Page 24 of Where the Wind Whispers

And everything was good.

The Gallucci mansion stood tall and foreboding in front of Violet.

Looming might have been a more accurate description.

Like hell was just waiting to welcome her back, its gates not yet opened to allow her inside.

The actual gates of the mansion were, in fact, closed, but she knew her arrival had already been noticed, announced, and apparently, refused. Her father, or one of his men, could have opened the gates for her the very second she stepped out of the black SUV with a suitcase in hand.

But Alberto hadn’t allowed the gates to be open.

He wasn’t allowing her back in.

Violet wasn’t surprised—her father’s lack of joy over her arrival wasn’t unexpected. It made her sick to her stomach to even think about it all, but her father was doing exactly what she thought he would when she returned to him.

Even if it was in his own, awful way.

Making her wait.

He probably thought she was silently begging to be let off the side of the street.

And maybe Violet was doing that in a way, except she wished she could turn around and leave more than she wanted anything else in the world.

Violet’s hand tightened around the handle of her suitcase, keeping her rooted in place. With her other hand holding onto her purse, she could resist the urge to touch her stomach, an action she knew would end badly for her if her father got even the slightest inkling that she was pregnant.

More than anything else—above all the lies she would need to tell and the things she would have to fake—the pregnancy was sacred.

Secret.

Something she knew would be entirely unforgivable to her father.

He could hide many things. He could scrub Violet’s misdeeds and wrongdoings away with money and silent glares. He could make it look like her marriage had never existed—like Kaz had never even happened.

But nothing—absolutely nothing—would scrub away the pregnancy.

No matter what kind of man her father was, he was still a devout Catholic at heart. Termination of the pregnancy wouldn’t even be in his vocabulary. Not even a forced abortion, as Violet sure as hell wouldn’t agree to a consenting termination.

And the moment she had the child, there would be no hiding anything.

So if Alberto found out, he’d only have one option.

To kill her.

Or … Violet believed he would do it.

The car driven by a one of Kaz’s men had dropped her off more than ten minutes ago, and the man hadn’t lingered on the outskirts of the Gallucci property. He’d even squealed the fucking tires when he drove off, leaving Violet staring like an idiot at her childhood home.

Except now … now, she wondered if it had ever really been a home to her.

Maybe at one point it had.

Now, it just felt like a slow death.

The buzzing of the speaker on the pillar attached to the gate brought Violet slamming out of her thoughts. She tried not to show her nerves as a familiar voice crackled through the speaker, knowing damn well security cameras were trained on her every single move.

Alberto thrived best when he could spot a person’s weakness.

Violet couldn’t give him that.