CHAPTER 25
MARCELLO
Roxanne.
Two rings. Then silence.
My chest tightened—her silence was always louder than anyone’s voice.
I stared at the phone. Stunned. Not a dream.
Mr. Cheung and his son sat across from me, watching the colour drain from my face. It felt like a ghost had called.
“Let’s continue this tomorrow.”
They were here to acquire some arms and ammunition, which could reach them only through me. They were leaving tomorrow, but I couldn’t give a damn. Not when her name had just burned through my screen. Not when something in me had just lurched awake—violent, unwanted.
I stared at her photo on the caller ID. Still glowing. Still haunting.
Three months.
Three months of silence. Three months of self-inflicted torture—resisting the urge to call her. And then today, out of the blue, she called. That too at this hour. Was she in trouble?
I paced the office, rubbing my forehead, imagining every worst-case scenario. Even an accidental call felt like a warning. My hands wouldn’t stay still; the tremor betrayed how close I was to losing control.
I poured myself a drink and swallowed hard, letting the whiskey burn all the way to my stomach. Then another. And another. Anything to drown the scream rising in my throat.
The air thickened—with concern, with memory, with her. An hour passed. I couldn’t hold back any longer. I picked up my phone and dialled.
She answered. Didn’t speak. But the music behind her did. Bass. Laughter. Glasses clinking.
Then—her voice.
“I’m tired.”
“None like you, though… couldn’t take my eyes off you.”
A pulse detonated behind my ribs. It was an unknown voice.
Was she being hit on?
I tightened my grip on the glass. I didn’t realise how tight I was gripping it until it began to crack in my hand.
My palm stung—skin split just enough to bleed.
I felt an unwanted wave of jealousy wash over me—feral and humiliating.
I wanted to reach through the phone and rip the voice from her world.
I hated that I still wanted her. I hated that I couldn’t stop. Even when she was far away, even when I pushed her away, memories of her came back to me in flashes.
Her smile, the glint in her eye, her worry, her tears. Her face haunted me in silence. That’s why I never let silence settle. By nightfall, the alcohol would sedate me into sleep.
“Roxy… girl, you’re in love.”
A familiar voice snapped me out of my thoughts. Ritu, I think.
“Maybe. I can’t get him off my mind…”
My breath caught. My whole body went still, like a deer caught in headlights.
Was she confessing her feelings towards me? Was she in love with me?
Her voice was slurred—but honest. She was drunk. But she was speaking the truth.
“He gives me butterflies… We were probably like shooting stars—brilliant, fleeting, never meant to stay…”
I listened in silence. Every word she slurred felt like a confession she never meant me to hear. Her words hit like bullets. Breath shallow. Heart wrecked.
I wanted to believe she meant me. I needed to believe it. I closed my eyes, absorbing every word landing like gospel. Unchallenged. Sacred, consuming me whole.
“Maybe the universe left us unfinished…”
No. No. No, Roxy. It wasn’t the universe. It was me. I had to keep you away. To push you away. I ran a hand through my hair, closed my eyes, and leaned back against the couch.
“To forgetting the unforgettable…”
The call ended. But the ache didn’t.
Three months. Three months of silence, of rage, of restraint.
For three months, I hadn’t entered the room we stayed in. I had instructed the staff to leave it as it was, just clear the untouched food.
The sheets still carried her scent. It hit me like a fist—soft, sweet, merciless. The room still echoed with her laughter. The last time I came in here was the day she left. But after that night, I never stepped foot in here again.
I remembered how she’d collapsed from panic the night before she left. Antonio had rushed to help her. I watched her sleep. Watched her break. Her fear had gutted me more than any blade ever had. Her chest moving with every breath. The food I’d left on the nightstand was untouched.
The next morning, she left. Not before she left me the note.
“I barely knew her, but she looked at you with admiration. She hid the truth, yes. But so did you. You didn’t give her a chance. Just tell her—she’ll understand.”
Antonio told me once she left.
“It’s better this way,” I replied dryly.
I watched her blow a kiss into the air—towards me, towards the silence. I didn’t catch it. I didn’t deserve to. And I’ve been chasing it ever since.
My heart sank—not being able to hold her, wipe her tears, tell her it’s okay. But I was hurting too. I thought we had something going, something strong. I knew she felt it.
It may have just been ten days, but ten days were enough. Yet not enough.
I remember seeing the file once we returned from Palma.
There were pictures of her—of us. My stomach twisted; someone else had been watching what was mine.
This was Lorenzo’s doing. That sleazy bastard never showed his face—he worked in shadows. I had to get to the man who followed her.
Santino tracked him down in less than a week; he was at Port Nerra warehouse—bound, bleeding. But I wanted to finish the bastard myself.
A sleazy Bulgarian sat slumped in the chair—twitchy black eyes, busted lip. I walked up to the table, rolled up my sleeves, and picked up a nail clipper. Before he could speak, I clamped the clipper and ripped off his fingernail. His scream echoed off the concrete walls—raw, animalistic.
“Please… don’t kill me. I’ll tell you everything,” he said in a raspy voice.
I ripped out two more—slow, deliberate, watching him writhe.
“Who?”
“I don’t know her name.” He stuttered.
“Her?”
“Yes, tall, big boobs, great figure, brown hair.”
I knew exactly who he was talking about. I swung my fist. Again and again until I heard the wet crack of bone. His face was pulp—unrecognisable.
All my rage towards Lorenzo, towards myself, towards the goodbye I never got—came out in the blows. I wasn’t just punishing him. I was punishing the version of me that let Roxanne walk away with tears still wet on her cheeks.
“Where. Is. She?” I asked between punches to his ribs.
My voice didn’t sound like my own—it was cold steel and something broken underneath.
He whispered, “I saw her in Naples.”
I hadn’t killed in years. But this man made my blood boil. From what Santino found out, he sold his own daughters to Lorenzo. He had no right to live. I picked up the blade. Walked behind him, gripped his hair. Pressed steel to skin—slow, deliberate.
“I have family… please.” He begged.
“You sold them,” I replied.
My mercy died with that admission. His eyes widened as my blade dug into his neck. My hand moved from ear to ear, slicing deep. His jugular split open. Blood gushed, hot and fast, as he gagged and choked on it.
“Send Lorenzo a souvenir,” I told Santino, wiping my hands as I walked out.
The informant was gone. But the threat against Roxanne was far from it. I still had to keep distance. Lorenzo would stop at nothing until he got control of my port and my business. And right now, she was my vulnerability. Again.
The woman I pushed away to protect. The woman I’d kill for. The woman I couldn’t stop feeling for—even if it destroyed us both. And I was already halfway gone.