He leaves, closing the door behind him with a soft click.
I stand at my window, looking out at the city sprawled below, and the questions cycle through my mind relentlessly.
Where is she right now? Who is she with? Is she thinking about me at all?
Or is she with someone else right now, laughing about how she played me? How she made the great Santino Marcello look like a desperate fool?
I pour myself a drink from the crystal decanter on my desk. A large one, filling the glass more than halfway. It's not even noon yet. I drain my glass and immediately pour another, the scotch burning down my throat but doing nothing to ease the tightness in my chest.
Soon she’ll be my wife, bound to me legally and permanently.
Whether she wants to be or not.
Whether there's someone else or not.
Whether I can trust her or not.
Mine.
The thought should comfort me, should make me feel secure in the inevitability of the arrangement. Instead, it feels like I'm trying to hold onto something that's already slipping away, like grasping at smoke.
I wonder where she is right now. What she's doing. Who she's with.
And whether I have any right to care when this is just a business arrangement that was never supposed to involve actual feelings.
Chapter 19: Liana
I should have left an hour ago, when the sun was still casting long shadows across the port and there were still people around.
The port is dark now, the sun long set behind the massive warehouses that line the waterfront. Most of the workers have gone home to their families, their dinner tables, their normal lives. Only a skeleton crew remains for the night shift, and they're on the other side of the sprawling complex, too far away to hear anything that might happen over here.
I'm alone in Warehouse Seven, finishing the inventory count that Antonio started this morning before he had to leave early for a family emergency. He made an error in the numbers—nothing major, just a simple transposition that threw off an entire column, but enough that I need to correct it before tomorrow's meeting with Papa. He doesn't tolerate mistakes, even small ones, and I've been working too hard to maintain my competence in his eyes to let something like this slide.
My phone sits on the scarred wooden desk beside me, its screen dark and silent. No texts from Santino. No calls. No attempts to reach out after the dinner last night.
Not that I expected any, not after how I've been acting toward him. Not after the distance I've deliberately created between us.
I finish the last column of numbers and save the corrected file on my tablet, triple-checking my work before closing it. I pack up my things, shouldering my leather bag and tucking my tablet under my arm.
The warehouse feels too big around me now, too empty. My footsteps echo against the concrete floor as I walk toward the exit, the sound of my shoes amplified in the cavernous space.
That's when I feel it—that prickly sensation on the back of my neck, the primitive warning system that evolution gave us. The one that says you're being watched. I stop walking and force myself to listen carefully, straining to hear anything beyond my own breathing.
Nothing. Just the sound of water lapping gently against the dock pilings. The distant hum of machinery from the active part of the port.
I'm being paranoid, letting my exhaustion and stress create threats where none exist.
I start walking again, faster now. My car is parked near the main gate. Less than a three-minute walk. I'll be fine.
I pull out my phone, activating the flashlight to illuminate my path. The dock lights are spaced too far apart, creating pools of darkness between each yellow circle of illumination. Budget cuts, Papa said. As if our family can't afford proper lighting.
Suddenly I spot movement near one of the shipping containers. My heart kicks up its rhythm, pounding against my ribs. I stop again, frozen in place.
"Hello?" My voice sounds small and uncertain in the vast darkness. "Is someone there?"
No answer comes back. Just silence and the lap of water against metal.
Just the shadow, now perfectly still.
