Page 3 of Unwanted Marriage with the Mafia Boss

Since everything will be in my territory, it’ll be easy to control and watch over. I’ll no longer have to deal with lowlifes trying to sell my drugs and messing everything up. My loyal people will be the only ones working at the Gaviani Resort, and everything sold and available there will be mine and of the best quality.

The resort will be perfect for money laundering too. With thousands of people visiting, it’ll be hard to keep track of things. And since everyone will be talking about it, my enemies or the cops won’t dare to come anywhere near it because they’d have all the attention on them in an instant.

My enemies launching an attack and innocent tourists die? All the cops in the world would be after the attackers and all theheadlines would be talking about it. Even the cops themselves would have to be careful if they wanted to sniff around.

The info about all the visitors will be on my servers because I won’t let just anyone sneak in. I’ll even have an excuse to have my guards out in the open and patrolling the area. My resort is going to be exclusive, and my guests need to feel safe all the time, especially if any famous people show up—and they will.

It’ll be paradise on earth. A place to get away from the world, with a little something to make everyone happy and keep them entertained. Everyone will be envious of my success, including the man who gave me my last name.

But Rocco stares at the remaining white houses on the map with a frown on his face. His brown eyes are narrowed as he runs his hand through his short, curly brown hair.

“What’s wrong?” I ask.

Rocco is my advisor for a reason. He sometimes sees things that I don’t because I’m too focused on my project. He thinks about things that don’t even occur to anyone, and he’s very detail-oriented.

“Nothing. I’m not sure expanding to the south is a good idea. Maybe if we moved to the west instead—”

“No. We need the south.” I point at two houses. “If we move these, we can offer the perfect view of the sea. It’s what people want. No one wants to stare at more buildings. They want to swim in the pool and pretend they’re at the beach.”

“But this area is very old. These houses have been here for decades.”

“So what? Even if something is under special protection, we have our guy who’ll override it and sign all the necessary paperwork. Once everything is done, no one will care. And if they do and they’re someone who matters, we’ll offer them a free stay at the resort.”

“It’s not that. It won’t be easy to convince the people who live there to sell. They see their homes as their legacy, and some of them have small stores and restaurants that they won’t want to give up. They’ve lived there their whole lives, and their ancestors before them too.”

“So they’ll ask for a lot of money. I get it. When we approach them, we’ll offer them a little below the fair price, and then we’ll up it to whatever they want if it’s within reason.” I’ll get my investments back very quickly once the resort is done anyway.

“I don’t think it’s about money. It’s more than that. Even before you took control of this area, gangs and the mafia stayed away from this particular neighborhood. We don’t have our dealers or any of our men there either.”

“Yet. That’s about to change.”

“Yeah, but there’s a reason for that. Anyone who’s not from that neighborhood and isn’t a tourist sticks out. They’re all very tight-knit, and there’s a chance that, if we approach them about buying their homes, they’ll come together and make a decisiontogether. They could decide not to sell.”

“I know how to deal with stubborn people.” Everyone has someone they love or some skeletons in their closet.

All I have to do is have my men do some digging. And I have a secret ace up my sleeve when it comes to one of the families. If everything else fails, I’ll resort to plan B.

“They could prove to be more difficult than you expect. Louder about it too. You could end up in the news as the villain who wants to chase the hardworking people out of their beautiful, old neighborhood and destroy it for some modern atrocity. You would be taking away their livelihoods too, since they’ll have to close their stores and restaurants.”

“I’ll pay them enough to reopen somewhere else.”

“Yeah, but the bad publicity could kill your project. Everyone could turn against you. How are influencers going to promoteyour resort if tons of people come under their posts and insult them and you over what happened?”

“I get that, but it’s not going to happen because I’m going to stop it. If someone turns out to be obstinate, I’m going to make sure they change their mind and never say a word about what happened. Or maybe I’ll just become one of them first.”

If people want to think of me as a villain, they can. But they better keep it to themselves or bad things will happen to them. No one has ever cared about what I wanted or needed, so I’m not going to care about their desires either.

Rocco bows his head, but I can see his eyes are still troubled.

I know what bothers him. He’s a good guy, and he’s always had trouble with the darker side of the mafia business. But that’s why he’s here with me. He doesn’t have it in him to be out there and put a bullet in someone’s head, so he’s not a guard or a soldier. Another thing he doesn’t have in him is to make hard decisions, so he’s never going to be a leader.

But he has anotherfault—one that I don’t mind exploiting—and it’s his loyalty. Even if he doesn’t agree with something or if he’s not willing to do something, he still knows what I’m paying him for. He’s not going to get in my way or lie to me, and that’s what makes him the perfect advisor.

I met him in juvie when we were just teens. He was there for something he hadn’t even done, of course, and he looked like he was about to have a mental breakdown until I calmed him down.

Everyone, including the people he was protecting, abandoned him, and even then, he refused to betray them. Once I was out, I helped him get free. I saw just how useful he could be when he drew the whole layout of a building from memory, without having to think too hard about it.

“Is there anything else you’re worried about?” I ask.

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