Cushions are still on the floor, papers scattered, my life turned upside down by a man with storm-cloud eyes and a smile that promises violence.
My phone chimes with a text notification. I’m pathetic enough to lunge for it. It’s just a food delivery app asking me to rate my order.
“For fuck’s sake,” I groan, dropping my phone onto the cushion again.
Why am I even waiting for him to text? It’s not like I want to hear from him. It’s not like I’m curious about what being his girlfriend will entail or when it starts.
And I’m definitely not replaying the moment his fingers curled around my throat or the way his voice dropped when he called me Little Thief.
Mental pin: All of the above.
God, I’m exhausted. Not just because I haven’t slept since he woke me up. No, it’s the kind that makes your limbs heavy and your thoughts sticky. I should sleep. I should clean up. I should stop checking my damn phone.
Instead, I curl deeper into the couch, pull a throw blanket over my legs, and stare blankly at the TV. A contestant is crying over a fallen souffle. I envy her. At least her problems have a time limit and judges who might be merciful.
Mine has neither.
I check my phone one last time before closing my eyes. Still nothing.
The wine and exhaustion finally pull me under, but even as I drift off, some part of me stays alert, waiting for the buzz of a notification.
When my alarm blares the next morning, I have a whole second of complete bliss. Then reality crashes back—Matteo, the belt, the favor—and I groan.
I drag myself into the shower, letting scalding water pound some life back into my body.
Everything is going to be fine. I am going to work, do my job, and not think about scarred faces or Mafia connections or the way my stomach flips every time my phone buzzes.
See? Totally fine.
By the time I walk into Holston PR, I’ve checked my phone seventeen times. Not that I’m counting.
The morning crawls by in a blur of meetings I can’t focus on. My body sits in conference rooms while my mind keeps drifting to Matteo. What exactly constitutes being his girlfriend? Hand-holding? Public appearances? Sex? Does he expect me to…
“Raven? Your thoughts on the Henderson proposal?”
I snap back to the room where five faces stare expectantly at me. “I think we should push for exclusivity,” I say automatically. “They’re wavering between us and Apex, but our personalized approach is the deciding factor.”
My boss nods approvingly, and the meeting continues. Crisis averted.
When lunch finally arrives, I lock myself in a bathroom stall and pull up an incognito browser on my phone. ‘Russo family Cleveland’ I type, then immediately backspace and try ‘Russo business Cleveland’ instead. Somehow, that feels safer.
The search results are frustratingly vague. Mentions of real estate holdings, and investment firms just to name a few.Nothing explicitly criminal, but plenty of local forum threads that cut off abruptly or dance around specifics in a way that makes my skin prickle.
I’m halfway through an archived news article about an explosion from last year that was suspected of organized crime ties when the bathroom door opens. I close the browser so fast I nearly drop my phone.
“Are you hiding from Holston, Raven?” It’s Marcy from graphic design.
I frown at her even though she can’t see me through the door. But hello, whatever happened to bathroom etiquette? Thou shalt not strike up a conversation with someone behind a closed door.
“Just taking a mental health moment,” I lie, flushing the unused toilet for show.
I spend the rest of the afternoon in a fog, nodding at the right moments and typing notes I’ll never refer to. By the time I escape the office, my nerves feel frayed at the edges, like a rope about to snap.
Back home, I order sushi—different from yesterday’s Thai, as if varying my takeout somehow constitutes getting my life together. After dinner, I find myself before the bathroom mirror, practicing facial expressions like I’m prepping for a pageant from hell.
I suppose I’m not far off since I’m trying to find one to use the next time I see Matteo.
Option one, professional detachment. I straighten my spine and smooth my features into a mask of polite indifference. My eyes look dead.
