Chapter 2 - THE BLOOD ON THE SILK
“Elena.”
My name. He knew my name.
The sound of it cut through the ringing in my ears, sharper than the gunfire that had just shattered L’Etoile’s dining room. Damian Rossi didn’t shout it. He didn’t have to. The terrifying calm in his voice was enough to freeze the blood in my veins.
I was still crouched behind the mahogany hostess stand, my hands trembling against the expensive floral carpet. The new girl beside me was sobbing silently, her hands over her ears.
Damian stepped over the trench-coated man groaning on the floor. He didn't look at Chloe, who was weeping uncontrollably, clutching her bleeding shoulder where the glass had cut her. He just kept his dark, unreadable eyes fixed entirely on me.
Why did the head of the Rossi syndicate know the name of a waitress who worked double shifts just to keep the lights on?
He stopped two feet away. His tailored suit was ruined, speckled with blood that wasn't his.
“Get up,” he commanded. It wasn't a request.
“I… I just wanted to help,” I stammered, my voice sounding incredibly small. “I saw her clutch. I saw the message. I don't know anything else, I swear—”
“I said get up, Elena.” He reached down, his large hand wrapping around my wrist. His grip was firm, iron-clad, but surprisingly not painful. He pulled me to my feet effortlessly.
“Let me go!” I whispered frantically, terrified the police sirens wailing in the distance would trap us both. “I have a son. Please. I just needed this job.”
“If you want to see your son again, you are walking out the back door with me right now,” Damian said softly.
The breath left my lungs.
He knew about Leo.
Before I could process the terror of that realization, Chloe let out a ragged scream from the floor.
“Damian! Don't leave me!” she begged, her emerald silk dress ruined. “Richard forced me! He said if I didn't text the signal, they would kill me! He's your brother, Damian, he's your own blood!”
I froze. Richard wasn't her brother. He was Damian’s brother.
Damian finally looked back at the woman he had been dating for six months. There was no love in his eyes. Only a cold, clinical disgust.
“Richard has been stealing from the family for two years,” Damian said, his voice echoing in the silent, ruined restaurant. “I knew he was planning a coup. I just didn't know he was sleeping with you to execute it.”
Chloe choked on a sob, her face turning pale.
“I used you as a shield tonight, Chloe, because I knew you were wearing a Kevlar vest under that silk,” Damian added, his words dropping like anvils. “You thought you were setting a trap. But you were the bait.”
He tugged my wrist, pulling me toward the kitchen doors. I stumbled behind him, my mind spinning violently. He knew. Damian Rossi had walked into an assassination attempt completely aware of what was going to happen.
But if he knew Chloe was going to betray him, why did my warning note matter? Why did he look so deeply shaken when he read it?
We burst through the kitchen, dodging terrified chefs, and spilled out into the cold, rain-slicked alley. A black armored SUV was already idling by the dumpsters.
A massive man with a scarred jaw threw the back door open. “Boss. We have three minutes before uniforms arrive.”
“Get in,” Damian ordered me.
“No!” I planted my feet on the wet asphalt. “I am not part of your mob war! I saved your life in there. You owe me! Let me go home to my baby!”
Damian stopped. The rain matted his dark hair against his forehead. For a fraction of a second, the cold mafia boss facade cracked, revealing something that looked dangerously like panic.
“You think I came to L’Etoile tonight for the Dover sole, Elena?” he asked, stepping into my space. The heat radiating off him was overwhelming. “I didn't come here to get ambushed by my brother. I came here because my men finally located David’s widow.”
David.
My late husband’s name hit me like a physical blow to the chest. David had died in a car crash three years ago. He was an accountant. A boring, safe, numbers guy.
“What does my husband have to do with this?” I whispered, my voice shaking.
Damian didn't answer. He reached into his ruined jacket pocket. His hand was smeared with blood from the fight. He opened his palm.
Resting in the center of his bloody hand was the expensive, pearl-clasped clutch Chloe had been carrying at the table.
Damian flipped it open.
Inside was the burner phone she had used to send the "Ready" text. But that wasn't what Damian wanted me to see.
He pulled out a glossy, 4x6 photograph and held it up in the dim alley light.
It was a picture of my five-year-old son, Leo.
May you like
He was playing on the swings at our local park. The photo had been taken today.
“Chloe wasn't just texting the hitmen in the restaurant, Elena,” Damian said, his voice deathly quiet. “She was texting the team waiting outside your babysitter’s house. Now get in the damn car before they murder your little boy.”
