Omero went still for a moment. His right hand moved to the inside of his left wrist and pressed hard against the pulse point, so brief anyone else would have missed it. His gaze turned dark and unreadable as he stared into his teacup. "I'll let her live out her days as my wife, comfortable and provided for. Consider it compensation."
I clamped a hand over my mouth and crumpled to the ground. Under the bewildered stares of the household staff around me, I scrambled back to the compound on my hands and knees.
In the darkness of my room, I wept alone.
So the man who had shared my bed that night was never Omero at all. And yet he had still married me, this tainted woman, willingly, all for Chloe Volpe.
He had even accepted a child that had nothing to do with him.
I remembered the day the soldiers slaughtered Millhaven. He had looked at my skirt, soaked through with blood, and wept until he could barely breathe.
He had sworn to me, voice shaking with conviction: "Penelope, I promise you, I won't let the villagers die in vain. And I won't let our child's sacrifice be for nothing."
He kept his word. Within three days, he tracked down the men responsible and killed every last one of them.