La Esposa Rechazada Del - Cruel Mafioso - Adri Lu...

He fills the doorway like a storm. Six foot four, shoulders carved from violence, jaw sharp enough to cut glass. His suit is charcoal, his tie loosened, a thin scar above his brow catching the lamplight. He is beautiful in the way a blade is beautiful — right before it draws blood.

He pulls a folded piece of paper from his jacket and tosses it onto my bed.

He closes the distance between us. His hand comes up — not to strike, not to push away — but to cup my face. His palm is calloused. Warm. And for the first time in three years, Alessandro Ferraro looks at me like I'm not a receipt.

I stood beside him in ivory lace, my hands trembling inside silk gloves, while he signed the mafia contract that bound our families. The wedding was a formality. The real ceremony happened afterward: Alessandro's father, Don Ferraro, shaking my father's hand over a table of illegal arms deals. La Esposa Rechazada del Cruel Mafioso - Adri Lu...

It's a photograph. Me. Leaving a bookstore in Milan last Tuesday. A red X drawn over my face.

"So what now?" I whisper.

And beneath it, written in elegant script: He fills the doorway like a storm

His thumb brushes my cheekbone. Gentle. Almost tender.

"Don't touch my things." "Wear red to the gala." "You're bleeding. Fix it."

That was three years ago.

"Because," he says, and his voice drops to a dangerous whisper, "I've spent three years convincing everyone, including myself, that I don't want you. But the Rosetti just threatened what's mine."

"I don't want you," he says, voice rough. "But I won't let them have you either."

"I have a problem," he says.

"You're in my room," I reply, surprising myself with the steadiness of my voice.