Claimed By The Ruthless Don

Chapter4

Valentina’s POV

The maid came in quietly with folded clothes and placed them on the chair at the foot of the bed. I watched her move about but had a feeling this morning would be different from the others.

“Mr. DeLuca is expecting you for breakfast.” I was surprised to hear her speak, but even more nervous because I had a feeling who it was. Her voice was so soft I had to strain my ears to hear.

Before she could leave I asked,

“And if I don’t come?”

She didn’t answer immediately, but then she did.

“I would come if I were you.” That made me shiver involuntarily as I sat there wondering who that man was and what he was capable of doing.

I looked back from the door she’d just walked out of, to the clothes, and again,

“Who does he think he is to expect me for breakfast. He wasn’t even asking.” Muttering into the empty room, I picked up the clothes and headed to the bathroom.

Three days of silence, locked doors and zero answers could do something to a person, and it had done something to me. I wanted to stay in the room and make a point, but what was the point really.

If showing up to this man’s table meant finally getting an answer out of him, then I was going to be there. Not for him but for me.

I took my sweet time getting dressed and I loved the outfit. While admiring how pretty I looked in the beautiful knee-length white dress, a knock on the door jolted me back to reality.

The maid whose name I still didn’t know escorted me to the dining room and I don’t know what I was expecting, but it seems it’s not often used.

It looked like it was there just to exist, like no one had ever actually sat in it long enough.

High ceilings, heavy curtains that swallowed the morning light, a long table that could seat an entire family but was only set for two.

He was already there when I walked in, seated at the head of it like he had been there for hours, a coffee in one hand and something in front of him that he was reading.

He looked up the second I came into the room.

Those cold blue eyes found me immediately and I felt it move through me in a way I didn’t appreciate.

I kept walking and masked my emotions perfectly, even though something underneath my ribs was doing something I refused to give any attention to.

There was a chair across from him, pulled out slightly, which surprised me because I didn’t expect that small courtesy, not here and definitely not from these people.

But I didn’t sit because sitting felt like agreeing to something and I hadn’t agreed to anything since I got here.

He didn’t react the way I thought he would, no irritation or anger, just nothing. He just looked at me patiently like he had all the time in the world, which was more aggravating.

Then he reached for his coffee while keeping eye contact, watching me stand there as if I was the most interesting thing he had seen all week.

I don’t even know how long I stood there honestly. The silence alone was doing the most and those eyes, those cold blue eyes were doing something to my legs that I was not about to deal with.

With no choice left, I sat down. Folding my hands on the table, I looked directly at him because my momma didn’t raise a coward, I wasn’t going to look away first.

“Where am I?” My voice came out steadier than I actually felt, which honestly surprised me because my heart was doing the complete opposite.

He said nothing as he set his coffee down slowly, reached for his fork and cut into his food deliberately and carefully, like he had all the time in the world and my question could wait.

The anger that had been sitting in my chest since the night those men walked into my home tightened into something ugly.

“I asked you a question.” I leaned forward, annoyed, making sure he could see me properly because I needed him to understand that just because I was sitting here quietly didn’t mean I was okay with any of this.

“Who are you?”

He still didn’t say anything, just kept chewing slowly like I hadn’t said a word. His eyes flicked to mine for just a second before moving away again like I wasn’t even worth the full second he had just given me.

I felt heat crawl up the back of my neck as I finally let the words out.

“My father sold me.” I didn’t plan on saying it like that, but once it came out I couldn’t take it back and honestly, I didn’t want to.

Something about saying it out loud made it land differently in that room and I kept going because stopping felt like letting him win.

“He stood there in our living room and handed me over without even looking back, like I was something he had been meaning to get rid of, and I have been locked in that room for three days with nobody telling me anything, I think—”

I stopped and took a deep breath, swallowing everything I was feeling back down,

“I think the least you can do is tell me why I am sitting at your table.”

Then he looked at me, really looked at me this time, and I don’t know how to explain it but it felt different from every other time his eyes had been on me since I walked in. I hated that I noticed, I hated that I could tell the difference.

“Your father owed me eighty thousand euros.”

He said it so quietly I had to push down the lump in my throat.

“He had nothing to give back, except you.”

I held his gaze and willed myself not to cry in front of him.

“So what does that make me to you?”

The silence stretched on for a while with him looking at me like he was thinking about something he had no intention to share.

“That’s what I’m still deciding.”

He said simply and then picked up his coffee again, a clear sign he was done with the conversation.

My father had handed me over without a second thought and here this man was sitting across from me treating my entire life like a business deal between sips of his morning coffee and there was nothing, absolutely nothing I could do about it.

Or maybe there was.