Page 35 of Read This Before the Villain falls in Love with You

Nora glances straight at me with a look of pure dread. "No. Hang up on him. Tell him nobody is there."

"Got it. Total mystery. Very cool." Amelia cuts the line with a sharp beep.

Nora drops her head onto her hands. "I run an office. Rich people pay me good money to solve their problems, and my assistant thinks I joined a crazy mountain group."

I rest my chin in my hand. "You got picked up by a mafia crew instead. Longer days, but Nonna's cooking makes up for it."

"Just great," she groans behind her hands.

Adrian gathers his files off the wood. "I will go read Enzo's lines with him before he messes them up." He steps out into the hall and shuts the door behind him.

Nora lowers her hands, resting her palms flat against the dark wood of the desk. Her eyes lock onto mine across the empty space between us, steady and unblinking in the quiet room.

Her eyes narrow as she looks at me across the desk. "You made up a whole fake trip for me. Hotel papers. Fake witnesses. A story about pricey food."

I meet her stare. "I make sure we don't get caught."

She raises her chin and looks right through me. "That's not just covering your tracks, Moretti. You're keeping me safe."

"Think whatever helps you sleep."

"I know what I see." She walks around the big wooden desk, stopping so close I can smell her soap. "You made sure no cop, no judge, no file anywhere has my name on it. You wiped me off the map. Why do that for me?"

I grip the wood behind me. "Because you're under my roof, not in front of a judge."

She steps in closer without backing down. "Am I supposed to be afraid of that?"

I watch the beat of the pulse in her throat. "Most people would be. Other people run from this house. You boss my brothers around and act like you own the place."

Her eyes darken with sheer fury rather than fear, her breath hitting my neck in sharp, shallow bursts. She searches my face for an inch of weakness and finds nothing but concrete.

She stands firm. "You talk too much for a scary boss."

I growl, arms hauling her against my chest. "And you never know when to shut up."

Her hand snaps out, grabbing the lapel of my suit jacket to yank me downward. She stares up at me with savage defiance, practically begging for a collision.

I don't hesitate.

I slam my hand against the back of her neck, tangling my fingers in her dark hair and crashing my mouth down onto hers with ruthless force. She gasps into my lips, a wild sound of shock and hunger, digging her fingernails into my shoulders as I shove her back against the desk until the wood rattles with the impact.

Her hands grip my neck tight. "You're out of your mind."

I pull her up against me on the desk and kiss her hard until she pulls me closer. "You're mine now."

Chapter 13

NORA

My lips are still tingling from the kiss Luca pressed against my mouth in the shadows of the courtyard terrace. The heat between us has not cooled down even as he leads me through the grand villa, past armed guards with rifles, and up the private stairs to his personal wing.

He shuts the heavy oak door behind us, cutting off the noise from the rest of the house. For a man running a dangerous syndicate, he moves without any rush, slipping his dark coat off and watching me like a problem he intends to handle personally.

He points toward the dark leather couch under the tall arched window. "Sit. You want the truth instead of jokes. I will explain the Brotherhood and the Bellini war once. Then you can decide what to do next."

I drop onto the leather cushions because my legs still ache from the flight. The room smells like cedar and gun oil, lined with tall bookshelves and not a single family photo. "You're offering me an exit strategy after kidnapping me into Italian airspace? Bold sales pitch, Moretti."

He splashes two fingers of amber whiskey into a tumbler he doesn't touch, setting the heavy crystal on the table between us like a physical boundary. "The Brotherhood isn't a corporate hierarchy with quarterly reviews. It's blood, collateral, and the silent agreement that if one of us drops, the rest dig the hole." He remains upright, dark jacket tossed over an armchair, sleeves rolled high enough to expose a pale scar tracing the curve of his forearm. "Matteo handles the supply chains because he chats too much for assassinations. Enzo commands the street outfits because he has to prove he isn't just the baby brother I dragged up by the collar. Adrian keeps our perimeters intact. Sofia stays clean of the ledger or I level entire neighborhoods."