Page 1 of Diary from an Inked Throne

1

NYAH

Dear Diary,

Here’s a wedding tip. If your groom gets shot, don’t assume the ceremony is over.

Idoubted anyone dreamed of a wedding day where the groom is shot in the middle of the I dos.

Not just once either, but four times, his blood spilling across your virgin-white shoes and staining them crimson.

I doubted, even in a dream, you would stand there shell-shocked and screaming, while the groom’s brother stepped forward, took his place, and claimed the wedding would go ahead.

Despite being the one who unloaded his gun into his own flesh and blood.

All while an entire congregation of Mafia families watch on with their mouths hanging open.

A sharp pain ripped through my belly, and I doubled over, clutching my baby, still growing deep inside me and hopefully oblivious to the nightmare his mother’s life had just become.

Enzo slapped me so hard across the cheek my head snapped to one side. It had the desired effect, cutting off my screams, and when I straightened, I made sure there was nothing but cold, hard venom in my eyes.

Agreeing to marry Carlos so this baby was safe and protected from a world that would hunt us down was one thing.

Agreeing to marry Luca’s cold-hearted uncle Enzo, Carlos’s brother?

Over my dead body.

Something in Carlos had been redeemable. When he’d come to me with his heart on his sleeve, grieving the loss of his only son, truly mourning him, I had felt a tiny sliver of sympathy. I’d felt the sincerity in his words when he’d begged me to give him another chance at being a father.

With Luca, Dax, and Lynx all gone, I’d agreed.

It was either that or take my baby, run, and look over my shoulder for the rest of my life. To hide, like Luca and his younger sister, Isabella, had done, only to be dragged back into it all at one snap of Carlos’s fingers.

No, it had been better to marry Carlos. To take him at his word that he wouldn’t touch me, and my child would grow up safe and protected.

Marrying Enzo was none of that and never would be.

Enzo’s eyes were so dark they were black. His pupils blown with the excitement and adrenaline of ending his brother’s life so brutally and stepping into his shoes without even taking a breath in between.

He waved a hand impatiently in the stunned priest’s face. “Say the words.”

The priest shook his head, clutching his Bible to his chest. “This is most improper—”

I almost laughed. Improper? Was he for real? This was a bit more than improper. I fought not to slip as Carlos’s blood ran in rivulets down the altar steps. Was I supposed to toe his dead body out of the way so we could continue the ceremony, substitute groom in place?

Enzo grabbed my hand so sharply I screamed, sure something in my wrist was going to break.

He smiled at my whimper.

An equally sharp pain splintered through my belly again. I’d never had a baby before, so I didn’t know what a contraction felt like, but I suspected I was about to get a crash course.

Could watching a man die right in front of you, hearing his gurgled breaths as he choked on his own blood, force you into labor? I had no idea. But I moaned, wishing my muscle and bone could protect my baby from the evil that was the man standing in front of me.

“Get to the I dos,” Enzo snapped. “I Enzo Guerra, take her. Whatever.”

Her. Like I wasn’t even worthy of him remembering my name.

“I’m not marrying you,” I spat at him when the pain eased. “I’m in labor. I need to go to the hospital.”