Chapter 6 - The Woman He Was Supposed to Marry
They reached Richmond in seventy-six minutes.
The front door hung open.
One of Damian’s guards was unconscious in the hallway. The other had been shot in the leg and was being loaded into an ambulance.
Laura Rhodes was gone.
Camille walked into the kitchen and stopped beside the overturned chair.
Damian came up behind her.
“I’m going to get her back.”
Camille did not turn around.
“You don’t know where she is.”
“I will.”
“Don’t make promises because you think that’s what I need.”
“I’m making it because I intend to keep it.”
She finally looked at him.
There was no panic in his face.
That almost made it worse.
Damian under pressure became colder, quieter, more precise.
A dangerous man sharpening himself.
Camille had always found that frightening.
Tonight it made her feel less alone.
Nico arrived ten minutes later with blood on his collar that was not his.
“They used a utility van with cloned city plates,” he said. “Traffic cameras lost them three blocks south. We found a burner phone in the alley. Deliberate.”
“A message?” Damian asked.
Nico handed him the phone.
One text.
MIDNIGHT. PIER NINE. THE CARDS, THE LEDGER, AND THE KEY. COME ALONE OR SHE DIES.
Camille read it.
“I’m going.”
“No,” Damian said.
“It’s my mother.”
“That is why you are not going.”
She turned slowly.
“You do not get to make that decision.”
“I absolutely do when Salvatore’s plan is to put you in the same room with him.”
“My father went alone eleven years ago because everyone else decided what was safest for him. I am not repeating that history by sitting in a locked room while men handle my life.”
Damian’s jaw tightened.
“I won’t use you as bait.”
“I’m not asking you to.”
“Then what are you asking?”
“To treat me like I’m in this with you.”
The words stopped him.
Camille stepped closer.
“For two years, I managed every crisis in your office. I knew which judge would delay a hearing, which banker was bluffing, which board member was sleeping with which lobbyist, and which of your captains lied when he touched his watch. You trusted my mind every day until this became personal.”
“It is personal.”
“Yes. To me.”
Damian stared at her.
She lowered her voice.
“Let me help save my mother.”
A long silence passed.
Then Damian nodded once.
“Together.”
It was not surrender.
It was something more difficult for him.
Respect.
They returned to Baltimore and established a command center in Damian’s penthouse office.
By seven that evening, every screen showed maps of the harbor, traffic feeds, property records, and satellite images of Pier Nine.
Then the elevator doors opened.
A woman Camille had never seen before walked in as if she owned the building.
She was tall, elegant, dressed in ivory, with dark hair falling in a straight line over one shoulder. Two bodyguards followed her.
Damian looked up and swore quietly.
“Serafina.”
The woman’s gaze moved to Camille.
Then to Damian.
“So that’s her.”
Camille’s stomach tightened.
Damian stood.
“Not now.”
Serafina De Luca ignored him.
She crossed the room and extended a hand to Camille.
“Serafina De Luca.”
Camille shook it.
“Camille Rhodes.”
“I know.”
Of course she did.
Serafina looked at Damian.
“Your uncle called my father.”
That changed everything.
Damian’s expression hardened.
“What did Salvatore want?”
“A truce.”
“With the De Luca family?”
“A merger, essentially.”
Nico muttered something impolite.
Serafina continued, “He told my father you were losing control and that Baltimore needed stability. He offered to formalize the old alliance.”
Camille did not like the word formalize.
Damian did not either.
“How?” he asked.
Serafina smiled without humor.
“By resurrecting the marriage agreement our fathers discussed when I was twenty.”
The room became very still.
Camille looked at Damian.
He looked furious.
That should have helped.
It did not help enough.
“There was a marriage agreement?” Camille asked.
“An idea,” Damian said.
Serafina laughed.
“It was considerably more than an idea to our fathers.”
“Did you agree to it?” Camille asked.
Serafina looked at her directly.
“No. Neither did he.”
Damian’s shoulders lowered half an inch.
Camille hated that she noticed.
Serafina’s gaze moved between Camille and Damian.
“May I borrow her?” she asked.
Damian frowned. “For what?”
Serafina looked at Camille. “Five minutes without men planning a war over our heads.”
Camille almost said yes out of principle.
She followed Serafina into the small conference room beside Damian’s office.
The door had barely closed when Serafina said, “He is in love with you.”
Camille stared.
“That is what you wanted to discuss?”
“No. But you were looking at me like I might pull a wedding veil out of my purse, so I thought we should handle that first.”
Camille felt heat rise to her face.
“I was not.”
“You were.”
Serafina sat on the edge of the conference table. “Damian and I were twenty and twenty-one when our fathers tried to turn us into a treaty. He told Vittorio he would rather lose the south docks.”
Camille blinked. “That sounds like him.”
“It was one of the nicer things anyone had ever said about me.”
Camille laughed before she could stop herself.
Serafina’s expression softened. “He did not want me then. He does not want me now.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Because Salvatore uses uncertainty. If he can make you doubt Damian, he will. If he can make Damian doubt you, he will. Men like Salvatore understand fear better than affection, so they assume affection is easy to poison.”
Camille studied her. “You know him well.”
“My father spent thirty years negotiating with the Morettis. Salvatore always smiles before he threatens someone. Vittorio used to become quiet. Damian becomes colder.”
“And what do you do?”
“I remember everything.”
Camille liked that answer.
Serafina reached into her bag and handed her a small card. It contained two phone numbers.
“One goes to me. One goes to a tug captain named Marco Ruiz. If the operation collapses and you cannot reach Damian or Nico, call Marco. Say the word ‘Lydia.’ He will get a boat to whatever pier you name.”
“Why Lydia?”
“My mother. Salvatore hated her.”
Camille put the card in her pocket.
“Thank you.”
Serafina nodded toward the office. “One more thing.”
“What?”
“Make him ask.”
Camille’s brows drew together.
“For everything,” Serafina said. “He was raised by men who treated wanting something as permission to take it. If Damian wants to be different, make him practice.”
Camille thought of the gala.
Are you planning to ask me first?
She smiled faintly. “I already started.”
“Good.”
When they returned to the office, Damian looked from one woman to the other with immediate suspicion.
“What did you discuss?”
Camille and Serafina answered together.
“Nothing.”
Nico laughed from across the room.
Serafina reached into her purse and placed a folded sheet of paper on the desk.
“My father received this with Salvatore’s proposal.”
It was a copy of a shipping manifest.
Pier Nine.
Medical relief containers.
Departure time: 12:20 a.m.
Destination: international waters.
Nico leaned closer.
“He’s moving something tonight.”
“Or someone,” Camille whispered.
Her mother.
Damian’s face turned to stone.
Serafina said, “My family still controls two tug operators in the south harbor. I can delay that vessel twelve minutes without Salvatore knowing why.”
“Why help us?” Camille asked.
Serafina’s expression became cold.
“Because Salvatore threatened to make me a bride to solve a business problem. I take that personally.”
Camille liked her immediately.
The plan changed.
They would not arrive at Pier Nine at midnight.
They would arrive at eleven forty through an abandoned rail access road on the north side.
Nico would take six men through the warehouse roofs.
Serafina’s tug operators would block the water exit.
Camille would carry a decoy card and bank key.
Damian would stay beside her.
At eleven fifteen, while everyone prepared, Camille found him alone in his office loading a pistol.
“You didn’t tell me about Serafina.”
Damian glanced up.
“I didn’t think a marriage proposal I rejected seventeen years ago was relevant.”
“She’s beautiful.”
He stared at her.
Camille immediately regretted speaking.
“That sounded pathetic.”
“No.”
“It did.”
“Camille.”
“What?”
“You told me you loved me this morning.”
She closed her eyes.
“I was hoping we could collectively forget that part until my mother is no longer kidnapped.”
“I can’t.”
She looked at him.
Damian set the pistol down.
“Do you think I wanted Serafina?”
“I don’t know what you want. That has been the central problem for nearly two years.”
He crossed the room.
Camille stood still.
“I wanted you in plum silk so badly at the gala that I nearly embarrassed myself in front of four hundred people.”
“You did embarrass yourself.”
“I’m aware.”
Despite everything, her mouth twitched.
He stopped close to her.
“I have wanted you in navy blazers. I have wanted you while you argued with contractors. I have wanted you while you ate crackers over my expense reports and pretended I didn’t see crumbs in the keyboard.”
Her breath caught.
“I have wanted you every day for longer than is sensible.”
“Then why didn’t you say anything?”
“Because you worked for me.”
The answer was immediate.
“And because when I hired you, I knew something about your life you didn’t. I told myself touching you while holding that secret would make me exactly the kind of man I never wanted to be.”
Camille’s anger weakened.
Not vanished.
But shifted.
Damian looked at her mouth, then back at her eyes.
“If we survive tonight, I will tell you everything. No more files. No more hidden facts. And if you still want to walk away, I will let you.”
Camille swallowed.
“That almost sounded healthy.”
“Don’t get used to it.”
She smiled.
Then Nico appeared in the doorway.
“We have a problem.”
May you like
Julian Cross had just entered Pier Nine.
And he was wearing the missing silver earring on a chain around his neck.
