CHAPTER ONE

SELENE'S POV

I thought I knew everything about Amaya.

After our five years of friendship, you’d think there would be no secrets left between us. We’d shared dorm rooms, heartbreaks, cheap bottles of wine, and every ridiculous dream we could spin up at three in the morning.

But she had never, not once, mentioned her father.

So when she leaned across our café table one Saturday morning and said, “Come home with me this weekend. Papa wants to meet you,” I nearly spilled my coffee.

“Your father?” I blinked. “You mean the mysterious man who apparently doesn’t exist?”

Amaya only laughed, eyes sparkling like she enjoyed how off-balance I was. “He exists. He just… likes his privacy. But he’s been asking about you. I want you to meet him.”

That’s how I ended up in the backseat of a sleek black car days later, staring wide-eyed as it rolled through iron gates taller than any building on my street. The driveway stretched forever, lined with lamps and roses that looked imported from another world.

“Amaya…” My voice dropped, nearly swallowed by the hum of the engine. “What is this place? Are you secretly a princess or something?”

She grinned like it was the funniest thing she’d ever heard. “Hardly. Papa just has… taste.”

Taste? The word didn’t explain the guards stationed along the drive, their eyes sharp and movements precise. It didn’t explain the way the car doors clicked locked from the inside once we passed the gates.

By the time the mansion came into view, glittering like a palace against the night sky, my mouth had gone completely dry.

“Amaya,” I whispered, gripping her arm. “Who is your father?”

The car slowed to a stop before she could answer. A guard opened my door, bowing his head in eerie respect.

And then I saw him.

Tall. Intimidating. Dressed in black with a presence that seemed to bend the room around him. His eyes were dark, unreadable, and fixed on me the moment I stepped inside.

Amaya beamed. “Papa, this is Selene.”

The air shifted. He didn’t move, didn’t speak. He just looked at me, gaze steady and piercing, like he could peel away every secret I’d ever had.

And in that silence, realization hit me like a bullet.

Her father wasn’t just a man.

He was someone powerful. Someone dangerous. He was a mafia lord.

The dining hall was too grand to feel real, like I’d stepped into the pages of a history book. A chandelier of dripping crystal hung above us, scattering golden light across a table long enough to host a small army.

And at the head of it sat Amaya’s father.

Don Mario Lucian.

Amaya chattered happily beside me, sliding into the seat on his right, while a quiet gesture from one of the men in black directed me to sit opposite her. Which meant directly beside him.

“Selene,” he said, his voice low, smooth, and rich with an accent I couldn’t place where it came from. He didn’t rush the syllables. He rolled them on his tongue like they were worth savoring. “Welcome to my home.”

I swallowed hard. “Th-thank you for having me, sir.”

“Sir?” His lips curved into something that wasn’t quite a smile. “I’m not your professor, Selene. You may call me Mario.”

My pulse jumped the way my name Selene fell from his mouth. I gripped my napkin tighter, praying Amaya couldn’t see the flush creeping up my neck.

Dinner began, dishes arriving in endless waves from silver trays of roasted meats, to platters of pasta steaming with herbs I didn’t recognize. Everything was too elegant, too extravagant.

I could barely taste it. Not when his gaze kept brushing mine across the table, subtle but deliberate. He asked Amaya questions about school, about her classes, about her plans for the summer. But his dark, sharp eyes would drift to me with every answer, as though he was listening for my reaction, and measuring me in silence.

At one point, his hand reached for the wine bottle. Instead of signaling a servant, he poured for me first. A small detail, I could tell only I noticed.

But his fingers brushed mine when he set the glass in front of me, slow enough that I knew it wasn’t an accident.

“Drink,” he said softly, just for me. “You’ll find it… smooth.”

Amaya didn’t notice. She was still laughing about something one of the guards had said earlier. But I noticed. Every nerve in my body noticed the smallest gestures he made towards me.

A few minutes into dinner, the doors opened.

A woman swept in as if she owned the place. Tall, gorgeous, with icy blonde hair that gleamed under the lights and a dress cut low enough to make me blush. Her red lips curled into a smile as she walked straight to Don Mario, leaned down, and kissed him slowly and boldly, right in front of us.

“Mario,” she purred. “I thought I’d join you tonight.”

Amaya slammed her fork down, the sound sharp against porcelain. “Jenny.” Her tone dripped venom.

Jenny didn’t even glance at her. Instead, she slid an empty chair beside Don Mario, brushing her hand along his arm as though staking a claim. “You didn’t tell me we’d have company,” she said sweetly, though her eyes flicked over me in a way that felt like a challenge.

“This is Selene,” Don Mario said, his voice calm, deliberate. “Amaya’s closest friend.”

Jenny arched a perfect brow, her smile widening in mock politeness. “How… cute.”

Amaya’s jaw clenched. I’d never seen her look so furious. She muttered under her breath, stabbing her food as if it had personally offended her.

Jenny, on the other hand, carried on as though she had every right to be there, laughing too loud, brushing against Mario whenever she could, dropping comments that made Amaya bristle.

“Honestly, darling,” Jenny said at one point, swirling her wine. “Your friends must think it’s exciting, seeing where you really live. All this time, hiding Daddy’s little palace away…”

“Shut up, Jenny,” Amaya snapped.

“Amaya.” Don Mario’s voice was sharp, controlled. One word, and she bit her lip, glaring at her plate.

Jenny smirked in victory.

I wanted to disappear into my chair. The tension was thick enough to choke on, and I couldn’t shake the way Don Mario’s gaze kept finding mine, even while Jenny clung to his arm.

By the time dessert was finished, Amaya was seething, Jenny looked smug, and I was dizzy from it all.

“Selene,” Don Mario said smoothly as the table was cleared. “It’s late. You should stay the night. Amaya would like the company, and I would prefer knowing she isn’t alone.”

Amaya grabbed my hand immediately, desperate. “Please, Selene. Don’t go yet. Stay with me.”

Jenny’s smile turned sharp as glass. “Yes, do stay. The house could use a little… fresh energy.”

My heart raced. I hadn’t planned on sleeping here, hadn’t even brought clothes, but under Mario’s dark gaze and Amaya’s pleading eyes, I found myself nodding.

Just one night.

That was all.