“He’s So Handsome, and I’m Just a Broke Virgin,” She Said—Unaware the Mafia Boss Was Watching

I had never heard a stranger pronounce my mother's name as though it were an accusation.

“Who are you?” I asked.

“Victor Bellandi. I believe I have already introduced myself.”

“I don't know you.”

“That is hardly surprising. Your mother was very careful about the people she allowed near her daughters.”

My fingers tightened around the telephone.

“How do you know my mother?”

A pause.

Then he said, “Ask Margaret what happened in November 2009.”

I turned toward the woman at our kitchen table.

She was shaking her head.

“Tell him to leave you alone,” she whispered.

Victor heard her.

“Ah, Margaret. Still loyal to the dead, I see.”

I ended the call.

For a few seconds, the only sound in the apartment was the refrigerator humming beside the kitchen cabinets.

Then Sasha emerged from the bathroom, her hair wrapped in a towel.

She looked at my face.

“What happened?”

I pointed toward the door.

“Someone is outside.”

She stopped.

“Who?”

“I don't know.”

Margaret rose so abruptly that her chair scraped across the floor.

“We need to leave.”

“Why?” Sasha demanded. “Who is that man?”

“Someone who should never have found this apartment.”

I looked at the notebook.

My mother's handwriting seemed suddenly unfamiliar. Every number, every red mark, every note in the margins had become a possible reason for someone to come looking for us.

I had spent 3 years trying to keep my mother's memory intact.

Now I was beginning to wonder whether I had ever known the whole of her life.

Another knock sounded.

“Miss Vale,” Victor called through the door. “I would prefer to settle this without involving the authorities.”

“Then you should leave,” I shouted.

He laughed softly.

“You have your mother's temper.”

I hated him for saying it.

I hated him for standing outside our home as though he had a right to discuss her.

Most of all, I hated that some part of me was afraid he might know something I had wanted to understand for years.

My mother had spent the last 6 months of her life growing increasingly anxious. She checked the locks twice before bed. She stopped answering calls from unfamiliar numbers. Once, when I asked why she kept looking over her shoulder, she told me that some people mistook kindness for weakness.

At the time, I thought she was talking about the hospital.

Now I was no longer sure.

Margaret grabbed the notebook and placed it inside her handbag.

“We have to go through the back.”

“There is no back exit,” I said. “We live on the third floor.”

“The fire stairs.”

“They lead into the alley.”

“Exactly.”

Sasha was already pulling on her coat.

I looked at the door one last time.

“Why can't we call the police?”

Margaret's expression became difficult to read.

“We can. But I need you to understand something first. Victor Bellandi does not frighten easily, and he rarely makes a threat he cannot carry out.”

“That isn't an answer.”

“No,” she admitted. “It isn't.”

We left through the fire stairs.

The cold struck us as soon as we reached the alley. Sasha had forgotten her gloves, and Margaret was breathing hard by the time we reached the sidewalk.

I took my sister's hand.

“Where are we going?”

Margaret hesitated.

Then she gave me an address.

“Somewhere Victor won't enter without permission.”

I already knew the answer before she said the name.

“Adrian Moretti.”

***

His house stood behind high iron gates on a quiet street north of downtown.

It was not the sort of mansion I had imagined when I thought about wealthy men. There were no golden statues, no extravagant fountains, and no enormous driveway designed to make visitors feel insignificant.

The property was old, discreet, and protected by security cameras that followed our car as we approached.

A guard recognized Margaret and opened the gate.

When we entered the house, a woman in a dark suit led us through a hallway lined with photographs.

I recognized Adrian in several of them.

At 16, he looked angry with the world.

At 25, he looked as though he had already learned that anger was a luxury.

In the most recent photograph, he stood beside an older man with silver hair and a hand resting on his shoulder.

The older man had the same eyes as Adrian.

His father, I assumed.

We were taken into a study.

Adrian stood beside the window with a telephone pressed to his ear.

“No,” he said. “I want the original documents. Not the summary. If someone has altered the records, I want to know who signed the authorization.”

He listened.

Then his gaze moved toward me.

Whatever he saw in my face made him end the call.

“Nerissa.”

He crossed the room.

His eyes moved over my coat, my hands, and the woman standing behind me.

“Are you hurt?”

“No.”

“Did someone follow you?”

“I don't know.”

He turned toward the woman in the doorway.

“Elena, check the perimeter. No one enters the property without my authorization.”

Elena nodded and disappeared.

Adrian looked at Margaret.

“What happened?”

She placed the notebook on his desk.

“Victor Bellandi found them.”

For the first time since I had met him, Adrian looked genuinely shocked.

He opened the notebook and turned several pages.

His expression changed as he read.

“This is impossible.”

“That was my reaction,” I said.

He looked up.

“Your mother kept these?”

“Apparently.”

He examined the photograph.

His thumb stopped over the image of his younger self.

“Where did you get this?”

“Margaret brought it to us tonight.”

He looked at her.

“You told me everything had been destroyed.”

“I told you the copies I knew about had been destroyed.”

“Those are not the same thing.”

“I know.”

The temperature in the room seemed to drop.

I stepped between them before the conversation could become something worse.

“Would someone please explain what is happening?”

Adrian closed the notebook.

“Your mother worked for my father.”

“I know that part.”

“She discovered irregularities in our financial records. She believed someone was using legitimate businesses to move money without the owners' knowledge.”

“And what did she do?”

“She copied the records.”

“Why?”

“To protect herself. Possibly to protect someone else.”

I stared at him.

“You're saying my mother stole confidential documents from your family?”

“I'm saying I don't know what she intended to do with them.”

The answer hurt more than I expected.

My mother had been dead for 3 years. Whatever secrets she had carried, she could no longer defend herself.

“She wasn't a thief,” I said.

Adrian's expression softened.

“I didn't say she was.”

“You looked at those papers and immediately assumed the worst.”

“No. I looked at those papers and realized that someone may have been lying to my family for nearly 20 years.”

He turned the notebook toward me.

“Look at the dates.”

I did.

The first entries were from 2009.

The last was from 2018, less than a year before my mother became seriously ill.

Several payments were marked with the same initials.

V.B.

I looked at Adrian.

“Victor Bellandi?”

“Possibly.”

“Then why did he say the documents belonged to his family?”

“Because the companies involved were connected to both families. Years ago, my father and Victor's father had a business arrangement. It ended badly.”

“Why?”

Adrian was silent.

Then he said, “Because someone died.”

The words landed with a weight that made my stomach turn.

“Who?”

“My older brother.”

I had not known Adrian had a brother.

He looked toward the window.

“Matteo was 24 when he died. The official report said his car left the road during a storm. My father believed the accident had been arranged.”

“By the Bellandis?”

“He suspected them.”

“Did he have proof?”

“No.”

I looked down at the notebook.

“Was my mother involved?”

“I don't know.”

The room seemed to shrink around me.

I thought about the photograph, the young man standing beside Adrian, and the words written on the back.

Some debts are paid with money. Others are inherited.

“What happened in November 2009?” I asked.

Adrian looked at Margaret.

She closed her eyes briefly.

“That was the month your mother disappeared for 3 days,” she said. “She returned with a broken wrist and told everyone she had fallen down some stairs.”

I felt the blood leave my face.

“My mother never told us that.”

“She didn't want you involved.”

“Did she know about Matteo's death?”

Margaret did not answer.

She did not need to.

I stepped away from the desk.

“I need to go home.”

Adrian moved toward me but stopped before reaching out.

“Nerissa, I understand that this is a lot to take in.”

“No, you don't.”

His face tightened.

“You're right. I don't know what it feels like to discover that someone you loved may have lived a life you never understood.”

The honesty of the admission silenced me.

“But I can promise you one thing,” he continued. “Nobody will use your mother's memory to threaten you while I can prevent it.”

I looked at him.

“And what do you want in return?”

“Nothing.”

“That's what you said before.”

“And I meant it.”

“Then why am I here?”

“Because you needed somewhere safe to go.”

I wanted to believe him.

That was the most dangerous part.

***

Sasha was given a guest room, clean clothes, and a cup of tea she drank while questioning Elena about the security system.

Margaret remained in the study with Adrian.

I was shown to a bedroom on the second floor.

It was larger than our entire apartment, with a fireplace, a private bathroom, and windows overlooking a garden covered in snow.

A folded set of clothes lay on the bed.

I changed into the borrowed sweater and trousers, then sat beside the window.

For the first time all night, nobody was asking me questions.

I should have felt relieved.

Instead, I felt angry.

Angry at my mother for keeping secrets.

Angry at Adrian for knowing things I didn't.

Angry at myself for wanting his reassurance when I had no reason to trust him.

A quiet knock came at the door.

“Come in,” I said.

Adrian entered carrying a tray with tea and a plate of sandwiches.

I stared at him.

“Do you always feed people when you don't know what else to say?”

“It's a useful strategy.”

“Does it work?”

“Occasionally.”

He placed the tray on the table.

Then he remained standing, as though uncertain whether I wanted him to stay.

“Sit down,” I said.

He took the chair opposite mine.

For a while, neither of us spoke.

Then I asked, “Did you know my mother?”

“No.”

“But you recognized her handwriting.”

“I recognized the format of the reports. My father used to keep similar records.”

“Did your father trust her?”

Adrian considered the question.

“He trusted her enough to let her work without supervision. In my father's world, that was unusual.”

“Was he a good man?”

Adrian looked toward the fire.

“He was a complicated man.”

“That's not the same thing.”

“No.”

He rubbed his thumb over the signet ring on his hand.

“My father believed loyalty could solve almost anything. He was wrong about that. Loyalty can make people brave, but it can also make them protect the wrong person for too long.”

I thought of Margaret.

“Do you believe my mother was loyal to your family?”

“I believe she was trying to protect someone.”

“Who?”

He looked at me.

“That is what we need to discover.”

I lowered my gaze to the cup in my hands.

“I'm afraid of what we'll find.”

“So am I.”

The admission surprised me.

“You're afraid?”

“Every day.”

He said it without embarrassment.

“Fear isn't the opposite of courage, Nerissa. It's the reason courage is sometimes necessary.”

I studied him for a long moment.

“Do you ever get tired of being the man everyone fears?”

His expression changed.

For a second, the powerful businessman disappeared, and I saw someone who had spent a long time carrying responsibilities he had never been permitted to refuse.

“Yes,” he said quietly. “More often than you might imagine.”

I wanted to reach for his hand.

I didn't.

I was beginning to understand that attraction could exist alongside suspicion, that tenderness did not automatically make someone trustworthy, and that wanting to know a man was not the same as knowing what he was capable of doing.

When Adrian rose to leave, I stopped him.

“Why did you choose me in the ballroom?”

He turned.

“I already told you.”

“You wanted a conversation. You could have had one without making me the center of a room full of people who clearly disliked me.”

He considered that.

“Because I wanted to know whether you would tell me the truth when you had every reason to be afraid.”

“And?”

“You did.”

I looked away.

“I was terrified.”

“I know.”