MY SISTER'S MAFIA FIANCE WANTS ME NOW

CHAPTER 8: The Man In The Trunk

The phone was still glowing on Matteo's desk.

There is a dead man in the trunk. It's not David.

I stared at it, my hand over my mouth so I wouldn't scream.

The office door was locked. Outside, I could hear the party — music, glasses, people laughing like nothing happened. Like a girl hadn't just been dragged away screaming.

I crawled off the leather couch, my wet church dress sticking to my legs, and ran to the desk. The wooden box was still taped to my thigh, scratching me.

Iya's message was still there. Under it, a photo was loading. Slow mansion Wi-Fi.

It loaded.

A black Bentley. Trunk open. And inside — a man in a black suit. Face down. Blood on his white shirt. Bald head.

I knew that bald head. He was one of the guards from the gate. The one who told me to kneel.

My stomach turned.

The door handle rattled.

I jumped back onto the couch and pretended to be fainted again.

The door opened. Matteo walked in. His tuxedo jacket was gone. White shirt, sleeves rolled up. He looked like he had been fighting.

He saw me on the couch, closed the door, locked it again.

"Stop pretending, angel," he said quietly. "I can see your chest breathing too fast."

I opened my eyes. He was holding a glass of water.

"Sit. Drink."

"I saw your phone," I whispered. "The man in the trunk —"

"You were not supposed to see that."

"Did you kill him?"

He knelt in front of me. That close, I could see a small cut on his knuckle, bleeding.

"No," he said. "I don't kill my own men without reason. Someone else did. Someone who was in Sofia's car."

"Sofia? My sister could not kill—"

"Your sister has killed before," he said coldly. "Or have you forgotten David?"

He took the water from my hands because I was shaking too much to hold it.

"Listen to me, Amara. The party is over. I sent everyone away. The guards found Sofia's car hidden behind the old church outside my wall. She has been coming and going through the tunnel. That is how she has been living in my walls for five years. She knows every hole in this house because David showed her."

Tunnel? Living in the walls? My head was spinning.

"Where is she now?" I asked.

"In the safe room. Downstairs. Alive. I promised you, did I not?" He touched my cheek. His hand was cold. "But I need to ask you something, and I need the truth."

I nodded.

"That box taped to your leg. Where did you find it?"

I swallowed. "Under... under your bed."

"Under my bed," he repeated, and his grey eyes got darker. "That box belonged to David. I have looked for it for five years. My mother told me Sofia burned everything of his."

He didn't grab it. He waited.

Slowly, with trembling fingers, I pulled up my dress just a little and ripped the tape. It hurt. The box was small, dusty wood, locked with a tiny rusted lock.

HELP ME was scratched deep into the bottom.

I placed it on his desk.

Matteo stared at it like it was a ghost.

He picked it up, turned it over, saw the words. His jaw clenched so hard I thought his teeth would break.

"Do you know what this is?" he whispered.

I shook my head.

"David was... he was not like me. He could not shoot a gun. He wrote. He wrote everything in his diary. He told Sofia he was going to write to the police about my family. About what we do."

He pulled a small knife from his pocket — click — and broke the lock.

Inside, there was no gold, no money. Just a folded piece of paper and a USB drive.

And a small silver ring. A man's ring. I recognized it. Sofia's.

Matteo unfolded the paper with bloody knuckles.

It was a letter. In messy handwriting.

Matteo, if you are reading this, I am dead. It wasn't an accident. Mama did it. She told me if I left with Sofia, she would kill Sofia's family. Sofia is pregnant. I have to save her. Forgive me. - David

Pregnant.

Sofia was pregnant.

Five years ago.

My sister never told me she was pregnant.

Matteo's hand started shaking. The letter shook with it. Then he crumpled it in his fist.

"Mama," he whispered, but it sounded like a curse. Like a death sentence.

He stood up so fast the chair fell.

He grabbed his phone, typed something, then looked at me — really looked at me, like he was seeing me for the first time.

"Amara, listen. Tonight, you will sleep in my room. My guards will be at the door. No one, not even my mother, will enter. Understand? No one."

"Why? What does the letter mean?"

"It means," he said, opening the office door, shouting for his guards, "that the dead man in Sofia's trunk is not the problem. The problem is that Sofia had a child five years ago. And my mother made sure no one ever saw that child."

Outside the office, his mother was standing there, smiling with her wine glass.

"Matteo darling, is your little wife okay?"

Matteo looked at his mother. Then at me on the couch.

And he said, "Mother. Where is Sofia's baby?"

His mother's smile froze.

And from downstairs, from the safe room, we heard Sofia scream — not in fear.

She screamed: "THEY TOOK MY BABY!"

To be continued...