Page 1 of Betraying the Mafia Boss

Chapter One

Vincent

There are hundreds of people in this room, but only one person manages to catch my attention. I don’t know her name or the color of her eyes. I don’t know who she is, where she is from, or why all I can focus on, is her.

I mean, there are over three hundred people in this health seminar, all of them doctors, nurses, and even morticians. I’ve met most of them several times before. So, why can’t I stop staring at the tall, slender woman across the room when I know absolutely nothing about her, other than the fact her curly, silver hair is wrapped in a messy bun at the top of her head and she’s goddamn sexy in the sky-blue scrubs she’s wearing.

I swear she’s the most beautiful woman in this room.

Why does my cock keep calling for attention at how badass she looks with a stethoscope around her neck?

Scratch that, did I somehow develop a kink for women in scrubs and didn’t realize it until today?

It’s been two years since I left the army. Let me rephrase that, two years since my older brothers forced me to leave the army after I lost…I stop my thoughts from drifting further. Thinking about the things I lost won’t help. It’ll only make my nightmares worse when they’re finally fading.

The seminar goes on for another hour, but most of what the speaker on the podium is saying becomes nothing more than muffled noise in my ears. All my focus is on that silver-haired woman.

“…that will be all for today. Thank you all for coming and I hope to see everyone here at the charity event on Monday night,” Professor Jenkins says from the podium. There’s chattering in the space the second he leaves the podium and all the delegates head for the tiny door leading out of the conference room.

The silver-haired lady doesn’t move though. A caramel-skinned woman with braids, also dressed in scrubs, is standing beside her. She leans in and whispers something to the woman I’ve been focused on for the last hour. Both heads whip in my direction and two light brown eyes pin me in place.

Those eyes are so beautiful it takes a moment before I can look away and pretend I haven’t been staring at her for the last hour.

From the corner of my eye, I see her friend whisper something to her, but the woman who stole my attention doesn’t respond, she just turns and drags her friend along as they leave the room.

“I saw you staring at her all through the seminar,” a deep voice says beside me. It’s my friend Luca. He’s almost as tall as I am with curly dark hair and a constant scowl. I’m surprised the kids in the pediatric section love him like they do with a face like that, never mind he swears they’re the devil’s spawn and he hates them.

Facing him, my lips quirks. “You’re here.”

“I never left,” he says.

To be honest, I can no longer tell if Luca is my friend or my bodyguard since Dominic insists he follow me everywhere I go. Luca would rather spend his time hunting and killing the Camorrista men, especially after the war between our families a year ago. There is something about someone called Elio Valentes. I don’t know the details and I don’t want to know. Mafia business is not my business.

What I do know is Elio has been running the Camorra business from a secret location and as it stands, none of his men knows where he might be. Marcus has tortured a few of them, and he hasn’t been able to get a single piece of useful information about Elio’s whereabouts from any of them.

Luca hates “medic bullshit”, as he usually calls it, but since the Capo ordered it, he has no choice but to act accordingly. “Funny, considering I thought you fell off the face of the earth during the presentation.” His lips twitch and he frowns before pushing up to his feet. “Are we leaving or will you spend an extra hour looking at the spot where she was standing?”

I rub my beard as I contemplate my next move. “Let’s go to the wards, then we can grab something to eat afterwards.”

Luca scoffs, his dark eyes glowering at me as we stroll out of the room. Everyone has left by now so the place has an empty, eerie feeling. “You’re no longer a combat medic. I can’t fathom why you’re obsessed with this place.”

I stop in front of the door as my throat tightens. He’s right. I’m no longer a combat medic. I shouldn’t be attending medical seminars or go on ward rounds, but it’s a pull I can’t resist.

At first, I joined the combat medics to atone for my family’s sins. I couldn’t give two shits about religion and if a deity exists or not, but I hope I can cleanse the world of some of the damages my kind, my family—the mafia—has done to it.

However, after that night two years ago when I saw life drain from the eyes of one of my comrades, I’m no longer certain if I’m doing this for my family or if I’m here to find a bit of peace for myself.

“Do you still have the nightmares?” Luca’s voice is careful as he asks. Sometimes I see the fear and respect in his eyes when he speaks to me. I may be nothing like my brothers, but I think he recognizes I’m just as much of a Romano as they are. As if I’m a predator hiding in the dark, waiting for the right moment to attack my prey.

I am nothing like that. I never will be. The bloodshed in the mafia, the ruthlessness and cruelty, disgusts me to my core. I refuse to be part of a world as dark as that.

“They’re not as frequent as they used to be,” I tell him. I continue walking and he follows. “One more thing, don’t say a word about my nightmare to my brothers.”

“I’ve kept it a secret for two years, why would I tell them now?”

“You’ve only been able to keep it a secret because neither of them has been interested enough to find out yet.” I smile when we arrive the pediatric ward and the kids squeal my name at the top of their lungs, some of them running to hug me.

I spend some time with the children and then go to the café downstairs for lunch. When I’m done, it’s time for me to check out the next event on the day’s schedule. The hospital’s foyer is decorated with flowers and several booths have been set up, each selling different items. A group of nurses stand in the entrance receiving the politicians and socialites.

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