THE MAFIA’s PET

CAUGHT AGAIN

I stared at the address on my phone.

Eleven o’clock.

I had hours to figure out how to get out of this mansion without Antonio finding out.

And if he caught me, I was screwed.

I glanced at the locked bedroom door.

Then at the window.

A stupid idea popped into my head.

Naturally, I started considering it.

I checked the time on my phone. It was barely afternoon. Eleven o’clock felt like an eternity away.

Fine.

I could wait.

I forced myself to eat something when a maid brought dinner, even though I had no appetite. I spent hours pretending to scroll through my phone while my mind raced through every possible way this could go wrong.

What if the person messaging me was Antonio himself, trying to test me?

By ten thirty, the mansion had settled into an uneasy quiet. I could still hear the occasional footsteps in the corridor, the distant murmur of men talking downstairs, and the faint sound of a door closing somewhere on the other side of the house.

I waited another fifteen minutes.

Then another five.

At precisely ten fifty, I slipped out of bed.

My heart was already beating like I’d committed a crime.

Technically, I was about to trespass on the property of the man who’d forced me into a marriage contract, so perhaps I wasn’t entirely innocent.

I grabbed my phone, shoved it into my pocket, and approached the window.

The drop looked much worse from up close.

I leaned out carefully, looking for somewhere to put my feet. A narrow ledge ran beneath the window, and a thick tree stood a short distance away. Beyond it, I could see part of the garden and the high wall surrounding the property.

Wonderful.

All I had to do was climb down, avoid the guards, cross the garden, get over the wall, and make it to an address I knew absolutely nothing about.

Should be worth it.

I swung one leg over the windowsill.

Then the other.

At one point, my foot slipped, and I grabbed the edge so hard my fingers hurt.

“Shit.”

I froze, slapping a hand to my mouth.

Thankfully, no one heard that and came rushing.

I carefully lowered myself onto the ledge, found a foothold against the wall, and began climbing down. My shoes hit the ground with a soft thud.

I crouched immediately.

A ridiculous little smile crept across my face.

Take that, Antonio Dante.

I moved along the side of the building, keeping close to the wall. The garden was darker than I’d expected, with tall hedges and trees casting long shadows over the path. Somewhere nearby, a guard spoke into his radio.

I ducked behind a hedge.

“North side is clear,” a man’s voice said.

Another voice crackled through the radio.

“Keep watching the gates.”

I waited until the guard moved away before slipping out from behind the hedge. I made it past a parked car, crossed a narrow stretch of grass, and reached the garden path leading towards the outer wall.

Freedom was so close I could almost taste it.

I just had to get over the wall.

I hurried towards it, glancing over my shoulder every few seconds. The path curved around a patch of flowers, and I was almost past it when a familiar voice spoke from somewhere behind me.

“Going somewhere, wifey?”

My blood turned to ice.

I stopped so abruptly that my foot caught against the edge of the path.

Slowly, very slowly, I turned around.

Antonio stood a few feet away, his hands tucked into the pockets of his black trousers. His white shirt was unbuttoned at the collar, his sleeves rolled up, and his expression was almost offensively calm.

I opened my mouth to say something, but nothing came out.

His gaze travelled from my face to the wall behind me, then back to my face.

“Interesting choice of route,” he remarked. “The front door is usually easier.”

I swallowed.

“I couldn’t sleep.”

“So you climbed out of a second-storey window?”

“I needed fresh air.”

“At eleven o’clock?”

“I have sleeping problems.”

He stared at me.

I stared back, silently begging the ground to open up and swallow me whole.

Then he took one slow step towards me.

He grabbed me and threw me over his shoulder.

“Hey! What are you doing? Put me down, you jerk!”

I kept kicking and cursing, but he didn’t let me go until we got back inside.

“What is wrong with you?” I spat as he put me down.

I adjusted my clothes, keeping one hand tucked inside my pocket, gripping my phone.

Antonio glanced at the hand hidden in my pocket.

“What are you holding?”

“Nothing.”

“Show me.”

“No.”

His jaw tightened.

“I’m losing my patience with you, Lucia. You signed a contract hours ago, and you’re already breaking clauses. Are you prepared to face the consequences?”

I hated the warning in his voice, but at this point, arguing wouldn’t do me any good.

“I need to know the truth about Alessia,” I said with a sigh.

He stared at me like I was some naive girl.

“And you thought sneaking out of my house in the middle of the night was the best way to find it?”

“Someone contacted me. They said they could tell me the whole truth about her.”

Antonio went completely still.

I had expected anger. A threat. Perhaps another one of his infuriating little smiles.

Instead, he pulled his hands from his pockets.

“Give me your phone.”

“No.”

“Lucia, don’t make me ask again.”

“Why? Afraid I’ll find out something you don’t want me to know?”

His eyes locked onto mine.

A few seconds passed. Neither of us did anything.

Then he held out his hand.

“Show me the message.”

My heart hammered against my ribs.

I could refuse, but we both knew how that would end. Reluctantly, I pulled out my phone and opened the conversation.

He stared at the screen a little too long, his thumb hovering over the message. When he finally looked at me, the usual arrogance was gone from his face.

“Who sent this to you, Lucia?”

“How the f**k would I know? I only know I’ve been promised more information about Alessia.”

“How gullible can you be? Some random person texted you, and your next move was to go without properly investigating. What if you hurt yourself?”

“Why do you care?” I snapped. “You, of all people, should be glad if I die so your secrets stay buried.”

“Lucia—”

“Matter of fact, why did you really marry me? Because I know it’s not that lame excuse of an answer you gave me.”

He watched me in silence, then turned and walked away.

“That’s what I thought. Walk away, you coward!”

I went back to the room and trashed whatever came into sight.

I was going to find out the truth. Everything.

And if that meant breaking every single one of his stupid rules, so be it.