His brows snapped together, and he dialed the family steward.

“Sir?” the steward answered, confused.

“Where’s my wife?” Vincenzo cut straight to the point.

The steward fell quiet for a beat.

“Sir… the mistress gave us all leave yesterday. She paid us an extra week’s wages and told us not to come back for the time being. She never said where she was going. We assumed you two had plans.”

She’s pregnant. Where could she possibly go?

Vincenzo shot upright from the sofa.

“Vin?” Adelaide flinched, staring at his ashen, furious face in alarm.

Hand trembling, he unlocked his phone and pulled up the villa’s security logs.

The last front gate entry was logged yesterday afternoon.

She’d left with the urn and the painting.

And she hadn’t come back.

He’d thought it was just another petty cold war, the kind he could fix with a few apologies later. Caterina would always wait for him. She always had.

But something in his gut screamed this was different.

She’d left without a single backward glance.

Vincenzo paced the room relentlessly.

Blizzards raged outside, all flights grounded.

Papers littered the carpet. His phone screen brightened and dimmed again and again, empty of any message from the one person he wanted to hear from.

Dark stubble shadowed his jaw.

“Vin, you haven’t slept for days. Please rest.” Adelaide walked over with a cup of warm milk, reaching for his arm.

“She isn’t worth this. She left so easily. She must not care about you anymore. Why do you—”

“Shut up!” Vincenzo roughly shrugged her off.

Adelaide froze.

He never snapped at her.

Tears welled instantly in her eyes, hurt and watery. “Vin… did you just yell at me?”

Vincenzo turned, bloodshot eyes pinning her in place, voice low and furious.

“I’m the one who should be asking you! Caterina’s been fragile since the pregnancy, but I know her. Upset as she got, she never once stormed down to the family headquarters like she did that day. What the hell did you say to her?”

Cowed by his ferocity, Adelaide twisted her hands, gaze skittish.

“I—I didn’t say anything! Just… silly women’s talk. I was just checking on her health—”

“Silly talk?” Vincenzo stepped forward. His gaze dropped sharply to the pink diamond ring on her left hand.

It was the rare pink diamond he’d just purchased.

The one he’d planned to give Caterina after the baby was born.

“Where did you get this ring?” He seized her wrist tight. “Who told you to put it on?”

Adelaide gasped in pain.

“I just—it looked pretty! I found it in your pocket by accident, and I thought it’d look nice for photos in Iceland, so I wore it for fun—”

Vincenzo’s eyes narrowed. “You’re lying.”

“Tell me the truth!”

Her legs buckled. She sank onto the carpet, breaking down in hysterics.

“I slipped a pair of my stockings in your pocket! I didn’t know she’d react like this! I just wanted to annoy her a little—”

“What else?”

Adelaide rambled frantically, unraveling completely.

“I told you I wanted a baby once, but you said I couldn’t with my career taking off. Then I found out she was pregnant, and I thought—I thought you’d gotten her pregnant to have a child for me! That’s what I told her! I just wanted her to know her place!”

Vincenzo struck her hard. “Who do you think you are? How dare you?”

He seethed with self-hatred.

To preserve the clan’s reputation, he’d pressured Caterina into public explanations, even used her unborn child against her.

Caterina loved children more than anything. Losing her first baby had nearly broken her.

How hopeless must she have been, hearing those words.