002: The Devil in the Dark

ADRIANA’S POV

I gripped the tray until my fingers ached and stepped through the heavy velvet curtain into the VIP section. Thick cigar smoke curled through the air like ghosts, and the dim amber lights barely pushed back the shadows. Low conversations hammered around the long table where several men sat in tailored suits that screamed power and money. I kept my eyes locked on the polished floor, my heart racing so hard I felt in my throat.

Head down. No eye contact. Serve fast and get out. Luca needs his mother alive.

The mantra looped in my head with every careful step. I had survived two months in this hellhole by following it. I refused to break that rule tonight, not when my little boy fought for every beat in his hospital bed. I set fresh bottles of aged whiskey on the table with steady hands that betrayed none of the storm inside me. Crystal glasses clinked softly as I arranged them. Then I gathered the empty ones, stacking them neatly on my tray while the weight of unseen stares pressed against my skin.

My skin prickled. I could feel them watching me, measuring me, but I refused to look up. I was almost done. Just a few more seconds and I would slip back downstairs to the safer chaos of the main floor. The extra pay would cover another round of Luca’s medication. That was all that mattered.

“Stop right there.”

The sharp command froze the blood in my veins. My feet locked in place. The tray suddenly felt impossibly heavy in my hands.

“Turn around.”

I drew in a shaky breath and obeyed, pivoting slowly. Expensive leather shoes filled my vision first, then the crisp line of dark trousers. The man rose from his chair and moved toward me with deliberate steps. He stopped so close that the heat of his body brushed mine. Without warning, his hand clamped onto my ass, squeezing hard enough to send sharp pain radiating through me.

Humiliation burned hot across my face and down my neck. I bit down on my tongue to keep from gasping. Do not react. Do not scream. Luca’s pale face flashed behind my eyes, his small chest rising and falling under hospital lights. I could endure this. I had endured worse in my marriage to Roman.

The man laughed low and ugly. “Look at this one, boys. Tight little body and that innocent face.”

His fingers dug deeper as he spanked me hard. The sharp crack echoed in the room, followed by crude chuckles from the others. He spanked me again, harder, clearly enjoying the way my body jerked.

“Get on your knees and suck my dick like the whore you are. That’s what you do here, right?”

Shame and fury twisted together in my chest until I could barely breathe. “I only serve drinks, sir. Please. I’m not a hooker.”

He ignored me completely and spanked me a third time, laughing louder when I flinched. The sound of their amusement scraped against my nerves like broken glass. Every instinct screamed at me to fight back, to claw his eyes out, but the cold reality of where I stood kept me paralyzed. These men killed without hesitation. One wrong move and Luca would grow up without a mother. I swallowed the scream building in my throat and tried to step away.

His hand shot out again. When his palm connected with my ass once more, pure reflex took over. My palm flew up and slapped his wrist away with a sharp smack.

The laughter died instantly. Silence crashed over the room like a guillotine.

“You stupid bitch.”

Metal scraped as he yanked out his gun and pressed the cold barrel hard against my forehead. The tray slipped from my numb fingers and crashed to the floor. Glass exploded around my heels, whiskey splashing across my legs. My knees nearly buckled. The gun dug deeper into my skin, and I felt the slight tremble in his hand. He was angry enough to pull the trigger. I could see it in the way his jaw clenched.

Tears stung the corners of my eyes but I refused to let them fall. My mind raced with images of Luca waking up alone tomorrow, wondering where I was. I had come back to this city for him, risked everything to find his father, and now I might die before I could even try. The irony tasted like blood on my tongue.

From the deepest shadows at the back of the room, a voice sliced through the tension. Low, dark and lethally calm.

“Remove that gun from her head or I will blow yours off.”

The gunman stiffened. Every man at the table went completely still. That voice. Rich and commanding with an edge of pure ice that I recognized in the deepest part of my soul. It wrapped around my spine and squeezed until I could barely draw air. No. Please, God, no.

Heavy footsteps moved through the darkness. The gunman lowered his weapon slightly as a tall, powerful figure stepped forward into the faint light. Jet-black hair styled with a few loose strands falling across his forehead. Broad shoulders filling a black designer suit that cost more than I made in a year. And those piercing steel-gray eyes that locked onto the scene with murderous intent.

Alessandro Vincenzo Orsini.

The world tilted beneath my feet. The man I had spent two desperate months searching for in the shadows of this city now stood mere feet away, radiating five years of pure, unrelenting hatred. My stomach dropped like a stone. This was not how it was supposed to happen. I had imagined approaching him carefully, finding the right moment, preparing for his anger. Not like this. Not drenched in fear and broken glass with my heart trying to hammer its way out of my chest.

Alessandro’s gaze shifted from the gunman to me. Those steel eyes dragged slowly over my cheap uniform, my trembling body, the mess at my feet. Something dark and violent flickered across his face.

“How dare you?” he said, voice soft yet deadly.

The gunman tried to speak, but Alessandro moved with terrifying speed. He raised his own pistol and fired once. The gunshot exploded through the room like thunder, ringing in my ears. The man dropped instantly, blood spreading across the carpet in a dark pool. I stumbled backward, hand flying to my mouth as bile rose in my throat.

“Clean it up,” Alessandro ordered the remaining men, tone flat and final. “And get out.”

They moved without hesitation, hauling the dead man away through a side door. The curtain fell shut behind them with a soft whisper, trapping me alone with the devil I once loved more than life itself.

Silence swallowed everything except the distant bass from downstairs. Alessandro holstered his gun and turned fully toward me. He studied me like a predator sizing up wounded prey. The cold smile that curved his lips held nothing but bitterness and pain sharpened into a weapon.

“Well, well, well,” he murmured, his voice low and rough. “Look who finally crawled back into my world. Adriana Rosalina Rossi in the flesh.”

I pressed my back harder against the wall, unable to find my voice. Memories flooded me without mercy. Secret nights in hidden places. His gentle hands on my skin. The way he once looked at me like I was his only light in a lifetime of darkness. Then the final day I shattered his heart to save his life. The hatred burning in his eyes now proved he had carried that wound for five long years and turned it into something monstrous.

He took one slow step closer, then another, until the familiar scent of his cologne mixed with gunpowder and fresh blood wrapped around me like chains. I had no escape.

“Do you have any idea how long I have waited for this?” he asked, each word dripping with venom. “How many nights I dreamed of finding you again just so I could make you feel even a fraction of what you did to me?”