Sweet Temptation by Cora Reilly

the blood. “Fuck,” he growled before he stopped in front of me. He held out his
hand.
I took it and let him pull me up, even as sharp pain sliced through my
fingers.
Faro touched my shoulder. “Andrea might have said it to provoke you,
Cassio. You don’t know if he said the truth. Daniele and the baby could be yours.
Do you really think Gaia would have risked putting cuckoo’s eggs in your nest?”
“Don’t call them that,” I rasped.
Faro regarded me with penetrating intensity that set my teeth on edge.
“Andrea knew what awaited him. A slow death, hours of brutal torture until he’d
given up all his secrets. By provoking you, he got a quick death.”
I regarded the bloody mess on the floor. “I doubt it was the painless end he’d
hoped for.”
“Not painless, no,” Faro said, following my gaze. “But fairly quick. Better
than he deserved if you ask me.”
I leaned back against the wall, not sure where to go from here. My wife had
betrayed me, had admitted that she’d rather see me dead, had threatened to kill
our baby… if it was even ours.
My chest constricted until every breath was a struggle.
“What are you going to do now?” Faro asked. I met his cautious gaze. “With
Gaia,” he clarified, as if I didn’t know.
“I don’t know.” I couldn’t—wouldn’t kill her. She was still my wife, still the
mother of Daniele and Simona. My head fell forward under the force of
emotions slamming into me.
“Cassio.” Faro squeezed my shoulder, his voice imploring.
“Call my father. Ask him to come over. He needs to know. Don’t alert
anyone else yet. We need to come up with a story.”
“You’ll keep Gaia’s affair a secret?”
“Of course. I don’t want people to know. We’ll blame this on Andrea.
Declare him a traitor, as he probably was anyway.”
“Gaia might know more. If she was his lover, they might have talked.”
I shook Faro’s grip off. A new wave of rage and despair rose in me. “I need
to check on her.”
“Cassio,” Faro said, gripping my shoulder. “Even if you don’t kill her, you
can’t trust her anymore. Your marriage is over.”
I didn’t say anything, only walked up the stairs. I found Gaia and the doctor
in her bedroom. She lay in bed, looking drugged. The doctor was covered in
sweat and had a swelling on his forehead. “She struggled. I had to sedate her and
drag her to bed. She would have hurt herself and the baby otherwise.”
Doctor Sal scanned my blood-covered clothes. “Should I check on your
injuries?”
“Is the baby okay?” I asked from the doorway, unable to go in, to go
anywhere closer to my wife and the bed she’d betrayed me in.
“It is. Of course, it’s not ideal that I had to sedate her. If she’s still this