Chapter 3 Gianni
Gianni
She bled on my leather.
That was my first real irritation—not the impact, not the shouting idiots gathering on the sidewalk, not even the way her body had gone loose when I lifted her.
It was the dark smear spreading across the seat I’d had imported from Milan because the original color wasn’t right for this car. The beige looked so much nicer.
“She’s conscious,” Enzo said from the front.
“Then she’s not dying,” I replied. “If she were, she’d be quieter about it.”
I watched her as she sat across from me on the back seat.
Her head lolled against the door, hair darkened with sweat, lashes fluttering like she was fighting something heavy and inevitable.
The wedding dress—what was left of it—was torn in multiple places, ruined.
Lace hung loose, silk shredded and filthy.
A bride. In the street. Bleeding. This city never ran out of surprises. It just kept giving me various versions of stupidity.
“Slow down,” I said to Enzo. “If you kill her after hitting her, you’ll be facing murder rather than manslaughter.”
The car eased through traffic, then stalled. Sirens wailed somewhere in the distance.
I loosened my cufflinks and rolled my sleeves back, then leaned toward her and caught her chin between my thumb and forefinger.
Her skin was warm, her pulse racing. She was alive. Annoyingly so.
She made a sound when I tilted her face toward the light. A low, broken thing, like she wanted to scream but didn’t have the strength to do so. Her eyes opened briefly—dark, unfocused—and landed on me.
Recognition sparked.
Not of who I was. Of what I was. She had good instincts.
“Easy,” I said, not kindly.
She tried to pull away, folding herself into the door.
“She’s probably got a concussion,” Larry muttered.
“She’s got poor judgment,” I corrected.
She whispered something. I leaned closer, hoping to hear.
“…don’t,” she breathed. “Please.”
Please was an inefficient word. It rarely saved anyone.
I released her and sat back. “She’s not going to the hospital.”
Enzo turned in his seat. “Boss—”
“No hospitals,” I repeated calmly. Flat. Final. “Not with a dozen witnesses who saw the accident. I don’t need the police breathing down my neck over one more complication.”
There was a pause. People always liked to test the boundaries, right up until they remembered who they were standing next to. Eventually, everyone fell into line. Even the stubborn ones. Especially the stubborn ones.
“Take us to the house in Montalcino,” I said.
Then, like it was nothing—like I hadn’t just rerouted an entire day—I pulled out my phone and sent a quick message to my right-hand man Dunn, instructing him to deal with the witnesses. Quietly.
I slipped the phone back into my pocket and exhaled through my nose.
This was so not what I fucking needed right now.
The girl slumped further as the car moved, slipping in and out of consciousness. Her fingers curled weakly into the ruined fabric of her dress, knuckles white.
She was afraid. Fear was a familiar emotion. It was predictable, and you always knew what you were getting with it.
What wasn’t predictable was the way it tugged at something sharp and unpleasant in my chest.
Something I ignored.
At the house, my men carried her inside.
She groaned when they lowered her onto the sofa—my sofa—and I winced. Not out of sympathy. Because I’d only just had it reupholstered. Months of waiting, an obscene invoice, and now this.
Her eyes fluttered open again, unfocused and glassy, like she was drifting in and out of a bad dream she hadn’t agreed to. Under proper lighting, she looked smaller somehow. The defiance I’d seen earlier dulled by shock and exhaustion, leaving something far more fragile behind.
It was an inconvenient detail, because fragile things often had a way of complicating matters.
Her thigh was already swelling, angry and purple, and blood streaked down her calf in a messy, unapologetic line.
A bruise bloomed along her hip where the car had clipped her, dark and ugly, like it wanted to be remembered.
The dress—what was left of it—had torn there, fabric shredded, modesty officially resigned.
And her hair. Christ. Black curls spilled over the white cushions, a stark, sinful contrast. The veil sat crooked on her head, pinned there at a peculiar angle by a single stubborn clip, like it was determined to see this disaster through to the end.
She looked less like a runaway bride and more like a fallen angel—tragic, dramatic, and absolutely not my problem.
Except she was.
When her eyes finally focused on me, I crouched in front of her, my eyes hard. Already planning how much this was going to cost me.
“Welcome,” I said calmly, because I’m nothing if not polite, “Scream, and I will gag you.”
Her gaze wobbled, fought to understand the words. Then—slowly—she nodded. Good. Because bleeding brides on my furniture were one thing. Noise was where I drew the line.
“Name?” I asked. I was met with silence.
I waited her out, because patience was a skill I’d perfected the hard way. The seconds of silence stretched. Her expression didn’t change. I wasn’t sure if her lack of fear of me was impressive, or stupid. Possibly both.
“It’s only a matter of time before I find out who you are,” I told her. “Your cooperation decides how unpleasant the wait becomes.”
Her lips trembled. “Why?”
“Why what?” I said, arching a brow. “Why do I want your name?”
She stared at me like I’d asked for a kidney.
I exhaled slowly, already tired. “I’d assume it’s common courtesy,” I continued, gesturing vaguely at her, “given that you’re bleeding all over my life and my furniture.”
Her blood had soaked into the pale fabric of the sofa in an ugly, spreading bloom. I made a mental note to burn it later. Or donate it. To someone I didn’t like.
She swallowed, her throat bobbing. But she still didn’t give me her name.
“You know,” I went on conversationally, “most people start with their name. It’s how conversations work. Introductions. Small talk. A social lubricant.”
Still, she gave me nothing.
I glanced toward Enzo, who was hovering by the doorway like a man who desperately wanted to be useful but lacked the imagination. “Don’t,” I warned, without looking at him. He opened his mouth anyway.
“Maybe she hit her head and forgot it,” he offered. “You know. Concussion. Temporary amnesia. Happens in movies all the time.”
I finally turned to him, eyes level and unblinking. It was a miracle he’d survived this long with such an underdeveloped sense of self-preservation.
“If this were a movie,” I said evenly, “you’d be dead by now for suggesting something that stupid.”
Enzo shut his mouth. Progress.
I looked back at her. She was watching the exchange with something like disbelief flickering across her face, as if she hadn’t expected banter to be part of the kidnapping experience. Understandable. I ran a tight operation, but I wasn’t a monster. Not all the time, anyway.
“Well?” I prompted. “This is the part where you decide how cooperative you want to be.”
Her lips parted. Closed again. She was weighing her options. I could practically see the math happening behind her eyes—risk versus reward, silence versus surrender. It was admirable, really. Futile, but admirable.
“I’m not asking again,” I said calmly. “I will find out who you are. I’m offering you the courtesy of choice.”
She laughed then. A short, brittle sound that surprised both of us.
“And if I don’t?” she asked hoarsely.
I considered that. “That would make today even more annoying.”
I stood and crossed the room, stopping just far enough away to avoid looming. Fear was more effective when it was restrained. “You’ve disrupted my day,” I continued. “My schedule. My furniture. And you’re doing it all without even the decency of an introduction.”
Her jaw tightened.
“And yet,” I added lightly, “here you are. Alive. Warm. On my sofa. So clearly, I’m exercising a remarkable amount of patience.”
Silence stretched again, but this time it felt different. She let out a deep, trembling sigh.
“Mikayla,” she said finally.
There it was.
I nodded once, committing it to memory. “See? That wasn’t so difficult, was it?”
She looked up at me then, eyes dark and furious and afraid all at once. “Now what?”
I smiled, and it was anything but kind.
“Now,” I said, “we figure out why you’re worth this much trouble.”
And whether you’re about to become a problem. Or an asset.
“And who,” I asked mildly, because I’m generous like that, “is the man unfortunate enough to have misplaced a bride?”
She dropped her gaze before answering, suddenly very interested in the wreckage of her dress. She tugged at the torn fabric, tried to arrange it into something resembling dignity with about as much success as you’d expect. It was almost charming. Almost.
I watched her fumble, veil crooked, blood still drying on her skin, looking like a cautionary tale no one would ever admit to learning from.
“Come on, Mikayla,” I coaxed, voice soft, friendly. “Do me a solid and tell me who the blushing groom is.”
She inhaled. Exhaled. Then finally lifted her eyes to mine, almost afraid to say the words.
“Archie Popovich,” she said.
She spat the name out like it might bite her back if she held onto it too long, like saying it at full volume might summon him out of thin air.
Ah. That explained everything.
I straightened, unhurried, giving the moment the respect it deserved. Some names changed the temperature of a room. That was one of them.
“Where’s the doctor?” I called, to no-one in particular.
“You didn’t ask for one,” Enzo said, like he’d followed instructions perfectly.
I stared at him. “And you assumed I was fine with a woman dying on my imported sofa?”
He was gone before I finished the sentence.
I looked down at her again, at the terror flickering into confusion as she tried to read my face.
“You picked the wrong street,” I said.
Her voice was barely sound. “I didn’t pick anything.”
“No,” I agreed. “I imagine you didn’t.”
Her eyes widened.
“You know who I was supposed to marry,” she said quietly.
“Yes.”
“And you know he’ll be looking for me.”
“Yes.”
Her shoulders stiffened, like each answer tightened the snare instead of loosening it. “And you’re still keeping me here.”
“Yes.”
Her breath hitched, like she’d finally reached the edge of something and found nothing solid beneath her. Her voice cracked when she spoke again.
“Are you going to take me back to him?”
“No.”
She stared at me, searching my face for the hidden clause.
“Why not?”
For the first time since I’d dragged her into my life, something close to amusement stirred. Not warmth or kindness. Just interest. Satisfaction.
“Because,” I said evenly, “he will tear the city apart looking for you.”
I watched the colour drain from her face as the truth settled in. She understood that kind of rage. She’d lived inside its orbit.
“And,” I added, unhurried, “I want to watch him fail.”