Chapter 6 - THE BLOOD DANCEElise stared at Mateo, her heart tearing itself apart inside her chest.
The man standing before her was a monster to the world—a ruthless mafia king who ruled the underworld with iron authority. Yet he was also a man who had murdered his own father to avenge hers.
"Why didn't you tell me?" she sobbed, sinking into the sofa against the brick wall.
"Because I didn't want you to look at me with hate," Mateo whispered, kneeling down on the floor before her, placing his broad, calloused hands gently over her shivering knees. "I spent four years searching for your father’s hidden ledger, not to use it for power... but to burn it. To burn every debt, every secret, and every shadow that threatened you."
Elise looked down into his eyes. The terrifying Don Mateo Reyes was kneeling at her feet, his soul laid bare, completely vulnerable.
"You marked me at the gala," she whispered softly.
"I marked you so no one else could touch you," Mateo growled gently, his fingers sliding up to frame her neck, his thumb caressing her jawline. "Because from the moment I saw you three years ago at that charity event—holding your clipboard, making sure the world ran smoothly while staying in the shadows—I knew you were the only light this dark city had left."
Elise leaned forward, resting her forehead against his. "You're a crazy man, Mateo Reyes."
"Only for you, mia cara," he murmured.
He closed the distance between them.
The kiss wasn't like the one at the gala—it wasn't staged, it wasn't for the cameras, and it wasn't a show of power. It was slow, desperate, deep, and intoxicating.
Mateo’s hands tangled into her hair, pulling her soft body against his broad chest. Elise let out a soft sigh, her arms wrapping around his neck, pulling him closer as the pain and grief of the past four years melted away into a raging, unquenchable fire.
May you like
He lifted her off the sofa effortlessly, carrying her into the adjacent dark bedroom.
Outside, the rain pounded relentlessly against the brownstone windows, but inside the locked room, beneath high-thread-count silk sheets, the Mafia King and the archivist’s daughter surrendered to the storm raging within them.
