CHAPTER 2  

Rafe didn’t sleep.

He couldn’t.

He lay on the mattress in the furnished room Marcus had assigned to him. His pulse had ceased from the hard and violet spike it had the moment he left Dante’s office, but the tension was still there, it was now a low and slow unwelcomed heat…  still simmering beneath his skin.

He sat up, running a hand over his short hair and letting out a loud hiss. 

Everything about Dante Moretti already felt like a threat to his mission, and a threat to the life he was fighting to maintain. An FBI asset is not supposed to feel this kind of heat he’s feeling for the target. They’re only allowed and trained to calculate and control.

He reached under the mattress. He pulled out the burner phone, he had tucked into his longsleeve when he got here, The burner phone was designed  to be untraceable

“Rafe,” Camila’s voice boomed from the other end.

“I’m in,” Rafe murmured, keeping his voice low, “I’m the club’s new bookkeeper. Direct access to Marcus, and apparently, direct access to Dante.”

A beat of silence. “Direct access to Dante? Rafe, that’s too fast. Did you push it? Don’t you think that’s a trap?”

“No.” He pulled me in. “Though I feel he’s smarter than the file suggests, Cami. He runs an organized, paramilitary operation. They’re clean, controlled, and dangerous.”

“And how’s the whole place treating you? You think you can survive there?” she asked, her tone laced with fear and care.

Rafe stared at the dark wall, picturing the startling deep brown of Dante’s eyes, the brief, firm pressure of his hand on his shoulder.

“Controlled,” he lied easily. “Tight. I have the ledger balance meeting tomorrow morning. I’ll start digging then.”

“Be smart, buddy,” she repeated the familiar refrain. “I trust you and I miss you.”

“Sure, i miss you too, so don’t miss me too much.” Rafe promised, cutting the connection before he got caught.

The next morning, Rafe swung his legs off the bed and dressed quickly, with every of his movement desperate and controlled, He checked his watch.

“Perfect, 5 minutes to go.” he muttered.

By the time he stepped out of his room, the clubhouse has already started with  activity. The main floor was already alive and booming, men  gathered around the bar, some cleaning weapons, others talking low over black coffee. A few glanced his way, then looked away.

Finally, admist the crowds, Rafe managed to find Marcus in the back office, waiting beside the dark wood conference table. Where the air was a bit colder than the others, heavy with the scent of old papers and new coffee.

“The Boss doesn’t like lateness Santos. You’re two-minute late.”

“I’m sorry boss.” Rafe replied.

Marcus grunted, pushing a heavy leather-bound ledger toward Rafe. “The Moretti family moves a lot of cash through here. Our job is to make it look like a small time liquor profits.”

Rafe opened the ledger. The handwritten numbers were precise, clean, and intentionally misleading. Truly in here, money flowed in high volumes, split through dozens of shell businesses: restaurants, auto-repair shops, and even a non-profit charity. The sheer scale was breathtaking.

“Good.” Rafe commented, “respect for the accounting technique seeing into this… But still it’s vulnerable. Some of the non profit needs a better percentage for the international funds.

Marcus’s eyes narrowed, but a flicker of curiosity returned. “You think you can improve the Boss’s system?”

Rafe met the challenge with a cool, professional gaze. “I can give that a shot.”

Before Marcus could respond, the office door opened, and Dante Moretti stepped in.

He was dressed casually on a thick, dark grey shirt that hugged his chest and forearms, revealing the corded strength beneath. The suit yesterday screamed authority, while this look screamed physicality.

Rafe starts to feel small, familiar, inconvenient tightening in his chest again,  It was instinct.

Dante didn’t sit, he moved to the head of the conference table, his presence immediately dominating the space between the two men.

“Change of plans,” he said. “You’re working with me today.” he said, a simple sentence that hit Rafe like a warning shot.

Rafe kept his expression calm. “Doing what?”

Marcus’s mouth twisted with a frown,. “Watching.”

But that didn’t help to solve Rafe’s tremor.

Marcus stood up and started walking out.

Rafe followed him immediately, until Marcus turned and casted him a cold stare. “Don’t follow me,” his voice cold as ice. “You’re with Dante for the day.”

Rafe stood rooted, too scared to look back. He didn’t know why, but he was scared of this man in a different way.

He turned slowly to meet Dante’s burning gaze.

Dante was standing  just behind his chair, not sitting,not on the desk, but strongly standing beside his own chair.

He was adjusting his hair, and the sight was distracting in a way Rafe immediately tries to shut down.

Dante looked up.

His gaze found Rafe instantly.

And it lingered.

“Morning, Santos,” Dante said.

Rafe nodded once. “Boss.”

He tapped the chair and said, “Come sit down.”

Rafe did without hesitation, not because he wants to, but because he doesn’t  want to piss the man off.

Dante’s eyes moved sharply to Rafe’s collar, his shoulders, his hands, before lifting his eyes  again to hold an eye contact with him.  a movement that made Rafe tense.

The silence that followed after was loaded.

Dante gestured toward the table. “Check this… Walk me through yesterday’s numbers.”

Rafe did.

He kept his voice even, professional. even though he was having a burning sensation inside, He explained the ledger discrepancies, pointed out inefficiencies, and suggested corrections.

Whole time Dante didn’t interrupt him.

He just stood up, moving slowly and circling the table. Passing behind Rafe’s chair. Close enough that Rafe caught his scent. The strong smell of a clean, expensive, woody edged with something darker.

Rafe didn’t turn

He didn’t react.

But his breath caught.

“You’re precise,” Dante said quietly. “Most men get sloppy when they’re trying to impress.”

“I’m… I’m not trying to impress,” Rafe replied. “I deliver.”

Dante stopped right behind him. leaning Close enough now that Rafe felt heat at his back.

“Is that so?”

Rafe swallowed hard and nodded slowly,  “Yes.”

Then…

Dante leaned down, bracing one hand on the table beside Rafe. The other sitting on the back of Rafe’s chair.

At this moment, Rafe’s body ached for his touch, for his hand to touch his skin. But it didn’t, and that was worse. But it still felt the weight, and the deliberate invasion of space.

“Look at me,” Dante said with a low voice that sounded seductive to Rafe’s ear.

It wasn’t loud.

Because it didn’t need to be.

Rafe turned his head slowly.

Now, their faces were inches apart.

Dante’s eyes were darker than before now, , unreadable, searching, and measuring. In a ways that Rafe finds it lustful.

“You don’t flinch,” Dante murmured. “You don’t rush. You don’t beg.”

Rafe met his gaze, trying to sound firm. “Because I don’t need to.”

Dante’s lips curved slightly. “Careful,”You’re getting too confident and Confidence gets men killed in my world.”

“Only when it’s fake.”

Something flickered behind Dante’s eyes. interest, real and dangerous.

“You think you know my world already?”

“I think,” Rafe said carefully, “that you don’t tolerate weakness or lies in your world.”

Dante straightened slowly.

“Stand up.” He commanded

Rafe did.

And now they were chest to chest, holding gaze.

“You’re right,” Dante said. “I don’t tolerate lies.”

His hand came up, not to grab, not to restrain, but to adjust Rafe’s collar.

A small gesture that was intimate and deliberate to Rafe. “If I find out you’re lying to me,” Dante continued softly, “I won’t ask questions but too kill you.”

His thumb brushed Rafe’s throat… barely a touch. But still, Rafe’s pulse jumped.

Dante felt it and smiled.

“And if you’re not,” Dante added, withdrawing his hand, “you’ll be very valuable to me.”

Rafe tried hard to hold his ground. “That’s the goal.”

Dante stepped back, reclaiming the space like it had always belonged to him.

“Good,” he said. “Because I don’t trust easily… so let me trust you.”

Rafe watched him return to the desk. He watched as his control snapped back into place. But the air between them had changed and was now fully charged.

“You’ll be shadowing me today,” Dante said. “Meetings, calls, and decisions. That’s your first test to show me what you’re capable of.”

“Understood.” Rafe replied with a nod.

Dante looked up again. “And Santos?”

“Yes Boss?”

“Do not mistake my interest for kindness. Okay?”

“I wouldn’t dare Boss.”

Dante smiled, pleased.

“Good. Now let’s get to work.”

He stood up and Rafe followed him.