Chapter 1
The morning sun poured through the floor-to-ceiling windows of the private Manhattan maternity suite, bathing the room in bright, cheerful colors. Golden light danced across the pristine white walls, the pastel floral arrangements, and the gleaming clear plastic of three separate bassinets. Inside those bassinets, wrapped securely in soft hospital blankets, slept three newborn babies. Their fair, rosy skin practically glowed in the natural light.
Sofia Ravelli lay exhausted in the center of the room. At twenty-six years old, she was breathtakingly beautiful by every American standard, though her rosy complexion was currently pale from the sheer toll of giving birth to triplets. Dressed in a standard hospital gown and non-slip hospital socks, she wore her patient wristband like a heavy shackle. She struggled to keep her blue eyes open, the heavy painkillers clouding her mind.
“Julian, please,” Sofia whispered, her voice fragile and shaking. “Bring him back. Put him down.”
Julian Mercer, her husband of two years, stood near the foot of her bed. He was thirty-six, handsome in a cold, sterile way, wearing an expensive tailored suit, a gleaming luxury wristwatch, and polished leather shoes. His fair skin remained perfectly flushed, untouched by the grueling night Sofia had just endured. He didn't look at his wife with love. He looked at her with calculation.
Julian reached out and deliberately slid the bedside call button across the mattress, pushing it just inches beyond Sofia’s desperate, grasping fingers.
“Don't make a scene, Sofia,” Julian said, his American accent smooth and devoid of any warmth. “You are tired. You aren't thinking clearly.”
Beside him stood his sister, Bianca. Bianca was thirty-three, dressed in an elegant sapphire summer dress that brought out the rosy flush of her cheeks. Her neck and wrists were adorned with heavy diamond jewelry that caught the bright hospital light. She stood perfectly still, her hands reaching out eagerly.
It was Victor Mercer, Julian and Bianca’s sixty-five-year-old father, who stepped toward the bassinets. Wearing a formal tailored suit and a luxury wristwatch of his own, Victor moved with an arrogant sense of entitlement. He reached into the closest clear bassinet, his large hands slipping beneath the hospital blanket, and lifted the crying newborn boy into the air.
Sofia gasped, pushing herself up on her elbows. Searing pain shot through her abdomen. “What are you doing? Victor, put my son down! Julian, stop him!”
Victor ignored her completely. He cradled the crying infant securely against his expensive suit jacket and began carrying the child toward Bianca’s waiting arms.
“You are being entirely unreasonable, Sofia,” Victor said coldly, not even bothering to look back at the bleeding, exhausted mother of his grandchildren. “You have three. Bianca gets one.”
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“No! No, you can't!” Sofia screamed, her voice breaking as she strained toward the edge of the bed. “He’s my baby! Julian, tell them to put him back right now!”
“Bianca can't have children,” Julian replied, adjusting his cuffs with chilling indifference. “We discussed this as a family, Sofia. It is the only fair way to balance the scales. You will hardly notice the difference.”
