and the same. It doesn't matter how small the village, someone is working there, using the people, hiding the products ... doing whatever they need to do."

"I don't understand what this has anything to do with us, Catrina."

"Nearly two years ago, the Pope excommunicated all Mafioso. Did you hear about that?"

A memory flickered into Dante's mind. One morning when he had to wake Giovanni up for church and his brother blurted out that bit of information as his reasoning for still being in bed despite smelling like weed and a brewery.

"I remember. What about it?"

"It was because a little boy, his sister, and his mother were gunned down by Sicilian cartel because of their father's low-level involvement with the mob. He stole money or drugs, or some nonsense like that."

"That's terrible his children were killed for his misdeeds, but I can't say I'm too surprised."

"That is Bruno's life, and he believes everyone around him can be terrorized into control. He likes the power; his father did, too."

Dante wet his lips, considering his next words carefully. "You were involved with his father, you said."

"He needed a pretty, innocent face working certain scenes. A girl who could catch a man's eye, act like a sheep willing to be herded, and then drain him dry when he wasn't looking like the wolf she really was. I was able to fit in with the higher class, weed my way into influential men's pockets and beds-"

Dante flinched at that omission.

"I'm sorry," Catrina said quickly, her cheeks turning pink. "I know what kind of woman you must see me as because of that."

"I'm not judging you," Dante managed to say.

Honesty walked hand in hand with pain, and whether he liked it or not, Dante loved Catrina. So, yeah, he needed to know these things even if he didn't like them.

Shaking those thoughts away, Dante said, "Please keep going."

"Once I was in, blackmail and manipulation were my forays. Whatever Vincenzo wanted, I was to get. I enjoyed it because I had everything at that point. Money, social status, and so on. I was no longer an underprivileged, poor child from the village. I was powerful in my skin, men adored me as much as they feared me ... so, yes, I liked it."

"And Queen came from this?" Dante asked quietly.

"It was born from it, essentially," Catrina answered. "Vincenzo's mistake was trusting me like he did to go out alone without watchers and putting me in places with men who were more powerful than even he was. I slowly made contacts and eventually began stepping out to do business with some of those people. I had suppliers for my side of things that had little to nothing to do with his cartel. I was making my name on my own time."

"Queen."

"S."

"And he found out?"

"No, he died. All of his bad habits caught up to him and his heart stopped."

Dante blinked, not expecting that statement. "Oh."

"At the time, I thought it was the best thing that could have happened. I was free of his constraints and demands. I could continue on the path I was making, and as I had already been working the aristocratic scene as it were, some of my contacts and clientele were from America. Coming here was the logical choice. I barely needed to do a thing but take a few men who had already worked alongside me for years and held no loyalty to Bruno's family."

"How do they keep from being deported?"

Catrina laughed, but it sounded faint and weak. "They have very little and nothing to keep them tied down. They don't feel as though they're losing much by staying with me. I've earned their allegiance. Fake documentation keeps them safe on American soil, for now."

"Did you lie to me about coming to America at all, or how many times you've been here?"

"No, I was twenty-five the first time I came back. I've only been here three years."

"You've achieved a lot here in that time."

"I've worked for it. I've sacrificed everything to be this person."

"Your sister," Dante murmured.

"Most importantly," she agreed softly. "Catherine was her name."

Instantly, Dante remembered the little girl Catrina introduced him to at the dinner and reception after their wedding. He had-mistakenly, obviously-thought his new wife connected with the child because her name was similar. Now, he believed it was probably a little more than that.

"Catherine didn't have nearly the claws I did, certainly not the kind to keep her alive."

"What happened?"

"She was so much younger than me," Catrina said, winging her hands together. "Five years younger and only ten-years-old when I left home. I thought she wouldn't care, that perhaps she wouldn't even remember me all that well, and he loved her, too. My step-father, I mean. He adored her and I knew she would be happy. Shortly after I left for the States, my sister came searching for me but she had no idea I was already off the continent."

"And she found Bruno."

"It didn't take long for word to get to me," Catrina stated, sighing shakily. "I knew how he was, Dante. I'd seen him with other women and how he treated them was like how a bastard might treat an abused dog."

"Cat-"

"I went back. The first flight I could get on, I took it. She loved him, she said. He didn't hurt her, she promised."

Catrina's stare glazed with water but she blinked it away. Dante wasn't surprised. His wife never did show emotion well. He was finally starting to understand why. Because before him, she lived in a world where feelings killed people.

"I had no choice but to leave again. Bruno had become even more insane than he was before his father died. Me being there only angered him, and I could see him blaming my sister for my presence. I tried to take her with me and nearly got myself killed in the process. That man I killed today ... he was the one Bruno sent after me."

Dante could still hear Marc's words to Catrina ringing in the back of his mind. Like a shot of poison directly to his heart, fury raced through his bloodstream. Somehow, he kept it hidden from his wife. She was upset enough, even if she was hiding it.

"I tried to keep contact with Catherine once I was back in the States, but I was ignored. Something inside me knew, Dante."

"Knew what?"

"That he was beating her, using her like he did the others."

Dante's throat felt tight and dry, but he still managed to ask, "How did you find out about Michel?"

"Someone sympathetic to my sister got in contact with one of my men," Catrina explained. "The informant was terrified of Bruno and wouldn't give too many specific details. It was enough, though."

"Enough for what?"

"To send me back again." Catrina's shoulders slumped as she shook her head. Pressing her palm to her forehead, she sat down on the couch. Dante surveyed his wife in silence, unsure of what to say or do. He was still so torn inside over what she had done and how she had lied to him. "I watched him and her for weeks, his men, too. I found her pregnant and beaten. Very pregnant.

"I was smarter the second time around," she continued, glancing up at Dante with a sad smile. "We flew in on a privately chartered jet. We stayed in the shadows making sure no one who might recognize us would catch us by mistake. I waited, thinking maybe I could bring her back with me if only I could catch her when he wasn't there ... and then she had him."