Chapter 1 - THE SMILE
Sabrina Voss smiled less than four minutes after Naomi D’Angelo died.
It was barely a smile. Just the corner of her mouth lifting for a second before disappearing.
But Roman saw it.
His wife’s body was still behind the delivery-room doors. Her blood was still on his cuff. Somewhere beyond another set of doors, their premature twins were fighting to breathe.
And Sabrina—the woman Roman had been secretly sleeping with for fourteen months—had arrived at the hospital dressed as though she’d been waiting for this moment.
“Roman,” she whispered, reaching for him. “I’m so sorry. But maybe now we can finally—”
“Take your hand off me.”
He didn’t raise his voice.
Sabrina froze.
“Get out of this hospital.”
Three hours earlier, doctors had rushed Naomi into an emergency delivery. Roman had money, influence, and enough power to make dangerous men lower their voices when they said his name.
None of it mattered beneath those fluorescent lights.
At 6:19 a.m., he heard two babies cry.
Then the voices inside the room changed.
Roman was allowed in just long enough to take Naomi’s hand.
“The babies?” she whispered.
“They’re okay.”
Naomi looked at him differently then.
“Take care of them.”
At 6:42 a.m., she died.
And now Sabrina was standing in the hallway, smiling.
Roman thought that was the worst thing she could possibly do.
Then his phone rang.
Sabrina hadn’t actually left the hospital.
She was downstairs making calls—to a law firm specializing in paternity, custody, and contested estates.
Naomi had been dead less than two hours.
May you like
Roman gave one quiet order:
“Watch her.”
