Chapter 2 - “Hayes will take you into town this afternoon.”
Roman pulled a tablet toward himself.
“You need clothes. Uniforms for cleaning. Everyday things. Whatever you need. Put it on the card he gives you.”
“I don’t need—”
“You’re wearing yesterday’s jeans.”
Roman never looked up from the screen.
“I run a clean house. That includes the people living in it.”
His tone closed the discussion.
“It’s not a request.”
Morgana bit the inside of her lip.
The instinct to argue rose automatically.
“Is the clothing added to my debt?”
Roman stopped moving his finger across the tablet.
He looked at her.
Actually looked.
“No.”
A beat passed.
“Consider it a signing bonus.”
He returned to the screen.
Morgana drank again.
The silence became uncomfortable.
She needed rules.
Limits.
Something she could understand.
“Mr. Costa.”
“Roman.”
“Roman.”
His name felt strange in her mouth.
“Why am I really here?”
Roman looked up.
“You don’t need a maid. You have men with guns outside. You have enough money to hire professional staff.”
Morgana held the mug.
“You didn’t buy a $40,000 debt because you needed someone to clean toilets.”
Roman lowered the tablet.
The casual mood disappeared.
He folded his arms.
“You’re right.”
Morgana waited.
“I don’t need a maid.”
“Then what do you need?”
“Leverage.”
His answer was immediate.
“Your father is a degenerate gambler, but he’s also a foreman at the southern docks. He has the manifest keys.”
Roman’s eyes remained on her.
“He’s been taking bribes from a rival crew to move shipments through my territory without paying me.”
Cold climbed Morgana’s spine.
Jason had not only gambled himself into debt.
He had been stealing from organized crime.
“I discovered it 2 days ago,” Roman said.
“In my world, the punishment is death. No trial. No negotiation. You steal from me, you go into the ground.”
Morgana’s coffee trembled slightly.
“Then why is he alive?”
“If I kill him, the Port Authority investigates.”
Roman spoke as though discussing accounting.
“The federal government starts looking at the docks. Operations stop. It costs me millions.”
He leaned against the counter.
“I needed Jason alive.”
Then his expression hardened.
“But I needed him terrified. Completely under my control.”
Morgana understood before he finished.
“Taking his daughter. Taking the one piece of property he actually values ensures his loyalty.”
The words struck more deeply than Roman’s original explanation.
Morgana was not an employee.
Not exactly.
She was not simply a person Roman had kept from the Vulovs.
She was collateral.
A hostage.
Strangely, the honesty steadied her.
Transactional cruelty made sense.
She understood cruelty with rules.
“So if he behaves, I stay alive.”
Roman’s eyes narrowed slightly at her calmness.
“If he behaves, you stay comfortable.”
He corrected the premise.
“Nobody touches you. You cook. Clean. Live quietly.”
Roman continued.
“When his usefulness at the docks ends, the debt disappears and you leave.”
“And if he doesn’t behave?”
Roman did not answer at once.
His eyes fell toward the bruise on her wrist.
“He’ll behave.”
He picked up his espresso.
“He’s a coward, and cowards protect themselves.”
Morgana looked down at her coffee.
“You’re wrong about 1 thing.”
Roman raised an eyebrow.
“You said you took the thing he values.”
A hollow smile passed across her face.
“He doesn’t value me.”
She continued before Roman could reply.
“If the Vulovs offered him enough money to betray you, he would let you kill me.”
Morgana looked at the black surface of her coffee.
“He wouldn’t even come to my funeral.”
Roman did not dismiss her.
He did not tell her every father loved his child somewhere deep inside.
He did not offer comfort he could not prove.
He simply watched her.
“Then let’s hope for your sake nobody makes him an offer.”
Roman left the kitchen.
Morgana remained alone in a house of glass and steel, living inside a cage whose bedroom door locked from her side.
The shopping trip took place exactly as Roman promised.
Hayes drove her to a department store near the edge of the affluent suburbs.
He did not follow her through the clothing aisles.
He positioned himself beside the sliding entrance doors instead, enormous and motionless, hands folded near his belt.
Morgana moved quickly.
She did not choose silk.
She did not choose cashmere.
She bought heavy cotton shirts.
Dark jeans.
Canvas shoes.
For work, she selected plain black scrubs.
Cheap.
Durable.
A uniform that clearly defined what she was in Roman Costa’s house.
At the register, Hayes paid with a heavy black card.
The cashier looked nervous.
Hayes showed no reaction.
By Tuesday, Morgana had built a routine.
Routine kept panic contained.
She woke at 6:00.
Cleaned the kitchen.
Polished the granite until it reflected light.
Vacuumed the huge living room.
Washed clothes.
The house had already been immaculate when she arrived.
Professional crews had maintained it before her.
Still, Morgana cleaned obsessively.
She bleached grout.
Polished baseboards.
Scrubbed things that were not dirty.
It gave her a kind of territory.
Something she could control.
Roman was almost absent during daylight.
He left before 8:00 in the armored SUV.
He returned late.
When he was home, he often disappeared behind the double doors of his private office.
They barely spoke.
Roman never demanded company.
Morgana avoided offering it.
That arrangement lasted until Thursday night.
A severe winter storm moved over the city.
Freezing rain struck the bulletproof windows.
At midnight, Morgana was awake in the kitchen.
The sound of wind against the house reminded her too much of Jason screaming during drunken rages.
Unable to sleep, she began cleaning the refrigerator.
The front door opened.
Morgana froze with a wet sponge in her hand.
Heavy, uneven footsteps crossed the foyer.
Roman entered the kitchen.
He no longer looked untouchable.
His tie was gone.
The collar of his white dress shirt hung open.
His left sleeve had been pushed toward the elbow.
The right cuff was saturated with blood.
Morgana backed against the refrigerator.
Roman stopped.
He looked down at the blood.
Then at her.
“Go to your room, Morgana.”
There was no anger in his voice.
Only exhaustion.
Morgana stayed.
Her eyes remained fixed on the red fabric.
“Are you hurt?”
“It isn’t my blood.”
The blunt admission settled into the room.
Roman walked to the sink and turned on cold water.
He scrubbed blood from his knuckles.
Pink water circled the drain.
Morgana watched.
Whatever safety the house had given her existed because of what Roman did outside it.
“I told you to go to your room.”
Roman shut off the water.
He dried his hands.
“I couldn’t sleep.”
Her voice shook.
She forced herself not to shrink.
Years with Jason had taught her that retreat sometimes made violent men worse.
“I was cleaning.”
Roman looked around.
At refrigerator shelves that already shone.
At spices aligned precisely.
At Morgana’s black scrubs.
At her wet hands.
“The house is clean.”
His voice sharpened slightly.
“You’ve been scrubbing the same floors for 3 days.”
He threw away the paper towel.
“You don’t have to perform for me.”
Morgana said nothing.
“I’m not going to hit you because there’s dust on the mantle.”
She flinched.
He had recognized too much.
“I clean because I want to.”
Defensiveness came into her voice.
“It’s the only thing in this house I can control.”
Roman paused.
Some of the irritation left him.
He leaned against the counter.
For the first time, he simply looked tired.
He removed a crushed package of cigarettes from his pocket.
Lit 1.
Inhaled deeply.
“Fair enough.”
Smoke drifted upward.
He did not question her.
Did not talk about her father.
Did not try to comfort her.
He stood in his kitchen with another man’s blood on his sleeve, sharing the silence.
Morgana knew she should return upstairs.
Instead, she went to the espresso machine with a clean cloth and began wiping its chrome surface.
“Did someone try stealing from you again?”
Roman looked at her through the cigarette smoke.
“A crew at the Southport decided to reroute a shipment of electronics without paying the transit tax.”
“So you hurt them.”
“I explained the economic realities of working in my territory.”
Roman spoke flatly.
“Violence is a tool, Morgana. It’s loud. Messy. It brings police attention.”
He took another drag.
“I use it when diplomacy fails.”
His eyes hardened.
“Tonight, diplomacy failed.”
“And my father?”
Morgana asked before she could reconsider.
“Is he being diplomatic?”
Roman extinguished the cigarette.
“Your father stamped 3 manifests this morning.”
He straightened.
“He showed up on time. He was sober.”
Then the cruelty returned to Roman’s voice, but Morgana preferred it to pity.
“For a man who sold his daughter to save his legs, he’s remarkably productive.”
“He’ll slip.”
Morgana continued wiping a surface that no longer needed cleaning.
“He can’t handle pressure.”
She knew Jason too well.
“When things get difficult, he looks for an exit.”
“Let me worry about Jason.”
Roman moved toward the hallway.
“Leave the kitchen. Sleep.”
At the doorway, he glanced back.
“If you need something to control tomorrow, the library shelves need dusting.”
Roman went upstairs.
Morgana remained behind.
Cigarette smoke lingered with the scent of bleach.
She looked at her hands.
They had stopped trembling.
2 weeks later, Morgana woke at 3:00 a.m. to breaking glass.
She sat up immediately.
The estate was normally silent at night.
She left the bed barefoot and moved toward the door.
Voices echoed from downstairs.
Urgent.
Angry.
Nothing like the controlled conversations Roman’s men usually held.
“He’s gone, boss.”
Morgana recognized Miller, 1 of Roman’s lieutenants.
Something heavy hit downstairs.
Wood broke.
Morgana unlocked her door.
She opened it only enough to look toward the glass staircase.
Roman stood in the foyer.
Black sweatpants.
T-shirt.
Bare feet.
Everything restrained about him was gone.
This was not the tired man at the espresso machine.
This was the man who controlled the city.
Hayes stood near the entrance in a coat wet with melting snow.
“How long?”
Roman’s voice was dangerously quiet.
“Maybe 4 hours.”
Hayes continued.
“The Vulovs sent a crew to the docks. They bypassed our patrol route.”
His expression was grim.
“Jason let them through the east gate.”
Morgana’s stomach dropped.
“They moved 2 containers of military-grade hardware out before shift change.”
Roman looked at Miller.
“Where is he?”
“Gone.”
Miller paced.
“The Vulovs paid him. We checked his house. Empty.”
He looked furious.
“He took the cash and skipped town. He knew you’d kill him.”
Morgana leaned against the doorframe.
The world blurred around the edges.
Jason had done exactly what she predicted.
He accepted Vulov money.
He betrayed Roman.
And by doing so, he had broken the agreement keeping her alive.
Her own words returned.
If they offered him enough money to betray you, he’d let you kill me.
She had known.
Knowing was not the same thing as standing upstairs while armed men discussed what happened next.
The foyer became quiet.
Miller stopped pacing.
Then looked toward Morgana’s floor.
“What do we do with the girl?”
Morgana stopped breathing.
Her fingers closed around the edge of the door.
“She’s a loose end now,” Hayes said.
There was no pleasure in his voice.
He spoke in the language of business.
“Jason broke the deal. We need a message.”
Morgana understood.
Leverage only worked if the threat was real.
If Roman allowed Jason to steal, disappear, and leave his daughter unharmed, rivals would see weakness.
Miller looked toward Roman.
“Bring her down.”
Morgana closed her eyes.
“We take her to the warehouse. Film it.”
His voice was emotionless.
“Send it to the Vulovs and whatever hole Jason crawled into. Let everyone see what happens when someone crosses the Costas.”
Morgana opened her eyes.
She looked around the room Roman had given her.
No weapon.
No meaningful escape.
The window opened over approximately 30 ft of concrete.
She would not hide beneath the bed and force them to drag her out.
If she was going to die, she would walk downstairs.
She opened the bedroom door.
Then Roman spoke.
“Nobody touches the girl.”
Morgana froze.
Miller blinked.
“Boss, Jason burned us.”
Roman did not turn.
“He stole from you. The collateral is forfeit.”
“I said nobody touches her.”
Roman’s voice lowered.
Hayes shifted.
“With respect, Roman, that’s not how this works.”
He spoke carefully.
“You keep her alive, you look soft. The Vulovs will use it.”
Hayes continued.
“They’ll say you don’t have the stomach to punish a traitor.”
May you like
Roman turned slowly.
He looked at Hayes.
