All Chapters of My Mafia Stepdad's Obsession : Chapter 101 - Chapter 110

LIANA'S POV It was the second day since Rei's parents died, and I still hadn't figured out how to hold my best friend together when I could barely hold myself.Hermes had flown back to Europe that morning, his foster mother needed him there, some urgent thing with her health I didn't fully understand and didn't ask him to explain. I told him to go. I meant it, mostly. But watching his car pull out of the driveway had left a hollow feeling in my chest I didn't have room for on top of everything else, so I packed it away and focused on the one person who needed me more than I needed anyone.Rei needed me.The funeral hall was too bright for how dark everyone felt. White lilies everywhere, their smell so thick it caught in the back of my throat. Rows of black-clad strangers who all seemed to know exactly how to arrange their faces into appropriate grief, and then Rei's grandmother in the front row, small and folded into herself, weeping with the kind of quiet that comes from a body to

HERME'S POV The blink of the CCTV footage camera in the sitting room was enough to give her away before her presence. It doesn't blink if no one is watching now… Celeste was capable of that… probably watched the scene in front of her before deciding to even show up. I didn't want to believe Marco’s death was her ... .I didn't want to conclude that either, because I was nothing closer to the real truth. All evidence pointed at someone else, something else with no exact location.I saw it, I knew it all…I felt shut and let her do her thing and show up at her own time, while still giving her a phone call…making sure my mother didn't understand the relationship quite right.But it was difficult to fool the mafia, they read body language… quiet, observant and add dots together in place. I listened to every word Celeste said, and none of it mattered as much as what she didn't say with her body.Her lipstick was smudged past the natural line of her mouth. Her hair, freshly styled an ho

LIANA'S POV I got in past midnight, the house dark and silent except for a single lamp left burning in the foyer for me. No one was awake to greet me, which suited me fine. I didn't have the energy left for conversation, not after the week I'd had. I dragged my suitcase up to my room, kicked off my shoes, and fell into bed still half-dressed, asleep before I'd even pulled the blanket over myself properly.Morning came slower than I expected.I woke to soft daylight filtering through the curtains and lay there a moment just breathing, letting the quiet of my own room settle over me before I made myself get up. Unpacking felt like the safest kind of productive, folding sweaters, hanging dresses, lining up shoes by color the way I always did when my brain needed somewhere harmless to go.It didn't stay harmless for long.Somewhere between refolding the same sweater twice, my mind wandered straight back to the airport café. The umbrella. The stupid, easy way he'd laughed at his own jok

HERMES POV The relief hit me the second she said my name.I set my glass down and crossed the room in three strides, pulling her against me before she'd even fully stepped inside. She melted into it immediately, arms winding around my neck, and I kissed her, slow, unhurried, like the last hour of Celeste and my mother and Damien's hands on her wrist hadn't happened at all.Sucking her lips hard, pressing my tongue against her, fuck. I miss her lips, it's been only a few days since she arrived in Europe and it has been complicated being with my little princess.Fuck, I was more in love than I wanted to admit.What has this little girl done to me? "I missed you too," I murmured against her mouth…sucking her tongues and stroking her butt. Argh…soft as fuck. I guided her to the chair by the window, sat, and pulled her down into my lap, settling her between my knees with her back against my chest. She fit there like she'd been designed for it."How was your morning," I said, tucking

LIANA'S POV I woke to an empty room.The study had gone quiet around me, evening light long since faded into something dimmer, and for a moment I just lay there in the chair, disoriented, my neck stiff from having fallen asleep somewhere between one of Hermes's low, murmured jokes and the warmth of his chest against my back. I stretched, joints protesting, and looked around.He was gone. Of course he was. Always busy. Arghh…."Hermes?" I called anyway, half-hoping, though I already knew the room would stay silent.It did.I took the quiet as an invitation to actually look at the space properly, something I'd never done with any real attention before, I'd only ever occupied this room as an extension of him, not as somewhere worth noticing on its own. The walls held art I hadn't clocked until now: a series of dark, textured pieces, abstract but deliberate, layered in deep blues and rust-colored strokes that somehow managed to feel both violent and controlled at once. I recognized t