Chapter 1 - The Blood on the White Sheet
By six-thirteen in the morning, Alessio Rinaldi knew three things about me.
First, I had lied about why I came to his penthouse.
Second, someone had hurt me before I ever crossed his door.
And third, if I left before he understood the truth, the people hunting me would probably find me before breakfast.
I knew none of that yet.
All I knew was that Manhattan looked cruelly beautiful through the glass wall of his bedroom.
Storm clouds hung over the skyline. The Empire State Building stood gray against morning light. Rain streaked the windows in long silver lines, and somewhere forty floors below, traffic had already started its impatient chorus.
I sat upright against white pillows with the sheet clutched to my chest.
My name was Elena Hart.
Twenty-eight years old.
Former junior accountant at Bellamy & Cross.
Currently unemployed.
Currently terrified.
And currently in the bed of the most feared man in New York.
Alessio Rinaldi entered carrying two cups of coffee.
He was barefoot, shirtless, and completely calm.
That should have made him less intimidating.
It did not.
He was tall and broad, with dark wavy hair still damp from the shower, a weathered square jaw, intense brown eyes, and a black-and-gray tattoo sweeping from his left shoulder across his chest. A gold chain rested against his skin. His expression had the controlled stillness of a man accustomed to rooms becoming quiet when he walked into them.
People called him a logistics billionaire.
The newspapers called him a controversial investor.
Federal prosecutors had called him many things without proving most of them.
The city had settled on a simpler title.
Mafia boss.
Alessio set one coffee on the glass table beside the bed.
“Cream. No sugar.”
I stared at him.
“How do you know how I take coffee?”
“You told the bartender last night.”
I did not remember telling anyone anything.
That scared me.
My memory of the night before came in broken pieces.
The Bellamy Foundation gala.
My former boss smiling like he had never threatened me.
A flash drive in my purse.
The elevator.
A man following me.
Alessio appearing beside me in the hotel lobby.
His hand at the small of my back as he said, very quietly, “Smile. The man behind you is watching.”
Then his penthouse.
A drink I did not finish.
A locked door.
And finally, sleep.
Nothing else.
I looked down.
That was when I saw the blood.
Two dark red spots marked the white sheet near my thigh.
My breath stopped.
Alessio saw my face.
Then the sheet.
His expression changed instantly.
He put the coffee down.
“Elena.”
I pulled the blanket tighter around myself.
“What happened?”
He did not move closer.
That mattered.
“Last night, you collapsed in my hallway.”
I stared at him.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“You brought me here.”
“You asked me to.”
“I don’t remember.”
“I know.”
My pulse accelerated.
He crouched several feet from the bed, keeping his hands visible.
“You were bleeding before you arrived.”
I looked at the sheet again.
My stomach twisted.
“I’m not—”
I stopped.
There was pain along my ribs.
A bruised ache at my hip.
Then memory came back.
Not of Alessio.
Of the parking garage.
A hand grabbing my arm.
A shove against concrete.
The flash drive falling.
A voice near my ear.
Give us the copy.
I closed my eyes.
Alessio’s voice softened.
“Who did this?”
“Nobody.”
His jaw tightened.
“That answer is insulting to both of us.”
I almost laughed.
Instead, tears filled my eyes.
I hated that.
I had spent six months teaching myself not to cry at work because Matthew Bellamy always smiled when women cried.
He called it proof they could not handle pressure.
I wiped my face.
“I need my phone.”
Alessio reached toward the nightstand, stopped before touching it, then looked at me.
“May I?”
I nodded.
He handed it over.
Nine missed calls.
Three from an unknown number.
Four from my sister, Natalie.
Two from Marco Bellamy.
Attorney.
I froze.
Alessio noticed.
“Bellamy.”
“It’s not what you think.”
“What do I think?”
“That I work for them.”
“Do you?”
“Not anymore.”
The phone rang again.
Marco.
I declined it.
Alessio stood.
“What did you take?”
My eyes snapped toward him.
“I didn’t take anything.”
“You came into my penthouse clutching your purse like it contained oxygen. Someone followed you out of a Bellamy event. You passed out with bruises on your ribs and blood on your dress.”
He paused.
“And Marco Bellamy has called you three times since dawn.”
“Twice.”
He looked at the screen.
“Three now.”
I hated that he was right.
Alessio crossed to the windows.
He did not threaten.
He did not demand.
He simply waited.
That was worse.
I had learned how to resist pressure.
Patience made me want to confess.
“My firm audited Bellamy Development.”
He turned.
“We found irregularities.”
“We?”
“My supervisor and I.”
“Where is your supervisor?”
“Dead.”
The room changed.
Alessio’s eyes became still.
“How?”
“Car accident.”
“When?”
“Four months ago.”
“And you don’t believe it was an accident.”
“No.”
I looked down at the phone.
“My supervisor copied records before he died. I found them later.”
“What records?”
“Shell companies. Construction invoices. Port payments. Political consulting. Security contracts.”
Alessio’s gaze sharpened.
“Rinaldi contracts?”
I said nothing.
That was enough.
He came one step closer.
“My company is in the files?”
“Your name is.”
“Same thing?”
“No.”
That answer made him stop.
“What does that mean?”
“The payments were made to companies using your vendor numbers, but the bank accounts didn’t belong to Rinaldi Logistics.”
For the first time, Alessio looked surprised.
Not dramatic.
Just one slight change around the eyes.
“Someone cloned my vendors.”
“Yes.”
“How much?”
“Forty-six million over five years.”
He swore softly.
I clutched the blanket.
“I didn’t come to you because I trusted you.”
“I assumed.”
“I came because whoever is stealing from Bellamy is also stealing through you.”
“And you thought my enemies might protect you from yours.”
I swallowed.
“Yes.”
Alessio almost smiled.
“Efficient.”
“My sister is missing.”
That erased the smile.
“What?”
“Natalie stopped answering yesterday.”
“Police?”
“I called. She’s twenty-four. They said there wasn’t enough evidence of danger.”
“Where does she live?”
“Queens.”
“Work?”
“Preschool teacher.”
“Boyfriend?”
“No.”
“Enemies?”
“No.”
“Connection to Bellamy?”
“Me.”
My phone buzzed.
A message from Marco.
COME BACK TO THE OFFICE. BRING THE DRIVE. NATALIE GOES HOME.
The air left my lungs.
I turned the screen toward Alessio.
He read it once.
Then again.
His face changed.
Not into anger.
Into calculation.
He took out his own phone.
I panicked.
“What are you doing?”
“Calling my attorney.”
“No police?”
“Also police.”
“You said attorney first.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Bellamy’s message just connected extortion to a financial conspiracy involving my companies.”
He looked at me.
“And because if I move the wrong way, your sister pays for my impatience.”
That was not the answer I expected from a Mafia boss.
He dialed.
“Marco Bellamy?” I asked.
“No.”
“Who?”
“My counsel.”
A man answered.
Alessio said, “Wake everyone. We have a Bellamy problem.”
I tried to stand.
Pain shot through my side.
Alessio moved instinctively.
Then stopped before touching me.
“Can I help?”
The question nearly broke me.
I nodded.
He offered one hand.
I took it.
Warm.
Steady.
He helped me stand.
Then his eyes dropped to the blood on the sheet.
His expression hardened again.
“Elena.”
“What?”
“That is not from your ribs.”
My stomach dropped.
I looked down.
There was another pain.
Lower.
Something I had ignored.
Something that had started days earlier and become worse after the parking-garage attack.
Alessio’s voice became quiet.
“Are you pregnant?”
I stared at him.
I had bought the test three days ago.
I had never used it.
Matthew Bellamy’s son, David, had been my fiancé until two weeks earlier.
Until I discovered the audit files.
Until David told me to stop asking questions.
Until he put his hand around my wrist and said family business was none of mine.
I left him that night.
Now I looked at Alessio.
“I don’t know.”
His jaw tightened.
“We’re going to a doctor.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“My sister—”
“Will not be safer if you collapse.”
I pulled my hand away.
“You don’t get to order me.”
He stopped.
Then nodded once.
“You’re right.”
That shocked me.
He corrected himself.
“I am asking you to see a doctor while my people and the police work on Natalie.”
“Your people?”
“Legal security team.”
I raised an eyebrow.
He almost smiled.
“I’m trying.”
Despite everything, I laughed.
It hurt.
But I laughed.
Then someone knocked on the penthouse door.
Three sharp knocks.
Alessio froze.
Nobody was supposed to know I was there.
His security chief spoke through the intercom.
“Boss. We found something downstairs.”
“What?”
“A woman.”
My heart stopped.
“Natalie?”
“No.”
The security chief hesitated.
“David Bellamy’s wife.”
I stared at Alessio.
David did not have a wife.
At least, that was what he had told me for two years.
The door opened.
A pale woman in a torn evening dress stood between two security officers.
She looked directly at me.
Then at the blood on the white sheet.
Her face collapsed.
“Elena?”
I did not know her.
She knew me.
She whispered:
May you like
“You’re the other one.”
And by dawn, the lie I thought I had uncovered was already becoming something much larger.
