Page 32 of Courting Danger

The name was familiar. Alex had mentioned his cousin a few times, but I couldn’t remember much about the woman. I certainly couldn’t think of a reason for her to be there now.

“Did Alex send you? I told him, I need some time to think. I’ll contact him when I’m ready to talk.”

Right before his eyes, Ghita’s confidence seemed to deflate. “So, he’s not with you?”

“What? No. Why would he be with me? I specifically asked for time away from him.”

She pressed her hands against her mouth like she was praying. “I thought... or at least I hoped that he’d just left to fix things with you. If not, then...”

She squeezed her eyes shut, but a few tears snuck free.

After pulling the knife from the bench and returning it to her, I guided Ghita to take a seat. “Deep breaths. Just like that. Now, tell me what’s going on.”

She wiped her eyes, smudging mascara across her lower lids. “Alex is missing. I was hoping he’d just left, but now I think he was taken.”

The sound of her words, so absolute in their meaning, shot fear through my heart. My whole body seemed to go numb, and my vision tunneled. At that moment, my whole world consisted only of the woman sitting on the bench.

I grabbed her shoulders and barely stopped myself from shaking her. “What happened? Who took him? I thought he was staying with his mother.”

Before Ghita could answer, Caden pulled me away from the bench. “What are you doing? I thought you didn’t want to get involved with the Mariano family anymore.”

I nearly shoved Caden away, until I remembered at the last moment to curb my strength. Instead, I merely patted the man’s shoulder.

“I said I wasn’t sure. I haven’t made any decisions yet. But none of that matters right now if Alex is missing.”

Taking a deep breath, I sat beside Ghita on the bench and stretched out my aching leg.

“Tell me everything that happened.”

She gave as clear an explanation as she could while also holding back tears. From interrogating the surviving assassins, to their suspicions about the Bianchi family. She even described Alex getting drunk and how she helped him into bed.

“When I went to check on him later, the room was empty. No one could find him anywhere. It’s like he just… vanished.”

With a grunt of effort, Caden sat on Ghita’s other side. He didn’t seem happy to be there. Rather, he had the air of one resigned to their fate. “And you’re sure he didn’t leave on his own?”

“That’s what Aunt Serafina and Valente are saying. He’s been visibly upset since his father’s death, and they think the pressure of taking over the family got to him. But, I’ve known Alex my whole life. He wouldn’t just leave. And... I keep thinking about something he said right before he disappeared. He was super drunk when I helped him to his room. It didn’t seem strange then, but he insisted that he only drank one bottle of wine. That’s enough to get him tipsy, but not enough to leave him stumbling around like he was.”

It didn’t take much for me to pick up what she was implying.

“You think he was drugged.”

“Maybe. I don’t know.” From a purse draped over her shoulder, she pulled out an empty wine bottle. It was sealed in a Ziplock bag like a prop on a detective show. “Hopefully, this will give us some answers.”

I took it from her and studied the bottle without opening the bag. Nothing looked out of place, but drug residue wouldn’t be visible to the naked eye.

“Have you told your family about this?”

“No.” Ghita snatched the bottle back and hid it in her purse. “If someone was able to abduct Alex right from his own bedroom without getting caught, that means they’re able to walk around the house without being noticed. One of our own men turned out to be an assassin at the aquarium. We thought they were the only traitor, but if there are more, then I don’t know who to trust. That’s why I came to you.”

“Me?” I looked up in surprise. “Why me?”

She shrugged. “Because Alex trusted you. Besides, you’re too inexperienced with all this to be a traitor. From what Alex said, you didn’t even know he was mafia until a few days ago. So, will you help me find him?”

It should have been a hard decision.

Alex had just inherited the title of Mafia Boss.

Alex had lied to me.

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