Chapter 1 - The Woman at the Breakfast Table
Adriana Vitale did not sit down.
She remained at the far end of the Romano breakfast room, one hand resting lightly on the back of an empty chair, while sunlight poured through the tall windows behind her. In any other room, she might have looked like the most composed woman present.
In that room, she looked like someone who had just discovered that a future she had considered guaranteed had been taken away overnight.
Her gaze stayed on Sophie.
Massimo's hand still covered Sophie's beneath the table.
"Yes," he had said.
One word.
It seemed to change the temperature of the room.
Adriana's expression did not crack, but something moved behind her eyes.
"How serious?"
Massimo answered before Sophie could decide whether she wanted to participate in another lie.
"Serious enough."
Sophie pressed the heel of her shoe into the side of his foot.
He did not react.
Isabella noticed.
The eighty-five-year-old matriarch hid a smile behind her coffee cup.
Caterina, however, did not look amused. She had been studying Sophie since breakfast began, and Sophie could feel the questions gathering behind the older woman's perfectly controlled face.
Adriana finally pulled out the chair.
"I see."
"No," Sophie said.
Every head turned toward her.
Massimo's fingers tightened around hers.
Sophie ignored the warning.
"You see a very small part of a complicated situation," she continued. "And before anyone starts planning a wedding, buying champagne, or asking whether our children will have his eyes, I would like to point out that I have a business to run."
Isabella's smile widened.
"I like her."
"Nonna," Massimo said.
"What? She is the first woman in ten years to make you look inconvenienced."
"I'm not inconvenienced."
Sophie glanced at him.
"You met me six hours ago and already lied to your entire family."
The room went silent.
Massimo turned slowly toward her.
Adriana's eyebrows lifted.
Caterina set down her cup.
Sophie realized what she had said.
Then she forced herself not to panic.
"We met six hours ago tonight," she corrected smoothly. "At midnight. We had seen each other before that."
Massimo stared at her for two long seconds.
Then, to Sophie's surprise, he smiled.
It was not the small, controlled movement she had seen earlier.
It was real.
Brief, dangerous, and unexpectedly warm.
"That," he said, "is what she means."
Isabella laughed so hard she had to put down her coffee.
Adriana did not.
She leaned back and looked at Massimo with open calculation.
"Your mother told my father you intended to make an announcement at the birthday celebration."
"I do."
Caterina's head snapped toward her son.
"Massimo."
He did not look away from Adriana.
"The announcement will not be an engagement."
The silence that followed was heavier than the one before it.
Adriana's jaw tightened.
"Then my father deserves to hear that from you."
"He will."
"When?"
"Tonight."
Adriana stood.
For the first time, anger appeared in her face.
"You should have told me before putting another woman in the center of this."
Sophie pulled her hand from Massimo's.
"On that point, we agree."
Adriana looked at her.
The hostility in her eyes shifted.
Not disappeared.
Shifted.
There was something else there now.
Fear.
Sophie recognized it because she had felt the same emotion when Massimo had pointed a gun at her less than nine hours earlier.
Adriana said, "Be careful what you think you've stepped into."
Then she left.
Massimo waited until the door closed.
"Everyone else out."
Caterina did not move.
"This is my mother's breakfast room."
Isabella waved toward the door.
"And I would like five minutes alone with my coffee before somebody starts another war."
The older men at the table immediately stood.
Caterina remained.
"Massimo, you will speak to me."
"Later."
"You humiliated the Vitale family."
"No. I refused a marriage."
"Those are not different things to men like Vittorio."
Massimo's voice hardened.
"Then Vittorio can learn the difference."
Caterina looked at Sophie.
Her stare was not cruel.
That made it worse.
It was the look of a mother trying to decide whether a stranger represented danger to her son.
"This young woman has no idea what she's being used for."
"I have a fairly good idea," Sophie said.
Caterina's eyes returned to Massimo.
"If anything happens to her, it will be because of this."
"I know."
"And you still put your hand on hers in front of Adriana."
"I know."
Something in Caterina's face changed.
For one second, Sophie thought she saw genuine disappointment.
Then Caterina left.
Isabella sipped her coffee.
"Your mother is right."
Massimo exhaled.
"You stayed."
"I am eighty-five. I stay wherever I want."
Sophie almost laughed.
Isabella looked at her.
"You should leave the estate."
Massimo's expression sharpened.
Sophie frowned.
"Excuse me?"
"Not because I dislike you," Isabella said. "Because my grandson has spent his entire life believing he can place himself between danger and everyone else. Sometimes he can. Sometimes he cannot."
Massimo rose.
"Enough."
Isabella ignored him.
"Three days is a long time when powerful men feel embarrassed."
Sophie's pulse slowed.
The humor had vanished from the older woman's face.
"Do you know what's happening?" Sophie asked.
"I know men. That is usually enough."
Massimo stepped around the table.
"Nonna."
Isabella looked up at him.
"Protect her better than you protected the truth."
The sentence hit Massimo harder than Sophie expected.
His face went still.
Isabella stood, kissed her grandson's cheek, and left.
Sophie waited until the door closed.
"What did she mean?"
Massimo did not answer.
"Massimo."
"We're going to your warehouse."
"Why?"
"Because whoever searched your bag may have searched your business."
Sophie stood immediately.
That possibility had not occurred to her.
Her warehouse held invoices, employee records, vendor information, schedules, access passes for the Romano event, and the floral plans for every section of the estate.
Within fifteen minutes, Massimo had her in the back seat of an armored SUV.
He sat beside her, fully dressed now in a black suit, speaking in short sentences into his phone.
"No police yet."
A pause.
"Check every camera within three blocks."
Another pause.
"No. Don't alert Vittorio."
Sophie looked out at the Chicago streets.
The city was already moving. Commuters crossed intersections holding coffee. Delivery trucks blocked alleys. People hurried through a perfectly ordinary Tuesday morning.
Her own morning felt like it belonged to another universe.
She turned to Massimo.
"Who was the source?"
He ended the call.
"What?"
"The person who gave you evidence that someone connected to the engagement was getting information from your captain."
"That isn't your concern."
"It became my concern when someone went through my handbag."
His gaze stayed on her.
She continued.
"You want me to pretend I'm your girlfriend. Fine. Then stop treating me like a decorative object you move around the room while you make the real decisions."
"I didn't call you decorative."
"You also didn't tell me who might want me dead."
"No one wants you dead."
The SUV suddenly swerved.
Sophie grabbed the seat.
A black sedan had cut across two lanes and slammed into the side of the vehicle ahead of them.
Massimo's driver cursed.
The convoy stopped hard.
Massimo's arm shot across Sophie before she could move.
"Stay down."
His tone changed completely.
Two security vehicles behind them boxed in the SUV.
Men stepped out.
Sophie stayed low until Massimo received confirmation that the crash was unrelated.
Only then did he remove his arm.
She stared at him.
"You were saying?"
He looked toward the windshield.
"I was saying we don't know what they want."
"That isn't comforting."
"It wasn't intended to be."
At the warehouse, Sophie knew something was wrong before the driver opened her door.
The loading bay was unlocked.
She had personally secured it at six the previous evening.
Massimo stopped her from entering.
"My employees could be inside."
"Then my men go first."
"They're my responsibility."
"So are you."
The words came out so naturally that both of them went quiet.
Massimo looked away first.
Four of his men entered.
Two minutes later, one returned.
"Clear."
Sophie rushed inside.
At first, nothing looked disturbed.
Buckets lined the walls. Refrigeration units hummed. Ribbon spools remained stacked by color. Three thousand eight hundred white roses for Isabella's party rested in cooled storage, waiting for final installation.
Then Sophie saw her office.
The door was open.
She walked in slowly.
Every drawer had been emptied onto the floor.
Her computer had been removed from the desk.
Massimo's expression darkened.
"Anything sensitive on it?"
"Vendor accounts. Contracts. Payroll."
"Romano access plans?"
Sophie looked at him.
"Yes."
He swore under his breath.
One of his men called from the back.
"Boss."
They followed the voice into the refrigerated floral room.
A single white rose lay on the concrete floor.
That alone would not have frightened Sophie.
What frightened her was the black thread tied around its stem.
Massimo picked it up carefully.
Attached to the thread was a small card.
Three words had been printed in block letters.
THREE DAYS, SOPHIE.
Her stomach dropped.
Massimo's face became unreadable.
"This isn't about the engagement anymore," she whispered.
"No."
"You said three days."
"I know."
"Only you and I knew that."
Massimo turned toward his men.
"Seal the building."
Then he looked at Sophie.
For the first time since she had met him, she saw something colder than anger in his eyes.
Fear.
Not for himself.
For her.
"You aren't leaving my sight."
Sophie should have argued.
Instead, she stared at the card with her name on it and realized that someone had learned about their private agreement within hours.
Someone close to Massimo was listening.
And whoever it was had decided that Sophie Miller was no longer an accidental visitor.
She was part of the game.
Before they left the warehouse, Sophie walked through the refrigeration room one final time.
Massimo followed.
She stopped beside the empty section where the warning rose had been found.
"You know what bothers me most?"
"Several things should bother you."
"The timing."
He waited.
"Whoever came here knew I would agree to your three-day arrangement before I agreed to it."
Massimo's expression sharpened.
"Unless they were listening inside the estate."
"Or unless they expected you to make the offer."
That possibility sat heavily between them.
Sophie looked at the rows of flowers.
"Someone knew how you would react to me being in your room. They knew your family pressure, Adriana, the engagement, everything."
Massimo's jaw tightened.
"You think the break-in was planned before you opened my door."
"I think my wrong door may not have been wrong."
He stared at her.
Sophie remembered Elena's directions.
Third floor.
West corridor.
Last door before the staircase.
Precise enough to sound helpful.
Vague enough to send her the wrong way.
"Elena knew the house," Sophie said slowly.
"Of course."
"Then why would she give me directions that could confuse the two west corridors?"
Massimo went still.
It was the first time either of them seriously questioned the housekeeper.
"We'll check her," he said.
Sophie nodded.
As they walked toward the exit, Massimo's hand settled lightly at the small of her back.
Not possessive.
Protective.
She glanced at him.
"This still doesn't make me your girlfriend."
"I know."
"Good."
A pause.
"You're very committed to that point."
"Because your grandmother already looks like she's choosing wedding flowers."
Massimo looked at the warehouse around them.
"She has options."
Sophie laughed despite herself.
May you like
It was a small moment.
But it was the first time she laughed with him when no one else was watching.
