Page 34 of Double Trouble for the Mafia Prince
Dante Salvatore is not a man anyone controls.
But he makes it feel like I do, if only for long enough to make the fall worth it.
Months pass in shadows.
We meet in hotel rooms, in empty conference halls after hours, in private corners of estates no one watches closely anymore.
Every encounter is a new sin, dressed in silk and teeth, and I let it happen because the hunger is easier than the silence.
He unravels me with brutal grace, and every time I think I’ve learned to expect it, he shifts, coils, surprises.
He knows my tells now—how my breath stutters when his fingers tighten, how my nails rake when he takes too long, how my voice softens when I try not to ask for more.
We don't speak of feelings.
That would be too dangerous, too real.
We speak in terms of bodies and business, pleasure and protocol.
He knows when I’ve filed something ahead of deadline, because I wear navy on those days, sharp and efficient.
I know when he’s been in meetings with Luca, because he shows up smelling like cigar smoke and mild irritation, needing to be reminded that not all power comes from brute force.
Rafa starts to notice.
He doesn’t say it aloud, but I catch the shift in his gaze.
He asks more questions.
Wants to know when I’m leaving, who I’m seeing, why I return home at hours not quite late enough to be innocent, but not bold enough to be confrontational.
I deflect.
I talk of Valentina’s new directives.
Of restructuring port oversight.
Of all the ways the Salvatores are breathing heavier down our necks.
And he lets it go, for now, because I’ve never given him reason to doubt me before.
But I feel the tension building, thread by thread.
And then, one morning, the thread snaps.
I’m standing in my bathroom, staring at the neatly ordered row of skincare bottles and perfumes, the gleam of gold caps and glass like little trophies of control.
Everything in its place.
Except me, because my cycle is three weeks late.
I try not to panic.
I’ve been late before.
Stress, travel, irregular sleep.
There are always reasons.
