Chapter 10 - The Reign of the Russo EmpireThe heavy steel door of the bunker creaked open, the harsh light from the tunnel spilling into the room.
I pulled Luca tighter against me, my entire body tensed for a fight.
A tall figure stepped through the threshold. His white shirt was stained with blood and soot, his sleeves rolled up to his elbows, revealing the corded muscle of his arms. A deep graze marred the side of his jaw, and a smudge of carbon darkened his high cheekbones.
It was Alessandro.
He was holding Vance by the collar of his ruined suit, dragging the traitor across the floor like a sack of garbage before shoving him brutally against the concrete wall.
Luca let out a joyful cry and broke away from me, running straight toward his father. Alessandro scooped him up instantly, burying his face in his son's neck with a shuddering, ragged breath, before setting him gently back down behind Marco.
Alessandro’s dark eyes locked onto mine across the dim room. He walked toward me slowly, his boots crunching against the gravelly floor, every step radiating raw, primal power.
When he reached me, he didn't say a word. He simply hauled me up into his arms, crushing me against his chest so hard I could feel the frantic, heavy beat of his heart.
"It's over," he whispered fiercely into my hair, his voice thick with emotion. "Vance is gone. The traitors are purged. The empire is secure."
I pulled back just enough to look up into his striking, sharp-angled face. "You could have died," I whispered, tears spilling over my lashes. "You were outnumbered."
Alessandro offered a slow, wicked, impossibly handsome smile—the smile of a man who owned the world and everything in it.
"I told you, Sophia," he murmured, his thumb gently wiping away a tear from my cheek. "Once you touch my world, you don't get to walk away. And once I found you in Central Park, I knew I would burn down every empire on earth before I ever let you go."
He leaned down and kissed me right there in the subterranean vault, slow and deep and absolute, sealing a bond forged in blood, chaos, and an undeniable, dangerous love.
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Six months later, the café near Columbus Circle had a new owner, and my old apron was hanging in a frame in a sun-drenched, sprawling Tuscan villa overlooking the Mediterranean. I never went back to pouring coffee. Instead, I learned how to run an empire by the side of the most feared—and fiercely devoted—mafia boss in Italy.
And as I stood on the balcony holding little Luca's hand while watching Alessandro's helicopter touch down on the lawn, I knew one thing for certain:
