The Billionaire Recluse & The girl who stayed.

Mafia Ties.

~ Jasper ~

It had been three months.

Three months since Charlotte's masquerade.

Three months since Lexi had seen something she was never meant to see.

And three months of me doing exactly what I'd always done—

Pulling away.

It was easier that way.

Cleaner.

Safer.

Charlotte, of course, had told her everything.

Or at least—

Everything she thought Lexi needed to know.

That she was part of the family business.

The mafia.

The word itself didn't sit right with me.

Not anymore.

Not since my father.

Not since the fire.

Charlotte had said it like it was normal.

Like it was something to be proud of.

Like it was something I had chosen to walk away from lightly.

It wasn't.

It never had been.

I leaned back in my chair, staring at the ceiling for a moment.

My family hadn't just been wealthy.

We'd been powerful.

My father ran everything.

The business was just a front—Monroe Enterprises built to look clean, legitimate, untouchable.

Behind it...

Was something else entirely.

Deals.

Control.

Violence.

And expectations.

I was raised to take over.

Trained for it.

Prepared for it.

Until the night everything burned.

The fire had taken them all.

My parents.

My brothers.

Everyone.

Except me.

And whatever was left of that world—

I refused it.

I walked away.

Gave it to Tom—my father's closest ally, Charlotte's husband now.

He wanted it.

Understood it.

Thrived in it.

I didn't.

I built something else instead.

Something controlled.

Something legal.

Something I could live with.

But that didn't mean I didn't understand that world.

Didn't mean I couldn't step into it when necessary.

Charlotte's party had proven that.

And I hated every second of it.

Because it reminded me—