Chapter 2 - THE ANNOUNCEMENT AT THE BALLROOM"You've lost your mind," Lydia hissed twenty-four hours later.
She was sitting on an Italian silk sofa inside Lorenzo’s private master suite on the top floor of the estate. Her shoulder had been professionally stitched and wrapped in soft white gauze under a stunning, custom-tailored dark emerald velvet gown. The dress was designed specifically for her body—hugging her generous hips, accentuating her thick waist, and framing her deep collarbones in rich, royal fabric.
Standing in front of a full-length mirror, adjusting his black silk bow tie, was Lorenzo Moretti.
"I rarely lose anything, Lydia," Lorenzo said calmly, his hazel eyes meeting hers in the mirror’s reflection. "Least of all my mind."
"I am a maid!" Lydia stood up, the heavy velvet swishing around her calves. She took three determined steps toward him, ignoring the dull throb in her stitched shoulder. "I have seventy-two dollars in my checking account! My father died in State Penn, my brother is serving five years for grand theft auto, and I live in a studio apartment above a bakery that smells like burnt grease! You cannot stand in front of the Five Families of Chicago tonight and tell them I am your fiancée!"
Lorenzo turned around slowly. He closed the distance between them until his chest was inches from her face. The scent of dark cedar, expensive leather, and pure power rolled off him in waves.
"Do you know why my brother is in that chair, Lydia?" Lorenzo asked softly.
Lydia blinked, caught off guard by the sudden shift in his voice. "The news said it was a car accident."
"The news lies," Lorenzo spat gently. "Two years ago, someone inside my inner circle sold the routes to our convoy. They ambushed us in Northbrook. Mateo took three bullets in the spine protecting me. For two years, I have lived with the guilt of his broken body. For two years, I have searched for the rat in my organization. I put those hidden cameras in Mateo's room not to spy on him, but because I knew whoever tried to finish the job would come for him when they thought I was vulnerable."
He reached out, his hand wrapping around her plush waist, pulling her flush against his hard, muscular frame. Lydia gasped, her hands instinctively resting against his broad chest.
"Last night, three different guards on my payroll turned off their radios," Lorenzo whispered, his thumb pressing into the soft curve of her hip. "Someone paid them millions to let that assassin inside. My entire inner circle is rotten. My lieutenants are vultures waiting for me to show weakness. But you..." His eyes burned with an intense, terrifying hunger. "...you bled for my twin. You fought a trained killer with a water glass because your soul wouldn't let you run."
"That doesn't mean I want to be a Mafia princess," Lydia whispered back, though her pulse was racing wildly against her ribs from his proximity.
"You aren't going to be a princess," Lorenzo murmured, his face dropping until his lips brushed the sensitive skin just below her ear. "You are going to be my shield. And I am going to be your weapon. The man who ordered that strike is sitting in the Grand Ballroom at the Drake Hotel right now, expecting to celebrate my brother's death. When I walk in with you on my arm—wearing the Moretti family diamonds—he will know his plot failed. And he will make a mistake."
"And what do I get out of this fake engagement?" Lydia demanded, raising her chin, refusing to be intimidated by the cold desire radiating from him. "I'm not a pawn, Mr. Moretti."
Lorenzo smiled dark and slow. "First: your brother's legal record is wiped clean by sunrise, and he is released from prison tomorrow morning with a clean union job. Second: ten million dollars in a private Swiss trust under your name. Third..." Lorenzo leaned in, his lips lightly pressing against hers—a fleeting, electric taste of possessive fire that made her knees turn to liquid. "...you get the absolute protection of the most feared man in the Midwest."
Before Lydia could formulate a response, the double doors of the suite swung open.
Mateo was rolled into the room by his specialized medical team. He was wearing a custom tuxedo fitted for his chair, his pale face looking healthier than it had in months.
"She looks incredible, Enzo," Mateo rasped, a genuine smile breaking across his features as he looked at Lydia in the emerald dress. "Much better than you."
Lydia instantly broke away from Lorenzo, walking over to kneel beside Mateo’s chair. "Mateo, tell your crazy brother he can't do this. He's going to get us all killed."
Mateo reached out his hand, his fingers surprisingly warm as they squeezed hers. "Enzo is crazy, Lydia. But he's right. The families think the Moretti line is weak because of me. They think Lorenzo is isolated. Tonight, you show them that the Morettis don't break. You saved my life. Let my brother protect yours."
Lydia looked from the paralyzed twin’s gentle, trusting eyes to the dark, lethal ruler standing behind him. She let out a long, heavy sigh that made her full bosom rise dramatically beneath the emerald velvet.
"Fine," she muttered. "But if anyone shoots at me tonight, Lorenzo, I’m throwing my shoe at your head."
Forty minutes later, a fleet of twenty black Cadillacs pulled up to the grand entrance of the Drake Hotel in downtown Chicago.
The sidewalk was swarming with paparazzi, high-society journalists, and armed syndicate soldiers from all Five Families. Tonight was the annual Commission Winter Gala—the highest, most dangerous gathering of organized crime lords in the country.
The valet opened the door of the lead vehicle.
Lorenzo stepped out first, his tall, imposing figure immediately drawing the flashbulbs of fifty cameras. The crowd murmured in anticipation. Everyone expected him to arrive alone, looking grim and paranoid after the rumors of an estate breach had leaked hours earlier.
Instead, Lorenzo turned around, extended his gloved hand, and helped Lydia out of the leather interior.
The crowd went dead silent.
Lydia stepped into the freezing Chicago air, the emerald velvet gown clinging to every lush curve of her body. Around her neck sat the legendary Blood of Milan—a eighty-carat ruby necklace worth thirty million dollars that hadn't left the Moretti vault in forty years. Her dark hair was swept up in elegant coils, exposing her soft, regal neck and the fierce, unyielding look in her eyes.
Beside them, Marco rolled Mateo out in his automated chair, surrounded by four heavily armed guards.
"Is that... a maid?" whispered a woman in a diamonds-and-mink coat near the velvet rope. "I heard she's a nobody from the South Side! Look at the size of her!"
"She's huge," sneered a young mob heir standing near the entrance. "Where did Lorenzo find her? A soup kitchen?"
Lorenzo heard the whispers. His eyes turned black as pitch.
Without breaking stride, he stopped in the middle of the red carpet, pulled Lydia against his side, and reached into his coat. He didn't draw a gun. He drew a massive, flawless twelve-carat yellow diamond ring.
In front of two hundred mobsters, thirty photographers, and the entire Chicago elite, Lorenzo Moretti dropped to one knee on the snow-dusted carpet.
Lydia’s eyes widened in genuine shock. "Lorenzo, what are you—"
"Lydia Coppola," Lorenzo declared, his voice booming across the silent street like a thunderclap, clear enough to be picked up by every microphone in the press line. "You bled for my blood. You stood between death and my family. From this night forward, your word is my law. Your safety is my priority. And anyone who disrespects your name, your body, or your origins will answer to my steel."
He took her right hand and slid the massive diamond onto her ring finger.
The press exploded into a frenzy of flashing lights.
Lorenzo stood up, pulled Lydia’s face toward his, and crashed his lips onto hers in a fierce, public, possessive kiss that left no doubt in anyone's mind: this was not a business arrangement. This was a declaration of war.
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When he finally pulled back, Lydia was breathing heavily, her cheeks flushed bright pink, her hand trembling inside his.
"Walk high, mia regina," Lorenzo whispered in her ear, his eyes scanning the crowd until they locked onto a silver-haired man standing on the hotel balcony—Don Silvano, the head of the rival Lucchesi family. Silvano’s glass of champagne was frozen halfway to his mouth, his face twisted in absolute horror. "The rat just revealed himself."
