CHAPTER 7
Mia sat cross-legged on the floor of her sunlit room, sketchbook open on her lap. Soft music drifted from the old speakers in the corner, blending with the distant hum of the city outside.
Her pencil moved gently across the paper, tracing the delicate curves of a flower blooming through cracked concrete a symbol she’d drawn more than once, a silent testament to resilience.
In this space, time slowed. The worries Luca carried didn’t reach her here. The danger, the secrets they were walls she couldn’t see past.
She bit her lip, concentrating, her emotions flowing into every stroke.
Her phone buzzed quietly on the desk, but she didn’t look.
There was a comfort in this bubble fragile and fleeting and Mia held on to it tightly.
For now, this was her world.
Safe. Still.
Mia’s fingers lingered over the page, her heart slowing with each delicate line she drew. The flower was imperfect petals uneven, stem bent but to her, it was perfect in its survival.
She wished she could be like that flower.
Strong enough to bloom despite everything.
Her eyes fluttered closed for a moment, the soft music wrapping around her like a gentle hug.
Though she was shy, fragile even, drawing gave her strength. It was the one place where her fears melted, and she could be herself without judgment.
Sometimes, she wondered if Luca ever saw that side of her the real her.
The girl who wanted more than just safety. The girl who dreamed, even if quietly.
Her lips curved into a small smile. Maybe one day.
For now, she would keep drawing. Keep dreaming. Keep holding onto the light inside her fragile but stubborn.
Luca stood in the alley across from the black sedan.
Engine off. Lights out. But it hadn’t moved in over two hours.
Coincidence? No.
He’d tailed it from two blocks away. Silent. Controlled.
The car was watching the street that led to the safehouse. Her street.
The rage in his chest simmered not loud, not careless but dangerous.
He moved through the darkness like he was born in it. Hood up. Steps measured. Eyes locked.
Within minutes, he was at the car’s side.
The driver was still inside a lean man, pretending to check his phone, but Luca caught the flicker of a lens in the rearview mirror. Recording.
Surveillance.
He pulled the door open before the man could react, slamming him back against the seat with a forearm across the throat.
“Who sent you?” Luca growled, low and cold.
The man sputtered, tried to reach for something under his coat. Bad move.
Luca had him disarmed and unconscious in seconds.
He tossed the gun aside and searched the man’s pockets burner phone, fake ID, and a tiny recorder clipped under his collar.
Marcello.
Of course.
Luca stepped back, breathing hard. The Don was suspicious. Too close.
Too damn close.
He had to clean this up fast and silent. Mia couldn’t know. No one could.
He looked down at the man’s motionless body and whispered under his breath:
“No one touches her. Not even shadows.”
Then he dragged the man into the alley, made a call to a cleaner he trusted with silence, and disappeared into the night.
Leaving no evidence for anyone to find.
Marcello stood by the tall windows of his penthouse, swirling dark liquor in his glass as the city pulsed below him like a living beast.
He had sent a shadow.
And that shadow had disappeared.
No report. No message. No trace.
Only silence.
Marcello didn’t react outwardly. He never did. But inside, his instincts sharpened.
Luca.
Reliable. Brilliant. Brutal when needed.
But hiding something.
Marcello had built his empire on secrets, betrayal, and cold precision. He knew when someone was protecting more than turf.
This wasn’t about territory. It wasn’t about money.
It was personal.
He narrowed his eyes.
“Whatever you’re guarding, Vitello…” he murmured, voice like a knife in velvet, “I’ll find it.”
He turned back to his desk and picked up a small silver coin, running it through his fingers — a nervous habit no one ever saw.
Because for the first time in years, someone in his own house was lying to him.
And that?
That could not stand, so he decided to see for himself.
Marcello adjusted the cuffs of his suit as he stepped out of the sleek black car parked a discreet distance from the Vitello family’s secondary business front a private cigar lounge Luca frequented.
No bodyguards. No driver. Just him.
He moved like smoke smooth, silent, unreadable.
Inside, the lounge was dim, the scent of tobacco and aged whiskey clinging to the walls. Businessmen laughed, poker chips clinked, and cigars burned low but none of that touched Marcello.
He saw only one person.
Luca.
Seated near the back, alone, drink untouched.
Marcello approached with the patience of a predator, every step a calculated beat in the growing storm.
Luca looked up, and for the briefest second, just one heartbeat , Marcello saw it.
Tension behind the calm.
Marcello offered a faint smile, the kind that never reached the eyes.
“Luca,” he said smoothly. “You’ve been keeping busy.”
Luca stood, always respectful, masking the edge in his posture. “Boss. Didn’t expect you tonight.”
“Didn’t expect to have to come myself.” Marcello poured himself a drink, not asking permission. “But when men vanish in silence, I get... curious.”
Luca didn’t flinch. “I clean up my messes.”
Marcello sipped, watching him over the rim of his glass. “I’m sure you do. But see, I hate being left out of the cleanup. Makes me feel like something’s being hidden.”
A pause.
Then, a quiet warning in a velvet voice:
“You wouldn’t do that to me, would you, Luca?”
Luca met his gaze. Cool. Controlled.
“No, sir.”
Marcello smiled again slow, dangerous.
“Good,” he said softly. “Because secrets buried too deep... tend to rot.”
He set the glass down, straightened his jacket, and walked out without another word.
But the air he left behind was ice cold.
Luca stood in the quiet of the lounge long after Marcello left, fingers curled tightly around the edge of the table.
He hadn't touched his drink.
His pulse was steady trained to be but in his chest, something heavier thudded with warning.
Marcello knew. Not everything, but enough to start circling.
He closed his eyes for a brief moment.
This wasn’t like before. The Don never came in person unless the message was more than words. This time, it was personal.
A test.
One Luca couldn’t afford to fail.
He pulled out his phone and checked Mia’s private security feed. Still safe. Still tucked in her room, curled up beside her sketchbook like nothing outside existed.
Princess.
The thought softened something in him, briefly. The world could be ashes around him, but if she was okay breathing, smiling, living then he'd find a way to hold the sky up a little longer.
But now?
He’d have to move more carefully. He couldn’t take chances. Not even with silence.
Because Marcello’s next visit wouldn’t be a warning.
It would be a reckoning.
And Luca Vitello would burn the world down before he let it reach her.