Chapter 134 Fiorella
Rocco hadn't said much when we woke up. He'd kissed my forehead, lingered a beat too long, then disappeared into the morning calls with his brothers. His eyes had been pinched, haunted in a way I hadn't seen in months.
Something was wrong.
And I knew better than to push before he was ready to talk.
I had enough chaos of my own to manage.
The east wing reconstruction had been completed. The last crew had left the night before, leaving the halls to a clean slate, a restoration covering over the embers of what had once burned there. But rebuilding walls wasn't difficult. Rebuilding trust and authority in our world? That took more than stone and paint.
I had on fitted black slacks and a freshly laundered white blouse, hair pulled back in a low knot, minimal jewelry.
Leo was already in the sitting room when I descended the grand staircase. His jacket was open, sleeves rolled high above his elbows, dark circles under his eyes. He hadn't slept either, by the looks of it.
"You're early," I commented, moving over onto the couch next to him.
He expelled a breath, rubbing his jaw with his hand. "You should've seen the messages from the docks this morning."
I accepted the tablet he offered. Line after line of logbook reports, shipping receipts, and customs releases, all accounted for. With the sole exception of one red document.
Shipment 12C, pending confirmation
Delay: 36 hours.
"Still stuck?" I asked, scrolling.
“Not stuck. Stopped," Leo snarled. "The crew says there's been some. activity around the containers. People they don't recognize. Cars idling where they don't belong. The normal watchers, but this feels—"
"Intentional," I completed.
He nodded once. "Yes."
I leaned back, thumping the rim of the tablet with my thumb. A shiver of gooseflesh crept along beneath my skin. not fear, not yet, but that inside feeling of something being wrong I'd grown to depend upon more than gun or camera.
"Do you think it's Phillipe?" I breathed.
Leo's expression turned grim. "Possible. But if so, he's wiser now. No gestures, no words. He's silent. Too silent.".
Phillipe's quiet wasn't peace, it was the kind of stillness before the storm.
I rose from my seat, walking over to the big window that faced out into the garden. The morning breeze blew the curtains, picking up the scent of roses from outside. My image in the glass appeared composed, lips pursed up in that small, practiced smile that questioned men's doubt about whether or not my sweetness was real, but my heart was racing.
“Send men to follow the watchers," I said finally. "No confrontation. I just want to know who they're reporting to."
Leo nodded curtly, already typing a message on his phone. "And what do we do about the shipments?"
"Keep them coming," I said. "If someone's watching, I want them to think I'm in the dark. Let them feel secure before we take the floor away from them.".
Leo's mouth jerked, the slightest flicker of admiration. "You're dangerous when you talk that way."
"I am always dangerous," I replied.
⸻
By noon, I'd made three calls, one to our Romanian supplier, one to the harbor master, and the third to our lawyer in Milan brokering out a licensing issue for one of Rocco's fronts. Every word, every tone, was a chess move only I could see.
In between it all, I caught myself glancing at my phone, expecting a message that never came.
Rocco had not told me what was wrong yet. He was hiding something from me, something that brewed behind his eyes.
And if there was one thing I knew about loving Rocco, it was this: when Rocco De Luca went quiet, someone was going to bleed.
⸻
By the time afternoon arrived, I was in the west office, the office that opened out over the courtyard, which was now filled with employees sweeping away the last remnant of construction debris. Papers filled the desk: ledgers, maps, shipping receipts. The hum of quiet routine calmed me.
Until Leo knocked again.
He didn't knock twice to get my permission before he entered, which meant whatever he'd brought wasn't good.
"Fiorella," he whispered, holding out a small envelope. "This was delivered through one of our mailboxes ."
I scrunched up my eyes. "A letter?"
"No return address. Just your name."
I took it, weighing it in my palm. The paper felt substantial, good quality. My fingertips ran over the seal, dark red wax stamped with an unfamiliar symbol. The borders of my instincts sizzled once more.
"Who received it?"
“One of the men,” Leo said. "Told me it was just sitting in the box. No one saw who dropped it."
I cracked open the seal. There was one card inside. Plain. White.
And on it, one symbol, in black letters.
The letter N.
No name. No message. Just that.
But something in the writing, smooth, deliberate, seemed false in a way that clawed at memory.
I stared at it for a very long time before I looked up. "Have you ever seen that before?"
Leo shook his head. "No. And whoever dropped it knew where to drop it. That's one of your private ones. The kind that even half our men don't know about."
My mind spun through possibilities, Phillipe's group. Or something completely different.
I tucked the card away in its envelope, folding it in my fingers until paper creased. "Increase vigilance at the mansion," I murmured. "All cameras. All doors. I want everyone who enters and exits watched."
"You think it's Phillipe?" Leo asked again, his voice quiet.
"No, it’s someone else," I told him.
⸻
Rocco returned that evening, and I stood in the courtyard, seeing the final light disappear behind the fountain. The air was still warm, the scent of rain still hovering in the air from the morning drizzle. He moved silently towards me. I always knew before I heard him.
"Hey," he whispered.
I turned, forcing a small smile. "Hey."
He studied me for a moment, eyes narrowing slightly, reading the stiffness in my shoulders. “You worked all day again.”
“So did you.”
“I had Riccardo and Rafael yelling in my ear,” he said dryly. “You had Leo hovering like a bodyguard.”
“He’s good at it.”
“I’d rather be the one guarding you.”
I smiled faintly, stepping closer. “You already do.”
His arm wrapped around my waist, pulling me toward him. For a moment, the tension between us eased. The silence that followed was softer, intimate, down-to-earth. Then his eyes focused on the envelope still clutched in my hand.
"What's that?"
I hesitated. "Something strange. A letter."
He raised an eyebrow. "From whom?"
I met his gaze. "No clue. But it had this—"
I opened the envelope, showing him the card.
The letter N.
His expression set at once. "Still getting the anonymous messages?"
"He sent it home, it’s not a text."
Rocco's grip around my waist tightened. "We'll find out who sent it."
"I know."
I stroked his jaw, my fingers tracing over the skin. "Just promise me something."
"What?"
"That whoever this N is we will find him."
He froze, his eyes on mine. "Fiorella”
"You're protecting me," I whispered. "I get that. But whoever it is, whatever it is , let’s act together.."
He said nothing for a long time. Then he leaned in and kissed me, slow, hard, the kind of kiss that contained both apology and promise. When he pulled back, he was talking nearly too quietly for me to hear.
"I swear."
⸻
Then at night, after he slept beside me, I sat on the bed's edge, gazing out over the city lights from the balcony. My phone buzzed onc, a message from Leo.
"The watchers crept closer. North perimeter. Two cars. Unmarked."
My stomach tightened. I stood up quietly, walking to the window, fingers tracing the curtain aside.
The grounds of the estate stretched out below, the marble driveway glistening with the light of the lamps, the silver moonlight lighting the gardens. Nothing moved. Nothing was out of place.
But as my vision adjusted to the night outside the gates, I could see it, a flash of metal. The outline of a car. And another one.
A figure shifted in the shadows.
Waiting and watching.
A chill ran down my spine.
I switched off the lights. The room was darkened, and only the soft light of the moon illuminated the floor.
My phone beeped once more.
Another message. Number unknown.
"Did you like my gift?"
— N
The card. The observers. The resulting silence.
Something was closing in on me.
And I knew, this was not someone that could be taken lightly.
This was something worse.