PROLOGUE

11:10 PM, July 25, 1956

Off the coast of Nantucket

HE was red-faced again, too much wine at dinner.

In the ship’s dining room Angelica Campana watched her husband drink, all smiles—until the gallant ship’s officer complimented her dress, her hair, made her laugh.

That’s when the storm clouds returned, forming in Gustavo’s dark, cold gaze. Their tablemates failed to notice. Nor did they question her husband’s thirst for more Primitivo. They saw only the fine fabric of his suit, the oily smoothness of his flattery. But Angelica saw the portents. And she knew what was coming.

Alone in their cabin, she resisted; she always did. He would laugh at her feeble defense, then at her tears as he would belittle her, force himself on her.

The brat of a boy had grown into a conceited man, spinning righteous reasons for his “punishments,” reasons she believed, until the light of love, real love, had shown her another truth—

There was nothing wrong with her. He was the twisted one, taking pleasure from her pain.

As a backward teenage bride, orphaned in the terrible war, she believed she’d found a savior. For too long she had endured his filthy accusations and stinging slaps, even prayed to God for forgiveness . . . and then her own death. Until her baby came. After that, she prayed for strength. Not an end to life, but a chance to make a new one for herself and her little Perla.

In time, he grew bored with her and took a mistress. The beatings stopped and life improved—until these last few months, when the storms returned.

That night, aboard the elegant Andrea Doria, in the depths of the fateful fog, she prayed her hardest, even as his fat fingers strangled her slender wrist, even as his free hand rose high to administer his brutal “correction” for her “whorish flirtations”—

But the blow never came. A screech of rending metal froze his arm, and then a terrible impact flung husband and wife against the steel bulkhead.

The awful crash ended the man’s curses, but not his contempt. When she groped for help, he shoved her away.

A moment before, she feared the horrible names he called her would be heard by the others in first class. Now only the gushing roar of water and cries of terrified souls filled the ship’s corridors.

Amid the screams and chaos, she heard a woman shout—

“La nave sta affondando!” The ship is sinking!

Cold sea water gushed under their stateroom door as the ship tilted so severely she feared it would capsize. Instead, the mighty ocean liner rocked like a toy in a baby’s tub before settling on one side. The earsplitting noises of the shipwreck quieted, too, and that’s when she heard her little pearl—

“Mamma! Mamma!”

Despite the rising water and sloping floor, Angelica reached the bathroom door. Her husband had shoved the child inside and wedged a chair against the knob. Now the chair was gone, but the knob was jammed. Whatever crippled the ship had warped the door, trapping her four-year-old in a tiny room filling with water.

Angelica begged Gustavo to help.

But his focus remained on the dresser, his fat hands ripping open the top drawer with the same possessive greed he’d used to rip her gown.

The jewel! That’s all he cares about. Not the beauty of the diamond or its rich history, but only for the fortune it will bring him in America.

Pig eyes, bright as polished jet, glanced her way as he thrust the silk bag under his lapel. Again she pleaded for help, but his weak chin lifted in smug superiority as his hand moved to a vest pocket.

When they first boarded the ship, he’d pulled out his jeweler’s tools and fiddled with the stateroom door. Like their bedroom in Italy, he wanted the option of locking her in. Now he held the room’s key, and she knew why.

He means to lock us in! Me and my little girl!

At dinner she’d watched him flirting with that young American, heard him boast about his family’s jewelry business, his plan to help them start anew in New York—as he wished to start anew, a free man in a New World.

The shipwreck had given him an easy way to end the burden of his “harlot” wife and troublesome daughter.

“No!” Angelica cried. “I won’t let you!”

She always thought herself weak and helpless. Now a power rose in her that she could not explain. Like a rocket ignited, she flew across the room, years of abuse propelling her petite form into his thick body.

Shocked by the attack, his feet slipped out from under him.

“Mamma! Mamma!”

The baby’s cries sent her over the edge. Protective ferocity drove her now, an instinct so primitive, it blocked all senses. She even failed to hear or see the two men who burst in on a rescue mission.

The men gawked at the young Italian beauty in the shredded evening gown, her body draped over a heavyset, middle-aged man. Unsure what she was doing, they focused instead on the little girl’s cries behind a warped door.

The pair waded across the room. The first man, a strong, young Italian with a head of thick, dark hair, kicked in the door and snatched up the child. Turning to her parents, he finally realized what was taking place.

The young beauty straddling her husband was not giving him aid. She was holding his head down.

The men exchanged glances, but—for very different reasons—neither interfered.

In the ruined stateroom of the sinking ship, two silent witnesses watched Angelica Campana drown her husband in the rising waters of the dark, cold deep.