Valentina
CHAPTER SEVEN
Ican’t sleep.
My body is still humming from his visit. Still feeling the phantom pressure of his length against my stomach. Still hearing his voice in my ear: “See what you do to me, Bella?”
I should be relieved he left when I said no.
Instead, I’m restless. Angry. Confused about why part of me wanted to say yes.
The estate is too quiet. Too big. The kind of silence that makes you hyper-aware of every sound your body makes, the rustle of sheets, the whisper of breath, the steady thump of your own heartbeat that hasn’t quite settled since he walked out of my room.
I’ve been lying here replaying everything. His hands on my gown strap. The heat of him. The command in his voice. Take off your clothes, Valentina.
And I said no.
But my body didn’t want to say no. My body wanted to arch into him, wanted to find out what would happen if I surrendered. My brain, thankfully, still has some sense left in it.
I throw off the covers and pad to the window, trying to clear my head. The estate grounds stretch out below me, perfectly manicured lawns disappearing into darkness. Security lights dot the perimeter like fallen stars.
In the distance, I can see a building I haven’t noticed before, a warehouse, maybe? Smaller than the main house but substantial. Floodlights illuminate the entrance.
And there are men. Three of them, dragging something, someone, inside.
My stomach drops.
All thoughts of Salvatore’s hands on me, his body pressed against mine, evaporate.
Because that’s him down there. I can see him now, striding toward the warehouse. Same purposeful walk. Same commanding presence even from this distance.
What is he doing?
I should look away. Go back to bed. Pretend I didn’t see anything.
Instead, I’m pulling on the robe hanging on the bathroom door and slipping into the hallway before my brain can catch up to what my body is doing.
The house is quiet. I take the back stairs, the ones Rosa showed me lead to the kitchen. My bare feet are silent on the marble floors. I don’t know why I’m doing this. Don’t know what I think I’m going to accomplish.
But my feet keep moving, carrying me across the damp lawn toward that warehouse, toward whatever is happening inside.
The door is slightly ajar.
I shouldn’t. I know I shouldn’t.
But the man who pressed his hard length against me and commanded me to strip is in there. The man who walked away when I said no. The man who locked my door and left me aching and confused.
What does he do when there’s no door to lock? When someone doesn’t have the power to say no?
I press myself against the wall and peer through the gap.
The warehouse is mostly empty, concrete floors, exposed beams, industrial lighting casting harsh shadows. In the center of the space, a man is tied to a metal chair. His face is already bloody, nose obviously broken, and one eye swollen shut.
And standing over him, perfectly calm in his tailored suit, is Salvatore.
My stomach drops.
I swallow hard, but it does nothing to steady the sudden, sickening realization settling in my chest.
“I’m going to ask you one more time, Romano.” Salvatore’s voice is quiet. “Who did you tell about the shipment?”
“I didn’t tell anyone, I swear.”
The crack of Salvatore’s fist against the man’s jaw echoes through the space. The man’s head snaps to the side, blood spraying from his mouth.
My hand flies to my mouth, stifling a gasp.
Those same hands that touched my skin. That dragged down my gown strap. That I felt pressed against me.
“Wrong answer.” Salvatore flexes his fingers, the same fingers that traced my collarbone, completely unbothered by the blood now staining his knuckles.
“Let’s try again. The Bratva knew exactly when and where that shipment was arriving.
They knew which truck, which route, which guards would be on duty.
That’s not a lucky guess. That’s insider information. ”
“I don’t know anything about the Russians!”
Salvatore sighs like he’s dealing with a particularly slow child. He walks to a table against the wall, I hadn’t noticed it before, and picks up something that glints in the light.
A knife.
Oh my God.
My fingers twitch at my sides, a tremor I can’t control. I’ve read about violence in books, studied it in history, but standing here, seeing it… it feels completely different. Real. Terrifying.
“I really didn’t want to do this.” Salvatore tests the blade against his thumb. “You’ve been with us for three years. Good worker. Reliable. Your wife recently had a baby, didn’t she? Little girl. Leah.”
The man’s remaining good eye widens in terror. “Please. Please don’t hurt my family. I’ll tell you whatever you want, please don’t—”
“I don’t hurt women and children.” Salvatore crouches in front of him, the knife held loosely in his hand.
The same casual dominance he had when he stepped into my room.
“That’s not who we are. But you? You put my family at risk.
My brothers. My people. The shipment you compromised had enough fentanyl to kill half of Newark.
It’s now in Bratva hands, being cut with God knows what, killing people in neighborhoods we’re supposed to protect. ”
“I needed the money! Leah was sick, the medical bills—”
“So you went to the Russians instead of coming to me?” For the first time, there’s heat in Salvatore’s voice.
Real anger, barely leashed. The same steel that was underneath when he said “That wasn’t a request.” “I would have paid for your daughter’s treatment.
Every penny. All you had to do was ask. Instead, you betrayed us.
You put my family in danger. You made me look weak. ”
He presses the tip of the knife against the man’s knee. Not cutting. Not yet. Just pressure.
The same control he showed when he stepped back from me. When he could have forced me and didn’t.
“Last chance. Give me names, or I start taking pieces.”
The man breaks. Sobs wrack his body as words pour out of him.
“Dmitri Volkov! He approached me six months ago, said he knew about Leah’s condition, said he’d pay for everything if I gave him information.
Small stuff at first, schedules, routes.
Then he wanted more. The shipment was supposed to be my last job.
He promised after that, I could walk away. ”
“And you believed him.” Salvatore stands, shaking his head. “Dmitri Volkov doesn’t let anyone walk away. You would have been feeding him information for the rest of your life, or until you outlived your usefulness. Then he would have killed you. And probably your family, to tie up loose ends.”
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
“I know.”
Salvatore says it like he means it. Almost gentle. The same quiet gentleness he used when he kissed my forehead earlier.
“But sorry doesn’t fix this.” His voice hardens again. “Who was the other man with you?”
The man stays silent.
Salvatore doesn’t repeat himself. He drives the knife into the man’s thigh and twists.
The scream tears out of him instantly.
“Valdimir!” the man gasps. “It was Valdimir. The two of us!”
Salvatore glances toward someone standing behind him and gives a small nod.
A second later, the man steps into view, and my blood turns to ice because the man is smiling.
Not a friendly smile. Not even a cruel smile. His smile is… empty. The smile of someone who feels nothing at all.
“Raffaele, make it quick,” Salvatore says to the man, already turning away, already done with this. “And make sure the Bratva finds him. I want Dmitri Volkov to know exactly what happens to people who steal from us.”
“Wait!” The man’s voice cracks. “What about Leah? What about my family?”
Salvatore pauses. For a moment, I see something flicker across his face. Not quite mercy. But not quite ruthlessness either.
The same expression he had when I said no and he stepped back.
“Your wife will receive a death benefit. College fund for Leah. She’ll think you died in an accident at the docks.
” He straightens his cuffs, those same cuffs I watched him adjust in my room.
“That’s more than you deserve, but your daughter doesn’t deserve to grow up knowing her father was a traitor. We’ll tell your wife you died a hero.”
“Thank you,” the man whispers. “Thank you.”
Salvatore doesn’t respond. He’s already walking toward the door.
Toward me.
I stumble backward, but I’m not fast enough. The door swings open and he’s there, haloed by the harsh warehouse lights, and his eyes find mine immediately.
The same eyes that looked at me like I was something he wanted to devour less than an hour ago.
For one horrible second, we just stare at each other.
Then the sound of a single gunshot splits the air behind him.
I flinch. Can’t help it. My whole body recoils from the sound, from what it means, from the reality that someone just died 20 feet away from where I’m standing.
Salvatore doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t even blink.
“Valentina.” His voice is carefully neutral. Not the heated command from my bedroom. Not the quiet menace from the warehouse. Something in between. “You shouldn’t be here.”
“You just—” I can’t finish the sentence. Can’t make my mouth form the words. “You were in my room. You were there and now you’re—”
“Yes.” He steps out of the warehouse, pulling the door closed behind him. Shutting away the body, the blood, the evidence of what he is. “I went from your bed to this. Because that’s who I am. That’s what I do.”
“You had your hands on me.” My voice is shaking. “You pressed yourself against me. You told me you wanted me. And then you came here and—”
“And ordered a man’s execution,” he finishes calmly. “The same hands, Valentina. The same mouth that kissed your forehead. The same body you felt against yours. I don’t separate them. I don’t turn one part off to become another. This is all me.”
“He had a baby.” The words come out strangled. “You talked about his baby, and then you killed him.“
“I didn’t kill him. Raffaele did.” As if the distinction matters. “And yes, he had a daughter. He also betrayed my family and put hundreds of lives at risk. Those are the choices he made.”
“You didn’t have to kill him.”
“Yes, I did.” Now there’s steel in his voice. The same steel that was underneath the desire in my bedroom. “This is my world, Valentina. This is what it looks like. Men betray us; they die. It’s not complicated.”
“It is complicated, and it’s cruel.”
I’m shaking. I don’t know when I started shaking, but I can’t seem to stop.
“You really are a monster.”
I said no to him an hour ago. He walked away. He respected my boundary.
And then he came here and did this.
I expect him to get angry. To snap at me, to remind me that I’m his, that I have no right to judge him.
Instead, he steps closer. Close enough that I can smell his cologne.
The same cologne that filled my senses when he leaned into me.
“I’ve never pretended to be anything else. And now you’ve seen it. The man who touched you in that bedroom, who told you he wanted you, he’s the same man who ordered an execution. Now you know exactly what kind of man you’re going to marry. No illusions.”
He reaches out, and I don’t pull away when his bloodstained fingers, the same fingers that dragged down my gown strap, touch my chin, tilting my face up to meet his eyes.
“I told you in my office, Valentina. I’m a monster who keeps his word. I will protect you from everything in this world, except myself. Because I’m the most dangerous thing you’ll ever encounter.”
“Then why?” My voice breaks. “Why come to my room? Why touch me like that? Why make me feel—” I can’t finish.
“Why make you feel what?” His thumb brushes my jaw. “Wanted? Desired? Like I’d burn the world down to have you?”
“Yes.”
“Because I would. I do. But that doesn’t change what I am, Valentina. The man who wants you is also the man who sanctions a death. You can’t have one without the other. You can’t separate the desire from the violence. It’s all the same man.”
“I don’t understand how you can—”
“If you had stayed in your room, you wouldn’t have seen any of this, and you wouldn’t be afraid right now.
” He gestures back toward the warehouse.
“But… at least when I walk into your room again, when I touch you, and tell you to take off your clothes, you’ll remember this moment.
You’ll remember what these hands are capable of.
And you’ll make your choice knowing exactly what I am. ”
“I already said no.”
“You did.” His smile is dark. “And I walked away. Because I wanted your no to mean something. But I also want your yes to mean something. When you finally give yourself to me, Valentina, it won’t be out of ignorance.
It won’t be because you convinced yourself I’m something I’m not.
It will be because you saw the monster and chose him anyway. ”
“That will never happen.” The words sound weak even to my own ears.
“We’ll see.” The same thing he said when he left my room.
He releases my chin. “But Valentina? What you saw tonight, it doesn’t leave this property. You don’t tell your mother, your sister, or your friend Lindsay. No one. Understand?”
It’s not a question.
“I understand.”
“Good.” He steps back, giving me space to move past him.
I want to scrub the memory of his hands on my skin. Want to unhear that gunshot. Want to unknow that the same man who made my body respond to him just executed someone without a second thought.
But I nod. Because what else can I do?
I make it halfway across the lawn before my legs give out.
The grass rushes up to meet me as I drop to my knees. My hands fly to my mouth, pressing hard against it as if that might hold everything inside, my breath, my thoughts, the scream threatening to claw its way out.
Only then do I let myself process what I just witnessed.
It feels unreal. Like I’ve stepped into a movie scene I was never meant to see.
Except the scene isn’t ending. There’s no director yelling cut. No fade to black.
This is my life.
I am going to become the wife of a mafia don and I have no idea how to come to terms with it.