“Who Are You Dressing Up For?” the Jealous Mafia Boss Demanded of His Secretary

Chastity Morales did not look away from the glowing monitor. She recognized the heavy, measured footsteps moving across the floorboards behind her.

Gabriel Mercer stopped.

The air seemed to change, becoming suddenly too thick to breathe.

His gaze moved from her sheer black stockings to the plunging neckline of the emerald silk dress she had purchased specifically to ruin someone else’s evening. It stopped at her collarbone.

“Where are you going in that dress?”

Paperwork was the true currency of the underworld.

Not shipping containers filled with contraband, hollow-point bullets, or stacks of physical cash left to decay inside damp duffel bags beneath floorboards.

Ink.

Offshore accounts. Shell corporations. Real-estate tax loopholes.

Chastity managed all of it.

For 3 years, she had occupied the desk outside Gabriel Mercer’s private office. She was his gatekeeper, accountant, and firewall, the barrier between a brutal man and a society that required the appearance of civility.

She knew the exact ratio of cream to coffee he preferred on mornings following a delayed shipment. She knew the names of every alderman on his payroll.

She also knew how to close a laceration so it would not scar, a skill she acquired during a particularly violent Tuesday in November when Gabriel entered her office smelling of copper and inexpensive whiskey.

She was indispensable.

She was also completely and suffocatingly invisible to him as anything except an extension of his own left hand.

Until that evening.

The clock read 5:45 p.m.

The legitimate administrative staff had left 1 hour earlier, leaving the 32nd floor of the Mercer Holdings building wrapped in the quiet mechanical hum of the ventilation system.

Beyond the floor-to-ceiling windows, the city stretched across gray concrete and motionless traffic. The fading winter sun cast long, bruised shadows over the streets.

Chastity saved the encrypted spreadsheet, closed her laptop, and stood.

She did not reach for the beige trench coat or practical wool trousers she ordinarily wore as armor.

Instead, she carried a black garment bag into the executive washroom.

When she emerged 15 minutes later, the woman known only as Gabriel Mercer’s secretary had disappeared.

The dress was emerald-green silk.

It did not cling to her curves so much as pour over them like liquid glass. The back was cut low enough to expose the sharp line of her spine. The straps were so narrow they looked like a challenge.

Black stiletto heels struck the hardwood with every step.

She painted her mouth a deep crimson, the color of dried blood, and released her dark hair from its severe knot. It fell in loose waves over her bare shoulders.

She returned to her desk for her clutch.

The heavy door of Gabriel’s office swung open.

He stepped out rubbing the back of his neck, a half-smoked cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth.

He wore his usual charcoal suit, although the jacket had been abandoned somewhere inside. The sleeves of his white shirt were rolled to his elbows, exposing the sprawling tattoo of a swallow in flight across his left forearm.

His tie hung loose. His dark hair had been disordered by repeated passes of his hands.

“Chastity, call Tommy and tell him the docks are—”

The sentence died.

The cigarette fell from his lips, struck the hardwood once, and burned a small black mark into the polished surface.

Neither of them moved to extinguish it.

Gabriel stared.

It was not a casual glance. The weight of it pressed physically against every place his attention settled.

He looked at the heels.

He looked at the pale skin exposed through the slit in the dress.

He looked at the silk following the curve of her hips.

Finally, his eyes moved to her painted mouth.

A muscle tightened in his jaw.

The silence stretched like wire.

“Where are you going in that dress?” he demanded again.

His voice was lower than usual and stripped of corporate restraint, roughened by the streets from which he had fought his way upward.

Chastity lifted her clutch.

Her movements remained controlled.

She refused to diminish beneath his gaze.

She had spent 3 years diminishing.

“I have an engagement, Mr. Mercer.”

“An engagement.”

He repeated the word as though he had never heard it.

Then he stepped forward, crushing the cigarette beneath the heel of his Italian shoe.

“It’s Tuesday.”

“My work is complete. Your calendar is clear for the evening, the offshore transfers have been finalized, and Tommy already knows about the dock delays. I sent the encrypted message 10 minutes ago.”

Gabriel moved closer.

He was a large man, constructed for violence rather than executive offices, and he used his physical presence like a weapon.

He stopped only inches from her.

Chastity smelled cedar, tobacco, and the sharp trace of winter air clinging to his clothes.

“Who are you going with?”

The question was not a request.

It was an interrogation.

She looked up into his dark, storm-gray eyes.

“That is outside the scope of my employment.”

Gabriel released a harsh, humorless sound.

He raised 1 hand.

His large, calloused fingers hovered less than an inch above the bare skin of her shoulder.

He did not touch her.

He never touched her.

The heat from his hand still sent a tremor along her spine.

“You are wearing a dress that costs more than my car. You have painted yourself like a target inside my city. I want to know who is taking you out.”

“It is a charity gala,” Chastity said, keeping her voice steady despite the frantic beating inside her chest. “I am capable of protecting myself.”

“You sit behind a desk.”

“I sit behind a desk and clean the blood you bring through the door.”

Her tone sharpened.

She stepped back, breaking the invisible connection between them.

“I am leaving, Gabriel. Good night.”

She turned toward the elevators.

His gaze followed the movement of her body beneath the silk.

Just as she pressed the call button, his voice reached her from the office.

Cold.

Tight.

“If he touches you somewhere you do not want to be touched, you call me. Understood?”

The doors opened.

Chastity entered and turned as they began to close.

Gabriel remained beside her desk, completely still, resembling an animal inside a cage.

“He won’t,” she said softly.

The doors met and cut the connection between them.

Only then did Chastity release the breath she had been holding.

The warehouse smelled of brine, rust, and fear.

Gabriel sat on a wooden shipping crate, rhythmically bouncing a steel ball bearing in his right palm.

The hollow metallic sound traveled through the cavernous building.

Approximately 10 yards away, a man knelt on the wet concrete with a split lip, trembling beneath the attention of Gabriel’s 3 lieutenants.

Under ordinary circumstances, Gabriel would have focused completely on the matter before him.

The man had attempted to remove 15% from a shipment of untraceable pharmaceuticals moving through Gabriel’s port.

He had used Gabriel’s trucks, routes, and protection, then reached into Gabriel’s pocket.

It was an insult and a breach of respect requiring a physical response.

Gabriel could not concentrate.

His mind remained trapped in a repetition of emerald silk.

Who was she with?

He threw the bearing and caught it.

The metal struck his palm with a sharp sound that made the kneeling man flinch.

Gabriel did not look at him.

He removed his telephone.

The bright screen glared inside the dim warehouse.

No messages.

He had expected Chastity to check in through the old habit she had developed over the years.

The screen remained aggressively empty.

“Boss.”

Tommy, a thick-necked enforcer with a previously broken nose, shifted beside him.

“What do you want us to do with him?”

Gabriel sighed and stepped down from the crate.

He approached the bleeding man and crouched, resting his forearms on his knees until their faces were level.

“You stole from me, Ricky,” he said quietly, almost conversationally. “You used my trucks, my routes, and my protection. Then you put your hand in my pocket.”

“I was desperate, Mr. Mercer.”

Ricky sobbed and spat blood against the concrete.

“My child. The medical bills.”

Gabriel looked at him.

He felt no pity and no anger.

Only the restless irritation crawling beneath his skin since 5:45 p.m.

“Break his right hand,” he told Tommy as he stood. “If he appears near the docks again, break his legs.”

He did not wait for the wet fracture of bone or the scream that followed.

He walked outside into the freezing air, removed a cigarette, and lit it with a silver lighter.

The nicotine did nothing to settle the agitation in his chest.

He took out his telephone and called another number.

A rough voice answered after 2 rings.

“Yes, boss.”

“Mick, do you still have men watching the Waldorf?”

Gabriel had stationed him near the downtown hotel where much of the city’s corrupt political class gathered.

“Quiet night.”

“Chastity is attending a charity gala there. Find out who escorted her inside.”

A pause followed.

Mick understood better than to ask why, but the hesitation conveyed enough.

No one followed Chastity.

She was the untouchable ghost of Gabriel’s organization.

“Give me 5 minutes.”

Gabriel leaned against the cold metal of his black vehicle and stared toward the dark harbor.

The skyline reflected against the water in distorted bands of light and glass.

He closed his eyes.

He saw Chastity inside the office again, defiant and unapologetic.

Women ordinarily looked at him with fear or calculated greed.

Chastity examined him like an unsolved equation and appeared completely unafraid of the answer.

She was his connection to humanity.

Whenever the violence of his life threatened to submerge him, he returned to the sanctuary of his office, listened to the regular tapping of her keyboard, and remembered how to breathe.

His telephone vibrated.

He answered immediately.

“She is attending the Winter Solstice Gala,” Mick reported. “Boss, she did not arrive with just anyone.”

“Give me the name.”

“Linus Romero.”

The name struck Gabriel like a physical blow to the chest.

Air left his lungs in a short hiss.

Linus Romero was the favored son of the city’s oldest criminal syndicate.

Gabriel controlled the hard, blue-collar underworld of ports and labor unions.

Romero controlled luxury casinos, illicit art transactions, and political blackmail.

He was old money wrapped in velvet, the kind of man who smiled while poisoning another person’s drink.

For 2 years, he had attempted to establish a position inside Gabriel’s ports.

Now his hands were on Chastity.

“Bring the car,” Gabriel ordered, dropping the unfinished cigarette onto the wet pavement.

His driver moved immediately.

“Where to, Mr. Mercer?”

“The Waldorf.”

The Waldorf’s ballroom was an exhibition of excessive wealth.

Crystal chandeliers hung beneath vaulted ceilings painted with Renaissance-style frescoes. Their light fractured over tailored tuxedos and designer gowns.

A string quartet played a slow, haunting waltz beneath the low murmur of the city’s elite.

Chastity stood near a tall ice sculpture with a champagne flute warming inside her hand.

She had not taken a single drink.

“You appear a million miles away.”

Linus Romero seemed to materialize beside her with the quiet grace of a predator who considered every room his own.

He was undeniably attractive.

His blond hair had been swept back perfectly. His cheekbones were sharp, and the midnight-blue tuxedo fit him without flaw.

He smelled of expensive cologne and authority.

“I was admiring the architecture,” Chastity said smoothly, giving him a practiced smile.

Linus laughed and moved closer.

He placed 1 hand at the small of her back.

The pressure was light.

Her immediate impulse was to step away.

She forced herself to remain still.

She had accepted his invitation partly to gather information about his current activities, a preemptive effort to defend Gabriel’s assets.

There was another reason.

She wanted to be seen.

For 3 years, she had existed inside Gabriel’s shadow, a functional piece of furniture within his violent life.

For 1 evening, she wanted to exist as herself.

“You are the most captivating woman in this room,” Linus said, lowering his voice into practiced intimacy.

His thumb moved lightly against the silk covering her spine.

“Mercer is a fool to keep you locked inside that tower.”

“I am not locked away, Mr. Romero. I work for him. I am not his property.”

“Of course not.”

Amusement sharpened Linus’s eyes.

“Men like Gabriel Mercer do not understand the difference between employment and possession. He is a street dog who found a bone. He does not know how to appreciate it, but he will bite anyone who tries to take it.”

Chastity opened her mouth to defend Gabriel despite her frustration with him.

The ballroom doors were thrown open.

Conversation stopped in a wave moving outward from the entrance.

The quartet missed a note, and the cellist looked up in alarm.

Gabriel Mercer stood inside the doorway.

He had not changed his clothing.

He still wore the charcoal suit from the office, with no tie and the collar open.

Wind had disordered his hair. His jaw was tight. His eyes were the gray of a dead storm cloud.

He looked entirely out of place among velvet and lace, like a dark scar crossing a beautiful painting.

Chastity’s breath caught.

Her heart struck her ribs.

He had actually come.

Gabriel ignored the politicians whispering behind their hands and the socialites watching with poorly concealed horror.

He surveyed the room with military precision.

Within 3 seconds, his gaze found Chastity.

Then it found Linus’s hand against her waist.

Gabriel moved.

He did not walk.

He advanced through the crowd like an approaching attack.

People stepped aside instinctively.

Within seconds, he stood before them.

“Mercer,” Linus said with open condescension, keeping his hand in place. “I did not know you were invited. I assumed charity events were too refined for your preferences.”

Gabriel ignored him.

He stopped close enough to Chastity for the winter cold to radiate from his suit.

His eyes moved over her face and body, checking for harm.

“Get your coat.”

His voice was quiet.

It carried the weight of a physical command.

“Gabriel,” Chastity began, aware of the hundreds of eyes watching them. “You are creating a scene.”

“I do not care about the scene.”

He finally looked at Linus.

The temperature around them seemed to fall.

“Remove your hand from her before I remove it at the wrist.”

Linus laughed softly.

His fingers tightened against Chastity’s waist.

“Bold language. Chastity is an adult woman. She accepted my invitation. You do not decide whom she sees after working hours.”

Gabriel inclined his head.

A narrow, dangerous smile appeared near his mouth.

“You believe you invited her because she likes you? You brought her here to send me a message and see whether I would react.”

He stepped closer until his chest nearly touched Linus’s.

“I am here. I am not looking away.”

Violence seemed to gather physically around him.

“She is not a pawn on your board. You do not use her to reach my docks. Remove your hand.”

For 1 agonizing moment, no one moved.

Chastity knew Gabriel carried a weapon. She could see the faint outline of the shoulder holster beneath his jacket.

She also knew Linus had men distributed throughout the room.

“Enough,” she said sharply.

She stepped out of Linus’s hold and positioned herself between them.

Her expression became the mask she used during hostile financial negotiations.

“Thank you for the champagne, Mr. Romero. The evening has concluded.”

Linus’s charming expression fractured long enough to expose the cruelty beneath it.

“A disappointment. We were beginning to understand each other.”

He looked at Gabriel.

“Watch your back, Mercer. The ports are becoming crowded.”

“I will remember that,” Gabriel answered.

He took Chastity’s hand.

His grip was tight, possessive, desperate, and entirely inappropriate for an employer.

He did not drag her, but his momentum was impossible to resist.

He led her past the ice sculpture, the staring guests, and into the carpeted hotel corridor.

He continued until they reached a secluded alcove near the coat check.

Then he released her and turned.

His chest rose heavily, as though he had run across the city.

He passed 1 hand through his hair, paced 2 steps, and turned back.

He looked furious, frightened, and completely outside his own control.

“What were you thinking?” he demanded. “Linus Romero. Do you understand what that man does to people who interfere with him? He is a psychopath.”

“He is a business rival,” Chastity answered, matching his volume.

She did not retreat.

She stepped into his space with her chin raised.

“I was handling him.”

“Handling him? He was nearly undressing you in front of half the city.”

“He was attempting to provoke you, and you gave him exactly what he wanted. You entered looking like a rabid animal and announced to everyone that you possess a weakness.”

Gabriel stopped.

The words remained inside the narrow alcove.

He moved toward her, forcing her slowly against the velvet-covered wall.

The anger in his eyes broke apart and revealed something darker.

He placed 1 hand against the wall beside her head and lowered his mouth near her ear.

“You believe you are merely a weakness?”

His voice vibrated against her skin.

“You think I cared about the docks while he was touching you?”

Chastity could barely breathe.

Cedar, cold air, and adrenaline surrounded him.

“Do you know what I saw when I entered that room?”

“No,” she whispered.