To save her family from financial ruin, Elena Romano is forced into an arranged marriage with the most feared man in New York's underworld-Luca Moretti, a ruthless mafia boss. What begins as a cold, loveless union soon transforms as Elena discovers...
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The house had always felt like a riddle, each hallway humming with secrets I wasn't meant to touch. I'd lived here for months now, with Luca's presence wrapping around me like something inevitable, something consuming. Our connection ran deep, tangled in ways I couldn't always understand, but there was a part of him—an entire world, maybe—that remained just out of reach.
Maybe it was the way he deflected when I asked about his past, the way his jaw clenched when certain names came up. Maybe it was the way he kissed me like I was his salvation, but some part of him still felt like a man drowning.
Whatever it was, the curiosity clawed at me today with a new kind of urgency.
It started as nothing. An idle moment in the library, my fingers trailing over the leather-bound spines of books that smelled like dust and ink. But then I noticed it—a shift in the shadows, a misalignment where the bookshelf met the wall.
A secret.
My breath hitched as I pressed against the edge, and the shelf groaned open with a soft creak, revealing a hidden room.
Cool air rushed over my skin as I stepped inside, the scent of old paper and something else—something raw—coiling around me. The dim light flickered against a massive corkboard on the far wall. My stomach twisted as I took it in.
Photos. Newspaper clippings. Maps. Red string tangled between them, an intricate web of obsession and desperation.
And at the center of it all: "The Disappearance of Matteo Rossi."
The world tilted.
Matteo. Luca's older brother. The one he barely spoke about, the one he brushed off with vague words and a quick change of subject. But this—this was an unraveling of truth. Luca had been searching for him. Not just searching—hunting.
The front door clicked open.
Panic surged hot through my veins.
I barely had time to turn before Luca's footsteps echoed down the hall, the sound sharp, unrelenting. Then he was there, his frame filling the doorway, his eyes locking onto mine with something dark, something almost dangerous.
"Elena." His voice was sharp, edged with something that made my pulse stutter. "What are you doing in here?"
I swallowed, forcing my voice to steady. "I— I found this." I gestured to the board, my fingers shaking. "Why didn't you tell me?"
A muscle in his jaw ticked as he ran a hand through his hair, exhaling roughly. "This isn't something you should have seen."
"Why not?" My voice rose, emotions crashing into each other too fast to control. "What is all of this, Luca? What are you looking for?"
His gaze pinned me in place, a storm raging behind his irises. When he spoke, his voice was low, rough. "My brother. Matteo. He didn't just disappear. I think he was taken. Kidnapped." He inhaled sharply, like the words themselves tasted bitter. "I've been trying to find him. For years."
