SHE POUNDED ON THE MAFIA BOSS’S DOOR AT MIDNIGHT—BEGGING HIM TO HIDE HER LITTLE SISTER UNTIL SUNRISE… BUT THE SECOND HE SAW THE BLOOD ON THE GIRL’S SKIRT, HIS FACE TURNED DEADLY COLD

I was not there to ask for money.

I was not there to ask for protection for myself.

I was standing on the front steps of the most feared man in the city, soaked to the skin, shaking so hard my teeth hurt, begging him to decide whether my little sister would still be alive by morning.

“My sister saw something tonight,” I said.

Those were the only words I could force out before my voice cracked.

Luca Moretti stood in the doorway in a black dress shirt with the sleeves rolled to his forearms, like midnight itself had decided to open the door. He was the kind of man people only mentioned in lowered voices. The kind of man mothers warned their daughters about and politicians pretended not to know. Cold eyes. Controlled breathing. A face too calm for someone with that kind of reputation.

Then his gaze moved past me.

To Sofia.

My sixteen-year-old sister stood one step behind me in her school uniform, her knees streaked with dirt, her hands covered in somebody else’s blood. Rainwater dripped from the ends of her hair. Her lips were colorless. She looked like a child trying very hard not to fall apart in front of strangers.

Luca took one look at her and everything in his face changed.

Not into kindness.

Men like him did not turn kind.

But something sharpened. Something deadly. Immediate.

“What did she see?” he asked.

I swallowed. “A murder.”

For one second, the whole world went still.

Rain slid down the stone columns. My breath came in short, ragged bursts. Sofia made the smallest sound in her throat, like her fear was trying to escape without permission.

Then Luca glanced into the darkness behind us, like he could already feel danger moving closer.

When he looked back at me, his voice dropped low and final.

“Come inside. Now.”

We stepped over the threshold.

And that was the exact moment our old lives ended.

Comment YES to read more.