Bought By The Mafia CEO

THE TRAP IN BROOKLYN

Elena should have told him.

The note was shaking in her hand. Cheap paper, torn from a hospital notepad, Maria's handwriting but rushed — too rushed.

Elena, amore. Meet me at old house. I remember about your father. I have to tell you before he does. Come alone. Don't tell him. - Mama

The old Rossi house. Abandoned for 4 years since Marco died. Windows boarded. Elena hadn't been back since the funeral.

And Maria had just had heart surgery 12 hours ago. She couldn't even stand.

It was a trap. Elena knew it was a trap. Every part of her designer brain screamed it.

But it was her mother's handwriting.

She looked at the penthouse door. Alessandro had left 20 minutes ago for a meeting with Luca — "Don't leave this penthouse, principessa. You are bleeding enemies. If you need to breathe, breathe here."

He had locked the elevator with his code. He had posted a man outside.

Elena slipped on her old white sneakers — not the red Louboutins he bought her — and grabbed a kitchen knife. She took the service stairs. 80 floors. Bare legs, oversized t-shirt that was his, knife in hoodie pocket.

Lagos rain would have been warm. Brooklyn rain was ice.

The Rossi house looked dead.

The gate was rusted open. The garden where Marco used to grow tomatoes was weeds. The red door where Elena had painted her first atelier sign was peeling.

"Mama?" Her voice cracked. "Mama?"

Silence. Then — a faint light from the second floor. Her old bedroom.

She pushed the door. It creaked.

Inside smelled like mold and old perfume — her father's cologne, still on his coat hanging on the rack.

"Mama, are you —"

The door slammed behind her.

Elena spun.

Leo Romano.

Not in his expensive suit. In black. Smiling. That smile she had loved for 3 years.

"Elena. You still run in sneakers. So predictable."

"Where is my mother?" The knife was out. Her hand was shaking so hard she could barely hold it.

Leo laughed and stepped closer. He looked at the knife like it was a toy.

"Your mother? Your mother is sleeping nicely in De Luca clinic. With two guards paid by me to look the other way. This note? I wrote it. Well, I made your mother write it. She writes like a child when she's scared."

He pulled out a folded paper — Maria's real handwriting, shaky: Elena don't come it's trap.

Elena's stomach dropped to the floor.

"You forged —"

"I learned from you, babe. You forge dresses. I forge notes." He grabbed her wrist, twisting the knife out. It clattered. "Do you know how much Old Man Romano paid for your fall collection? $300k. Your little red dresses are worth something after all."

"Let me go!" She kicked him. He didn't flinch.

From the dark hallway, two more men came out. Romano men. One held a rope. The other held a phone recording.

Old Man Romano's voice on speaker, old, gravelly: "Bring her to warehouse. De Luca will come. And when he comes, kill him. The girl — we can sell her designs after we cut her hands. Like we cut Marco's brakes."

Elena went cold.

"What did you say about my father?" She whispered.

Leo leaned in, his breath on her face. "Oh, you didn't know? Your saint father? Old Man drugged him that night. Lorazepam in his whiskey. So he'd crash with Matteo De Luca in car. Two birds. De Luca loses son, Rossi goes to jail as drunk driver. Perfect war."

Elena couldn't breathe. The world tilted.

Her father didn't drink. He NEVER drank. She had told everyone for 7 years. No one believed the poor girl.

He was drugged.

She screamed — not a word, just a raw sound from 7 years of grief — and bit Leo's hand so hard blood filled her mouth.

Leo howled and backhanded her across the face. She fell onto the dusty floor. Her lip split. Blood on her white t-shirt. His t-shirt. Alessandro's t-shirt.

"Stupid b***h —"

The front door exploded.

Not opened. Exploded. Wood splintered.

Alessandro De Luca stood in the doorway, rain on his shoulders, black shirt soaked, gun in hand, grey eyes black with murder.

He didn't say a word. He didn't need to.

He shot the man with the rope first — between the eyes. The man dropped without a sound.

The second man reached for Elena — Alessandro was faster. Two shots. Chest. Head.

Leo grabbed Elena by hair, holding her in front of him like a shield, knife now at her throat.

"Come closer and I cut her! I swear to God, Alessandro, I'll cut her pretty throat!"

Alessandro lowered the gun. Slowly. Too slowly. His eyes were on Elena's split lip, the blood on his t-shirt.

"Leo." His voice was low, Italian accent thick. "You touched my wife."

"She's not your wife! She signed paper! She is MY —"

Alessandro moved.

Elena had never seen a man move that fast. One second he was 10 feet away, next his hand was around Leo's throat, slamming him into the wall, plaster cracking.

The knife fell.

"You put hands on what is mine." Alessandro whispered, but it was louder than a scream. "You wrote note with her mother's hand."

Leo choked, clawing at Alessandro's tattooed hand.

Alessandro looked at Elena. She was on floor, crying, lip bleeding, t-shirt torn.

"Principessa. Close your eyes."

Elena didn't. She couldn't.

Alessandro took Leo's right hand — the hand that hit Elena — and with a sickening crack, broke all five fingers backwards.

Leo's scream filled the abandoned house.

"This hand hit her." Crack.

"This hand wrote note." He broke the left hand. Leo screamed until his voice broke.

Alessandro let him drop, gasping, broken on the floor. He kicked him once, hard, in the ribs.

"He will live. So Old Man knows." He said to someone behind him — Luca had appeared, silent, with two more men. "Take him to warehouse doorstep. No hospital."

Then he was on his knees. In front of Elena. Rain dripping from his hair onto her face. His hands — those hands that just broke bones — were shaking when they touched her cheek.

"Mia moglie... look at me."

Elena was shaking violently. "My father... Leo said... they drugged him... my father didn't —"

"I know." Alessandro pressed his forehead to hers. His voice broke. First time she had heard it break. "I found report tonight. I was coming to tell you. Elena, your father was innocent. He was murdered. Like my brother. I am sorry. I am so sorry I hated him. I hated you."

He picked her up — bridal carry, like at hospital, bare feet dangling — and carried her out of the house that smelled like death.

Outside, three black SUVs waited. Rain pouring.

He didn't put her in car. He held her in rain, letting it wash blood from her lip.

"You disobeyed me." He whispered against her hair.

"I thought Mama —"

"I know." He kissed her bleeding lip, soft, tasting blood. "If you ever scare me like that again, principessa, I will lock you in penthouse and throw key into East River."

He carried her to car. Luca opened door.

Elena clutched his soaked black shirt. "Don't leave me."

Alessandro's grey eyes softened for only her. He slid in with her on his lap, not letting go.

"Never." He said. "You are blood now. Remember?"

He took her hand and pressed it to his chest — over the tattoo. MATTEO.

Under it, his heart hammered like war drums.

Back at penthouse, he didn't call doctor. He washed her feet himself. In warm water. In his bathroom. On his knees again. Like a prayer.

Elena watched his black hair bent over her dirty feet and whispered the thing she had been holding for 7 years:

"Thank you for believing my father was not a drunk."

Alessandro looked up, water dripping from his tattooed hands.

"I don't believe. I know. And I will kill every Romano for him."

He stood, lifted her wet body, and laid her on his bed — not the guest room. His bed.

He lay beside her, fully clothed, gun on pillow, arm locked around her waist so tight she couldn't fall.

"Sleep." He ordered.

But Elena didn't sleep. She stared at ceiling, listening to rain and his heart, and felt something terrifying.

She was safe. In the arms of the man who bought her for revenge.

And for the first time, she didn't want to run.