Chapter 6 - The Golden Cage
"I am not going anywhere with you," I hissed, pushing against his chest with both hands. "I have a job! I have a life here! I can't just pack up a four-year-old and move into a mafia compound because you suddenly decided to play domestic!"
"This isn't a request, Ellie," Dominic said, his voice dropping into that dark, flat tone that commanded absolute obedience from hardened killers. "My men are already securing the perimeter downstairs. By sunrise, my rivals will be sniffing around this neighborhood. If you stay here, you are signing a death warrant for my daughter."
Hearing him call Lily his daughter sent a jolt of fierce maternal instinct through my veins.
"She is my daughter too!" I yelled, though I kept my voice low enough not to wake her. "You don't get to storm back into my life after five years of radio silence and start barking orders like a dictator!"
Dominic closed his eyes, taking a long, slow breath through his nose. When he opened them, the anger had vanished, replaced by an agonizing, raw plea.
"Please," he murmured, the word foreign and heavy on his tongue. "For five years, I lived in hell thinking I had nothing left to lose. Finding out I have her—finding out I have you—nearly broke whatever is left of my soul. I can't protect you from a distance anymore. Let me keep you safe. Please."
The raw desperation in his voice broke through my defenses. I looked around the cramped, peeling apartment—at the bills piled on the counter, the water stains on the ceiling, the constant, grinding anxiety of living one paycheck away from disaster. And then I thought of Lily.
"If I do this," I whispered, my voice thick with warning, "if I walk into your world... you don't own us, Dominic. We are not your possessions to lock away in a tower."
"You will have the safest estate in Illinois," Dominic promised, stepping closer until his chest brushed mine. "You will have anything you want. But you will be under my roof, where my men can watch every shadow."
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By 3:00 AM, our meager belongings were stuffed into two battered suitcases. Lily was sleepily carried down to a bulletproof black SUV by Dominic himself, her head resting trustily against his broad shoulder as if she had known him her entire life.
As the car pulled away from the curb and drove out into the neon-lit Chicago night, I looked out the tinted window at the sliding skyline. I had spent five years surviving on my own terms. Now, I was walking straight into the lion's den.
