Chapter Three
The spa day went amazing—apart from the little snag where the guards, for some odd reason, had no choice but to be in the room with them while they were getting massages. Mia didn’t like it, as to her it didn’t feel right having men watching her.
At least her friends also ended up having the same problem. If all her friends’ guards acted the same way, then she knew without a shadow of a doubt something was wrong. There was no point in asking Giovanni what was wrong, as she simply wouldn’t be told.
So, instead, all she did was finish her massage, and rather than go for a swim, she cut the date with her friends short. All three of them were feeling the same way.
Her friends went back home to their respective husbands, while Mia decided to do some shopping. She just didn’t want to go back home. Shopping usually helped cheer her up.
Her guards didn’t help matters, as it was like they had closed the distance and were now keeping her safe.
Mia went from one store to another. Even when she made her way through and was contemplating lingerie, her guards didn’t give her any space.
There were no clothes that appealed to her, because everything she looked at seemed childish to her.
Was it childish? Did bright colors and stylish dresses make her look like a child?
When she asked her guards, all she got was silence.
They were no help at all. So, she ended the trip around five in the afternoon and felt even more depressed than when she started.
The trip home was uneventful, but she was shocked to see Giovanni’s car already parked in the main driveway of their country home. It wasn’t like him to get home early. In fact, it wasn’t like him to open the main door and make his way down the steps toward the car to greet her, yet here he was.
“Where were you?” he asked.
Mia frowned. “I went shopping.”
“Liana, Clarissa, and Tatiana arrived home hours ago.”
“And?”
“Where were you?”
She wasn’t used to this line of questioning, and it was starting to irritate her.
“I went shopping. Looking for some new clothes. What is the problem?”
Giovanni reached for her arm and attempted to pull her inside, but she wasn’t going with him.
“What’s going on?”
Every fiber of her being was telling her to not make a scene, not cause trouble, that this wouldn’t be good for either of them, yet she remained firmly still. Her mother had told her she must be a good wife. A subservient wife. A wife that didn’t make waves, didn’t want her husband to beat her.
Mia didn’t know everything that happened between her parents. Whenever they were together, her mother and father always looked powerful, strong. Like nothing was going to separate them. She had never seen her mother with a bruise either.
Pushing those thoughts out of her mind, she attempted to focus on Giovanni. There were a lot of women within the Colombo Mafia that had to deal with their husbands using their fists to discipline.
“If you come inside, I’ll tell you,” he said.
This was new. Mia didn’t know if she wanted to know, but she found herself moving one step in front of the other, following him.
They didn’t go to the bedroom, where in the past he had distracted her from telling the truth. He closed the door and made his way toward his desk, but he didn’t sit behind it. Instead, he leaned against the edge of it and looked at her.
“There’s a problem,” he said, seeming to pause between each word.
“What is it?” she asked. This felt unreal. Giovanni was actually telling her there was a problem with the Colombo Mafia.
“What I am about to tell you cannot leave this room. Your friends cannot know. Just you and me,” he said.
Mia didn’t know if she could do this, but couples usually confided in each other.
She nodded at him and squared her shoulders. “You can tell me.”
Giovanni stared at her for a minute, then another, and another. She had no idea how much longer he was going to continue staring at her, and she was trying not to get unnerved, when he reached into his jacket pocket.
“This is a list,” Giovanni said, reaching out toward her.
Mia took another deep breath, grasped the list, started to read it, and frowned. “What is this?”
“It’s a list of women and girls. Their descriptions, to be exact.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Someone—or a gang, or perhaps those responsible for what happened last year—decided to attempt to capture our women,” Giovanni said.
She watched as he reached into his jacket pocket.
“And use this.”
Mia held the packet in her hands. She had never touched drugs before, and right now, it wasn’t making her comfortable.
“They’re going to use this to kidnap wives, possibly daughters, girls, vulnerable women.”
“But wouldn’t that only work if people took these drugs?” Mia asked. Was her question stupid? Immature? Giovanni was confiding in her, and she was terrified of saying or doing the wrong thing. She hated this feeling.
“They don’t have to take it,” Giovanni said. “All you have to do is be near someone when they smash it in their face, hold them immobile for a few seconds, and it works fast.”
“Oh,” Mia said. “Wouldn’t something like this make news or something?”
Giovanni shook his head. “Not if there are only targeted people using it.”
“You think they’re coming for us?” Mia asked.
“There is a description that matches yours,” Giovanni said.
“Come on, that doesn’t mean anything. There are tons of girls who could match my description.”
“And yet, the man we found with it came to my place of business and started to stalk my employees. You can see the one circled that matches her description,” Giovanni said.
“Wow. What does this drug do?” she asked. “Does it make the woman compliant?”
“It completely knocks you out; however, I am not aware if the woman is even aware of what is happening when they do this.”
“I could take it,” she said.
He shook his head. “You’re insane. No, I am not allowing you to take it.”
Mia looked at the drug in her hand, and then at him. “Why not? I can tell you the aftereffects. You’re here, which means I’m safe, perfectly so.”
“No.” He took the bag of drugs from her, and Mia sighed.
“You’re never going to know unless we try it,” Mia said, and then handed him back the list. “You could trust me to at least do this for you.”
Mia didn’t see a reason to stay in the office, so she made her way out and upstairs toward their bedroom. Just when she thought they were taking one step forward, they, of course, had to take another ten back.
She trusted him, didn’t that mean anything? She had even offered to take a damn drug, and that meant nothing to him either.
What was the point of even trying?
****
Mia still wasn’t talking to him, and Giovanni could live with that. All his soldiers could test the drug, but other than feeling groggy, they didn’t have any real side effects. For the Colombo Mafia, that was case closed. It was a drug designed to knock women out.
Only, something wasn’t sitting well with Giovanni. Some drugs could have targeted effects. What men felt might not be what women felt. He was not going to allow Mia to take that fucking drug.
Life had to go on. He had orders to follow, and some of those also meant going to nightclubs with his wife, meeting with suppliers of delicate products.
Mia was used to this and tended to enjoy going out with him—at least recently, after she had escaped her guards to go to one of their nightclubs with her friends.
Since then, he had taken her along, and she tended to love dancing.
Tonight, she was sitting, soda in hand, looking out across the dance floor. He didn’t have time to go dancing tonight. Business had to be dealt with, and if Mia wanted to act cold to him, then he didn’t need to say a word to her either.
Leaving their private booth, he knew her guards would be watching her, so he made his way toward the booth, where Leanne Arboritz, the daughter of one of the suppliers, was sitting, enjoying a drink. She wore a tight business skirt, crisp white shirt, and a matching jacket that went with the skirt.
She was a woman who did business. Negotiated drugs and guns for her father. His only son had proven to be too weak and had attempted to sell out the Arboritz Family.
“I see you could pull yourself away from your wife long enough for us to have this meeting,” Leanne said.
“I want to know why you insisted on this meeting being here?” Giovanni asked.
“Simple—my father has gotten some information that he finds distressing,” Leanne said.
“What kind of information?”
“That you’re chasing ghosts. Ghosts that have a list of women that need ... supplying.”
Giovanni didn’t show a single sign that her information was exactly right.
“What does your father want?”
The Arboritz Family had a way of finding out all kinds of information.
Not only did they deal with guns and drugs, information and blackmail were also supplied.
It had helped the Colombo Mafia out of some tight situations in the past few years.
Especially when certain law enforcement had come calling.
That information had proven vital in keeping them off their backs.
“We’re not interested in human trafficking,” Leanne said. “My father is in a lot of interesting deals, but it would seem when it comes to the supply of humans, he holds a firm line.”
Giovanni nodded. “Then we are in agreement.”
“However, this is what is troubling to my father, because there are certain claims you are dabbling. That you’re the ghosts arranging for women to be taken and sold. And girls.”
“That is untrue,” Giovanni said.
Leanne reached out and put a hand on his knee.
They were business associates, but also friends.
They had never fucked. Leanne was simply not interested in mixing business with pleasure, and he had men test her.
She was a woman of quite a few principles, which was always funny to hear considering she dealt in drugs and guns, along with blackmail. Even still, she did have integrity.
“Someone is attempting to make it look like the recent kidnapping is internal,” Leanne said.
“My father, until this matter is cleared up, wants to put business deals on hold. I have advised him against this, that I believe you are all being set up, but he will not budge, and he is the boss.” Leanne reached for her glass of wine.
“I am reaching out to you as a friend. My father just wanted to handle it with a phone call.”
Giovanni nodded. “Tell your father I understand his concern, and I will deal with this.”
“Do you want to enjoy a drink with me?” Leanne asked.
Giovanni was tempted, but he also knew he had to fix the problems he had with his wife.
“Another time.”
Leanne gave his hand a squeeze, and he gave her one back. She was trying to offer him some comfort, but he didn’t need it. This was a fucking shit show.
He arrived back at his table to find Mia was not there. Nor was her guard. He got to his feet and looked down toward the dance floor, and again, there was no sign of her. Giovanni didn’t like this.
He put a call through to Mia’s phone, and of course, that was turned off.
He should have known. The next person he called was her guard, who told him Mia had not been feeling well and had asked to go home.
Giovanni didn’t like to be disturbed at these meetings, and her guards would have just taken Mia home.
Hanging up his cell phone, he looked out across the dance floor, and his anger came flooding back.
So, not only were people out there attempting to attack the Colombo Mafia’s women, they were now intent on making it appear they were doing this internally. That they had entered the fucking trafficking ring.
This pissed him off. Yes, they dealt in brothels and prostitutes, but those women had willingly come to the Colombo Mafia. They didn’t deal with them on a forced basis.
He put his cell phone away, not in a good mood, as he left the nightclub. A couple of his guards were waiting, and he made his way toward his car, sitting in the back. Giovanni was not interested in driving.
What did he have to do to win Mia back? There would have been a time she would have stayed anywhere until his business was finished. Now, she made her own decisions, left when she chose, and it was pissing him off in a big fucking way. He fucking hated it.
Running a hand down his face, he tried to clear his mind and figure out what the fuck was going on.
Drugs last year.
Trafficking this year.
What the fuck were they going to do?
Arriving at his home, he climbed out of the back and ignored his men as he made his way into the house.
He took the stairs two at a time, entering their shared bedroom.
For a short period after the party where he had called her a child, Mia had moved out.
Giovanni went to that bedroom, only she wasn’t there.
Leaving her room, he stood at the top of the stairs and waited. “Where’s Mia?” he asked.
“She went into your office, sir,” one of the guards said.
Giovanni was pissed off, made his way downstairs, and entered his office. The moment he saw Mia, he nearly fucking lost it.
She was sat slumped in one of the chairs, and the packet of drugs he had shown her last night was open. Giovanni couldn’t believe she had taken the fucking drug, especially when he fucking told her not to.
Slamming the door closed so no one would enter, he had no choice but to go to her.
“What the fuck is this?” he asked.
His anger was starting to get the better of him. Giovanni’s hands clenched into fists.
“I have no fucking way of knowing if this is an actual drug or not. Are you insane?” He growled the words, as he didn’t want to alert anyone to what Mia had done.
“If anyone finds out about this, I am fucked.” He didn’t know if her parents would be pissed that their daughter had taken an untested drug.
He picked Mia up, carried her to the couch, and laid her down so she was more comfortable.
“You’re going to drive me crazy, aren’t you? Just doing what the fuck you want.”
He sighed.