“I Need a Boyfriend by Tomorrow,” the Plus-Size Maid Whispered—And Her Mafia Boss Heard Everything

The doors opened.

“Stay behind me. Do not let go of my jacket. If I tell you to get down, you drop to the floor and do not look up until I say your name.”

He held her gaze.

“Understood?”

“Yes.”

They stepped into the lobby.

Wedding guests crowded the marble space.

Women in pastel dresses and men in uncomfortable suits waited near the valet stand for transportation to the chapel.

Chloe stood near the revolving doors in a cloud of white tulle, loudly complaining about the humidity.

Roman did not slow.

He moved through the crowd like a freight train.

People instinctively moved aside.

Sadi gripped the back of his jacket and hurried to keep pace.

Then she saw the vehicles through the enormous glass wall.

3 black SUVs tore into the circular driveway.

They ignored the valet lane and slammed to a stop, heavy tires climbing onto the pristine concrete curb.

“Get down!”

Roman’s roar tore through the lobby.

Sadi obeyed immediately.

She threw herself sideways.

Her knees struck marble.

At that exact moment, the first pane of reinforced glass spiderwebbed.

Then it exploded inward.

The lobby filled with screaming and glittering shards.

Roman remained standing.

He moved directly in front of Sadi, turning his body into a tailored shield as safety glass rained over his shoulders.

Outside, 4 men emerged from the SUVs.

Street clothes.

Weapons raised.

Roman drew his pistol.

He fired with terrifying precision.

3 sharp cracks thundered beneath the vaulted ceiling.

The first attacker fell immediately.

The second staggered backward, clutching his shoulder.

The remaining 2 scrambled behind the engine block of the lead SUV, shouting frantically in Italian.

“Move!”

Roman grabbed Sadi by the bicep and hauled her upright.

He dragged her backward toward the heavy oak doors leading into the hotel kitchens.

The wedding party dissolved into hysteria.

Chloe sobbed on the floor, her white dress covered in glass dust.

Helen screamed for security.

Derek—the man who had spent 3 years telling Sadi she needed to be stronger—cowered behind a luggage cart with both hands over his ears.

He trembled violently.

Sadi saw all of it in a single fractured instant.

Then she looked at Roman.

His face held nothing except absolute concentration.

He was not panicking.

He was working.

Roman kicked open the kitchen doors and shoved Sadi through them just as another burst of gunfire tore through the drywall where they had stood seconds earlier.

Kitchen staff fled through the loading dock.

Pots and pans remained abandoned on industrial stoves.

Roman dragged Sadi between stainless-steel prep stations, his shoes slipping slightly on grease.

He pushed her behind the massive door of a walk-in freezer and pressed himself against the wall beside it.

Gun raised.

Chest heaving.

Footsteps crunched through broken glass beyond the swinging kitchen doors.

They were coming.

“Roman.”

Sadi covered her mouth to contain a sob.

He looked down.

A thin cut across his cheekbone leaked a line of red blood.

Roman gripped the back of her neck with his free hand.

His fingers were hot.

Hard.

Completely steady.

“I have you.”

His voice cut through the ringing in her ears.

“I have you. Breathe.”

Then he released her.

A man in a leather jacket came around the corner, sweeping the kitchen with his weapon.

Roman did not fire.

The angle was wrong.

A ricochet would be too dangerous.

Instead, Roman stepped out, crossed the 3 ft between them with terrifying speed, and drove his forearm into the attacker’s throat.

Cartilage crunched.

The man collapsed, choking.

Roman kicked the weapon beneath an industrial oven.

“Out the back.”

He grabbed Sadi again.

They ran through the loading-dock doors and burst into the blinding, humid afternoon.

Roman’s black SUV idled beside the dumpsters.

One of his guards had a bleeding graze on his arm but still held an assault rifle aimed at the alley.

“Get in!”

Roman shoved Sadi into the rear seat and dove in after her.

The door had barely closed before the driver accelerated.

The SUV fishtailed through the alley and tore away from the country club.

Sadi watched the shattered remains of her former life disappear behind them.

For 40 minutes, they drove in suffocating silence.

The SUV cut unpredictably through suburban side streets before reaching the interstate and heading deep into the industrial grit of Chicago’s South Side.

Sadi sat pressed against the armored door.

The midnight-blue silk dress had been destroyed.

Grease from the kitchen floor smeared the expensive fabric. Pulverized glass clung to it.

Her entire body shook.

The tremors began somewhere deep inside her and became violent enough to make her teeth chatter.

Roman sat beside her with a phone against his ear, speaking rapidly in hushed Italian.

The words came sharp and controlled, punctuated by dark commands.

He ended the call and threw the phone onto the center console.

His knuckles were bruised.

Blood from the cut on his cheek had dried into a dark crust.

Roman unbuttoned his jacket and tossed it onto the floor.

“Are you injured?”

His voice was flat, seemingly untouched by the adrenaline burning through Sadi.

“No.”

Her throat felt like sandpaper.

Then anger overwhelmed the fear.

“I just watched you shoot a man, Roman.”

Her voice snapped through the SUV.

“I watched you crush someone’s windpipe next to a deep fryer. Yes, I’m in shock.”

Roman flinched.

Barely.

A tightening of his jaw.

But she saw it.

He looked out the tinted window.

“This is the reality of my life, Sadi. There are no clean edges. I told you I needed an alibi. I didn’t tell you the men I killed last night had brothers who hold grudges.”

His voice lowered.

“You shouldn’t have been there.”

“You brought me there because you asked me to.”

Roman turned back.

For the first time, his voice rose and cracked through the icy façade.

“Because I watched you stand in my kitchen crying over a sink of dirty dishes, letting people who aren’t fit to shine your shoes make you feel like you were nothing.”

Sadi stared at him.

“I wanted to fix it.”

Her breath stopped.

“You…”

The realization came slowly.

“You didn’t do it for the alibi.”

“I could have gone to a crowded casino for an alibi. I could have attended a charity gala with a dozen state senators.”

Roman leaned forward, elbows resting on his knees, massive hands clasped.

“I chose a miserable suburban rehearsal dinner because you needed a shield.”

He looked at the floor.

“And all I did was put a target on your back. I ruined your sister’s wedding.”

Sadi’s anger slowly drained away.

In its place came a strange, heavy clarity.

She remembered Derek hiding behind the luggage cart.

Her mother screaming for someone else to solve the problem.

Then Roman stepping into a line of gunfire without hesitation.

The SUV struck a pothole.

Both of them shifted.

The vehicle slowed.

They entered an abandoned shipping yard and drove through the open doors of a massive rusted warehouse.

Steel doors rolled closed behind them.

Dim fluorescent lights replaced the daylight.

Roman’s guard exited first and swept the perimeter.

“Stay here,” Roman said. “I have a medical kit inside. I’ll patch the cut on your arm.”

Sadi looked down.

Only then did she notice the thin, bloody scratch along her forearm from the flying glass.

Roman got out.

Sadi followed.

The safe house was a concrete office built into the rear of the warehouse.

A military cot.

Security monitors.

A metal desk.

Nothing comfortable.

Nothing personal.

Roman removed a white medical box from a cabinet and set it on the desk.

He began taking out gauze and antiseptic.

“Sit.”

Sadi did not.

She approached him instead.

Then she took his wrist.

Roman froze.

Every muscle beneath her hand went rigid.

His eyes slowly lifted.

“I don’t care about the wedding.”

Sadi’s voice had stopped shaking.

“I don’t care about the dress. And I don’t care that they saw.”

Roman frowned.

“They saw you leave with a known criminal, Sadi. You can never go back to that country club. You can never go back to your catering job. The police will be looking for you to give a statement by morning.”

“Good.”

Sadi removed the antiseptic wipe from his unmoving fingers.

She gently held his jaw and pressed it against the dried blood on his cheek.

Roman released a harsh breath.

His hands hovered for a moment.

Then they settled heavily on Sadi’s hips.

His fingers gripped the ruined silk.

His thumbs pressed into the soft curve of her waist.

He did not pull her closer.

He simply anchored her to him as though she were the only solid object left in the room.

“You don’t understand what you’re saying.”

Roman’s eyes moved toward her mouth.

“If you stay in this room with me today, I will not let you leave tomorrow.”

His voice dropped.

“I’m a selfish man, Sadi. I take what I want, and I keep it.”

“Then keep me.”

A low sound came from Roman’s chest.

He pulled her against him.

Then he kissed her.

There was none of the controlled, manufactured affection he had performed as her fake boyfriend.

This was desperate.

Bruising.

Real.

The kiss of a man who had nearly lost something before realizing how badly he needed it.

Sadi kissed him back.

Her hand traveled up his chest and closed around the lapels of his ruined vest.

The kiss tasted of copper, adrenaline, and peppermint.

It was messy.

It was violent.

And it felt like waking up.

By sunrise, pale light spilled across Sadi’s apartment.

She stood in the living room wearing old sweatpants and an enormous gray T-shirt belonging to Roman.

He leaned against the counter of her tiny kitchenette drinking coffee from a chipped mug.

Against the thrift-store furniture and potted succulents, he looked completely misplaced.

Lethal.

Beautiful.

His phone had finally stopped ringing 3 hours earlier.

The Moretti family had retreated.

Roman’s lieutenants had spent the night making sure the retaliation was swift and absolute.

There would be no more black SUVs.

Sadi’s phone, however, was vibrating violently on the coffee table.

She picked it up.

24 missed calls from Mom.

Sadi answered.

“Sadi Miller!”

Helen’s shriek was loud enough that Roman could hear it from the kitchen.

“Where are you? The police have been here all night. The venue is a crime scene. The photographer got a picture of you running into an alley with that—that mafia thug. Are you kidnapped? Blink twice if you’re kidnapped. I swear to God—”

“Mom, I’m fine.”

“Fine? The wedding is ruined. Derek is in the hospital for a panic attack, and you are on the evening news. You need to come home right now. You need to tell the police he forced you into that car. We can fix this. We can hire a publicist.”

“Mom. Stop.”

The authority in Sadi’s voice silenced Helen.

“I am not coming home. I wasn’t kidnapped. I left willingly. And I’m not pressing charges or speaking to the police.”

“You are making a massive mistake,” Helen hissed.

Her panic became venom.

“You are throwing away your life for a violent criminal who is using you. You are a maid, Sadi. Do you really think a man like that wants you for anything other than a shield?”

Several days earlier, the words would have destroyed her.

They would have driven her into the familiar pit where she became too large, too loud, too undesirable, too difficult to love.

Sadi looked across the room.

Roman watched her over the rim of his coffee mug.

He did not move forward.

He did not take the phone from her.

He did not fight the battle for her.

He allowed Sadi to fight it herself.

He respected her enough to let her win.

“I don’t scrub floors anymore, Mom.”

Her voice was quiet.

Firm.

“And I don’t let people shrink me to make themselves comfortable. Not you. Not Derek.”

She walked toward the window.

“Tell Chloe I’m sorry her reception was interrupted, but she looked beautiful. I’ll send a gift.”

Sadi paused.

“Goodbye.”

“Sadi, don’t you dare hang up on—”

Sadi ended the call.

She dropped the phone onto the table.

The apartment became quiet except for the old refrigerator.

Roman put down his mug.

He crossed the cheap laminate flooring and stopped inches from her.

His eyes searched her face for regret.

For panic.

For collapse.

There was none.

“She’s going to call the cops.”

“Let her.”

Sadi folded her arms.

“They don’t have a warrant, and I didn’t see anything. I was looking at the floor.”

A slow smirk appeared on Roman’s face.

“You’re a very good liar, Miss Miller.”

“I learned from the best.”

Roman touched her jaw with his thumb.

The humor disappeared from his expression.

What replaced it was heavy and immovable.

“I meant what I said yesterday. You can’t go back.”

Sadi waited.

“The catering company fired you this morning. Your landlord is breaking your lease because my men have been parked outside the building since 4:00 a.m., and he’s terrified.”

“So I’m homeless and unemployed.”

Sadi considered the situation.

“And dating a mobster.”

“You’re not dating me.”

Roman’s hand moved to the back of her neck, fingers slipping into her messy dark hair.

“Dating implies a trial period. I don’t do trials.”

“Then what are we doing, Roman?”

Her breath caught as his thumb moved over the pulse in her throat.

“A partnership.”

He did not phrase it as a question.

“I need someone who doesn’t panic when the drywall gets torn apart. Someone who looks at the monster and doesn’t run.”

Roman leaned closer.