The Mafia's Obsession

Chapter 6: Her Archenemy

Updated: July 24th, 2024

Principessa Valeria Rossi

It was the middle of the night – the night after the Romano ball, and I wasn't someone who would wake up randomly at 3 am, but I did tonight all because of the noises I heard. I was terrified. It was silly, I wasn't usually easy to frighten but because of the current circumstances that loomed over all our heads like a grey, thundering cloud, I was a bit on edge. I figured I was overthinking. Either way, I lifted my sheets off of myself and got out of bed very carefully.

It was just me in my chambers. I dismissed my lady's maids earlier as I was quite exhausted after the night I'd had. The Romano ball was very tiring. My kiss with Geo popped back up in my mind for a split second, disappearing the way it had entered as well. And as I thought of Geo, I also thought of the vermin that had disgraced us with its presence – the one I saw from the corner of my eye as I kissed Geo, more commonly known as Romeo D'Angelo. Way to ruin my night.

As I lifted off my sheets, telling myself that it was probably the Soldati shuffling around and that I was being paranoid, the huge window in my room shattered and some of the glass pieces hit me, making me shuffle back in surprise. As I stepped back and of course, over shards of sharp glass that pierced my skin, my feet started to bleed. With another hit to the window, I completely fell back and my head hit the glass shards on the ground so hard that I was sure it was bleeding. Although the injuries weren't so bad, I was shocked and unable to process what had happen. The second that I started being grateful for my injuries not being so bad, a shooting pain went up my leg.

I was about to scream for my soldati to come into my chambers but before I knew it, my room was full of masked people with one of them holding me so tight that it hurt, covering my mouth. I wanted to scream in pain. I could feel my body wanting to give out because of the pain. I knew it was a bullet in my leg. I had suffered it before at the hands of the House of D'Angelo and I knew it was them behind it. But I could not bear the pain. I tried to trash around but it was no good when I was surrounded and held by masked men, a couple of them pointing their guns at me, all with silencers so that if I were to get shot, nobody would hear it.

I had tears in my eyes as I tried to look around for a familiar face. I wasn't one to cry, but with the sharp pain in my leg, I couldn't help it. Although, the tears seemed to come more from the emotional pain I felt rather than the physical and I wasn't sure what I was so hurt over. I couldn't put my finger on it, but I wanted to sob.

I had to get out. I knew I did, and I tried to fight my kidnapper as best as I could, but I couldn't. I thrashed around, trying to grab their hands and arms but it didn't seem to do anything other than make them hold me even tighter.

I had tears in my eyes, also because of the amount of times I'd experienced this before and I wanted to collapse. I couldn't breathe. A panic attack was making its way onto me.

The masked men seemed to communicate with head and hand motions, none of them speaking a word. I hoped the window breaking made a sound loud enough for at least someone to hear because I desperately wanted to be anywhere else. I started to frantically look around to understand what was going on but nothing. I was panicking, I was frantic, I was scared and most of all, I was confused. My head, my body, it was all bleeding and my leg was wounded by the bullet I'd been shot with.

Don't cry, do not let them see you cry I reminded myself, trying to close my eyes to make the tears disappear.

If there was one thing my papá taught me, it was to never let those I didn't trust see my tears.

"His High -" one of them started, cut off by the one holding me as he edged the knife I just realized he was holding closer to my throat. "Dante!"

"Apologies. The boss ordered for the princess to be taken captive," the other guy spoke.