The Mafia Kings’ Fake Fiancée (Mafia Kings Reverse Harems #3)

Chapter 1

LUAN

The whiskey burns going down, but I don't taste it. The glass is cold against my palm. The gun is colder.

I sit in the dark because there's no reason not to.

The leather sofa holds my weight without protest. My apartment is silent except for the low hum of the heating system and the occasional groan of wind against reinforced glass.

Forty-three floors up, the Gold Coast sprawls beneath me, invisible and irrelevant.

The gun rests across my thigh. My finger stays outside the trigger guard. Discipline, not hesitation.

I should sleep. I won't. I can't.

My mind won't settle. Hasn't settled in weeks. Every time I try to force stillness, something pulls tighter in my chest. Not fear. I don't do fear. But the silence in this apartment feels different now. Heavier. Like it's waiting for something to break.

I reach for the glass again. The ice has melted enough that it barely clinks when I lift it.

Watered down. Useless. I drink it anyway.

The burn is duller now, but it still grounds me.

Reminds me I'm still here. That I'm still capable of feeling something, even if it's just the scrape of whiskey against the back of my throat.

I set the glass down.

I should put the gun away. Go to bed.

The restlessness is too sharp tonight. It claws at the edges of my control, demanding release. But I don't move. Don't pace. Don't give in to the urge to do something to burn off the energy coiling in my chest.

Movement is a choice. Stillness is control.

I choose control.

Outside, the wind picks up. It rattles against the reinforced glass, testing the seams. The windows don't shake. They're built to withstand force. Just like everything else in this place.

Safe. Secure. Controlled.

Empty.

I exhale slowly through my nose. My hand tightens on the gun. Not enough to be dangerous. Just enough to feel the textured grip press into my palm.

The lock mechanism on the front door disengages with a soft click.

I raise the gun. Smooth. Controlled. Aimed at the sound.

No hesitation. No second-guessing. If it's a threat, I end it.

My pulse stays steady. My breathing doesn't change. I've done this before. I'll do it again. The only thing that matters is whether the person on the other side of that door is supposed to be here.

If they're not, they won't leave.

But then I hear her.

"No, I'm already here. Give me a second."

A woman's voice. Light. Easy. The kind of tone that has no business existing in my world.

I don't lower the gun. Not yet.

Her footsteps move across the entryway. Sneakers on hardwood, soft and quick. Grocery bags rustle. Plastic crinkles. She's carrying something heavy, her stride shifts, uneven for a moment before she adjusts.

She hasn't seen me. The layout of the apartment ensures it. The entryway opens to the left, straight into the kitchen. The living room sits separated to the right. She'd have to walk past the kitchen, turn the corner, and look directly at the sofa to know I'm here.

Instead, she moves into the kitchen. More rustling. A cabinet door opens, then another. She's putting things away. Methodical. Efficient. The rhythm of someone who's done this a hundred times before.

"Hold on, let me put you on speaker. I need both hands."

A beep. The faint buzz of a phone on speaker mode.

"Finally," another woman's voice says, tinny through the speaker. "I was starting to think that you are too busy to talk to your best friend."

"I'm working, Jess."

"You're always working."

I lower the gun. Slowly. Rest it back on my thigh. My pulse hasn't spiked.

It should have.

An unknown person in my space, armed or not, should trigger something. But all I feel is the weight of the weapon and the faint burn of whiskey in my chest.

It must be someone from the concierge service. I'd forgotten about the arrangement. Artan must have coordinated it. Restocking the apartment while I was gone. Making sure everything was in place when I got back.

Except I came back early.

And she's here.

"Someone has to pay the bills," the woman in the apartment says. There's a smile in her voice. Not forced. Natural.

"Between the concierge gig and the grocery store, you're running yourself into the ground," Jess says. "When was the last time you took a night off?"

"I'll take a night off when the debts are paid and I've figured out where I'm living."

A pause. The sound of a refrigerator door opening. Something heavy slides onto a shelf. Glass bottles clink together.

"They're not your debts, Lily. And it is your house!"

Lily.

The woman in my kitchen has a name now.

"They're my brother's debts. Same thing."

"No, it's not. He gambled them away. Not you."

Lily sighs. Soft. Resigned. The kind of sound someone makes when they've had this argument too many times to count. "He's sorting it out now. He stopped gambling. He's going to be a father. He's starting a family. He needs the house more than I do."

"The house your aunt left to you because she knew he'd gamble it away if she left it to him."

"He needs it. I'll figure something out." A beat. A smile creeps back into her tone. "Besides, I'm going to be an aunt. That's something, right? More family."

Another pause. Longer this time. A cabinet closes. Something rustles. Paper, maybe. A bag being folded.

When Jess speaks again, her voice is quieter. "Lily, you don't owe your brother everything just because he's the only family you have left."

"I'm not giving him everything. Just the house." Lily laughs. Light. Deflecting. "I'm fine. Really."

"You need a better job. You have qualifications. You used to be a sub-chef at a Michelin-star restaurant, for god's sake."

"Yeah, well." Lily's tone shifts. Still light, but there's an edge now.

Humor laced with something sharper. "I didn’t like my boss's wandering hands. And how he kept telling me he liked his women chubby. I don’t know what was worse, him calling me fat or the way he used to corner me in the walk-in. "

She says it like a joke. It's not.

"That son of a bitch," Jess mutters. "You should have reported him."

"And then what? He knows half the high-end kitchens in the city. He made sure I couldn't get another job anywhere decent. I'm taking a break from restaurants anyway. It was stressful."

"You're lying."

A clatter. Metal against ceramic. A bowl, probably. Something scrapes. A drawer opens, closes. The sounds are ordinary. Domestic. The kind of sounds that don't belong in my space.

But they don't grate the way I expected them to.

"I bet you're cooking something right now, aren't you?" Jess says. "Even when you're not getting paid to cook, you're still cooking."

Lily laughs. The sound is easy, unguarded. "You know me too well."

"So? What is it?"

"My famous banana bread."

A pause. Then Jess's voice, sharper now. "Lily, why?"

"I don't know anything about the owner," Lily says. There's a clatter of something metallic. A whisk against a bowl, maybe. "But I was told they needed to rest. I'm assuming they're coming back from a long trip or something. There's nothing better than coming home to fresh-baked goods, right?"

I sit very still.

She's making food. For me. For someone she doesn't know.

No one does things like that. Not in my world. Not without an angle. Not without wanting something in return.

But the way she says it, casual, matter-of-fact, there's no calculation in her tone. No hidden agenda. Just a woman making banana bread because she thinks it might be a nice thing to come home to.

"You're too nice," Jess says.

"Or just practical. Happy clients tip better."

"Come meet me at the bar when you're done. Just one drink."

"I can't. I need to pack when I get home. I have to be out by the end of the month, and I still need to find storage and a place I can actually afford. Plus, I start my shift at the grocery store at seven a.m."

"Lily—"

"I'll see you this weekend. I promise. Bye! Have fun!"

A beep. The call ends.

The kitchen goes quiet except for the soft sounds of movement. A spoon scraping against a bowl. Rhythmic. Steady. The oven door opens with a metallic creak. The rack slides out, then back in. She closes the door with a soft thunk.

And then she starts humming.

Low. Unconscious. A melody I don't recognize. It drifts through the apartment like something tangible, filling the space in a way silence never does.

My sister used to hum.

The thought surfaces before I can stop it. I shove it down. Hard.

I sit in the dark with a gun on my lap and listen to a stranger hum in my kitchen.

The agitation I started with is still there. But quieter now. Muted beneath the sound of her moving through my space like she belongs here.

She doesn't.

But the wrongness of it isn't sharp. It's not an intrusion. It's something else. Something I don't have a name for.

She keeps humming. Keeps moving. Water runs in the sink. The sound is steady, punctuated by the soft clink of dishes being rinsed and set aside. She's cleaning up. Putting things back the way she found them.

The oven timer beeps softly.

The smell hits me a moment later. Warm. Sweet. Cinnamon and vanilla, undercut with something richer. Brown sugar, maybe.

It fills the apartment. Cuts through the sterile, empty smell that's lingered since I moved in. Invasive. Inescapable.

I don't hate it.

A towel rustles. The water turns off. A cabinet opens, closes. She's finishing up.

The humming stops.

The silence that replaces it feels wrong. Hollow in a way it wasn't before she arrived.

Her footsteps move toward the door. Slower now. Deliberate. She pauses near the counter. I hear the soft scrape of a pen on paper. She's leaving a note.

The pen scratches for a few more seconds, then stops. She sets it down. Her footsteps resume.

The door opens. Closes. The lock engages with a soft metallic click.

She's gone.

The apartment is silent again. The heating system hums. The wind groans against the glass. Everything is exactly as it was before she arrived.

Except it isn't.

The smell of banana bread lingers. Warm and sweet and so out of place in this sterile apartment that it feels like an intrusion. Like someone reached into my space and left a mark I can't erase.

I exhale slowly. Set the gun on the side table. My hand finds the glass, but it's empty.

I lean back against the sofa. The leather creaks softly. My shoulders relax by a fraction.

Good thing she didn't go snooping. Good thing she didn't walk past the kitchen, turn the corner, see me sitting here with a weapon in my hand.

Good thing I was sitting in the dark.

The dark.

I hadn't thought about it. Hadn't registered it.

Because I can't see it.

I'm blind.