Chapter 4 - Monday Morning Crossfire
The Mancini estate in Beacon Hill was less of a residence and more of a private fortress disguised behind eighteenth-century red brick and iron ivy gates.
By 7:30 Monday morning, Nina was sitting at a mahogany dining table long enough to host a minor parliament. She was dressed in a crisp ivory silk blouse and tailored slacks that had been delivered to her guest suite at dawn, tags still attached, tailored to her exact measurements without anyone asking.
She stared into her porcelain cup of black coffee, her hands steady only because she willed them to be. Her phone—confiscated, scrubbed, and handed back by Alex’s head of security, a humorless man named Dante—buzzed against the polished wood.
A text from Sariah: Did you survive the weekend or did you get whacked? The office group chat says Mancini arrived with four black Suburbans and took the private elevator. Are you alive??
Before Nina could formulate a reply that didn't sound like a plea for federal witness protection, heavy double doors swung open at the end of the gallery.
Alex walked in.
He wore a bespoke charcoal three-piece suit, the jacket open, crisp white cuffs fastened with silver links shaped like coiled vipers. His dark hair was combed back, every trace of the rain and drywall dust from Friday night eradicated. The only reminder of the bloodbath in Dorchester was a faint purple bruise darkening his left knuckle.
He carried a thick leather binder under one arm and set it directly in front of her plate, next to a silver tray of untouched croissants.
"Drink your coffee," Alex said, sliding into the armchair at the head of the table. "We have twenty minutes before the executive board convenes."
Nina pushed the cup aside. "I don't need pastries, Alex. I need an explanation. I spent forty-eight hours locked in a penthouse with armed guards stationed outside my bathroom door. My landlord called me yesterday screaming that my apartment had an 'accidental gas leak renovation' and my lease was canceled with a full deposit refund."
"You received three times your deposit," he noted without looking up, turning a page of his tablet. "And the building needed rewiring anyway."
"You bought my apartment building!"
"I bought the whole block," he corrected mildly, his dark eyes lifting to pin hers. "It simplifies property management. Now open the binder."
Nina gritted her teeth, but professional habit overcame raw indignation. She opened the leather cover. Inside were thirty pages of dense balance sheets, shipping manifests, and customs clearance forms bearing the stamp of the Massachusetts Port Authority.
She skimmed the first two pages. Her breath hitched. Her accountant’s eye caught the discrepancies instantly—gaps in terminal fees, phantom container numbers, and off-ledger wire transfers rerouted through an offshore logistics firm in Limassol.
"This isn't our routine corporate audit," Nina said, leaning in, her focus narrowing down to the red flags. "These numbers belong to the North Terminal expansion. The joint venture with the Moretti holdings."
"Very good," Alex said, watching her intently. "Those numbers were rubber-stamped by our Chief Financial Officer on Thursday afternoon. He claimed the books balanced to the dollar."
Nina traced a line of transfers with the tip of her fingernail. "He lied. Someone siphoned fourteen million dollars out of the bonded warehouse accounts over nine months. And they structured the trail to make it look like the leaks originated from my department’s authorization codes."
The silence in the grand dining room grew sharp, cold, and absolute.
"They didn't come to your apartment on Friday just because they tracked my car," Alex said, his voice dropping into that chilling, quiet register that made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. "The Morettis knew you were forty-eight hours away from catching this hole in the quarterly report. You were going to be eliminated, and your signed confession of embezzlement was already typed up to be found on your laptop."
Nina’s stomach dropped out from under her. The image of the drywall exploding, the wood splinters raining down over her bed—it hadn't been collateral damage from Alex’s presence.
She had been the target all along.
"My text," Nina whispered, realization dawning on her. "You came because of the text."
"I was three blocks away meeting an informant when your photograph landed on my screen," Alex admitted, leaning forward over the table, his broad shoulders casting a shadow across the papers. "I came because I wanted to see if you were actually brave enough to play that game with me. If you hadn't sent that stupid, accidental message, my men wouldn't have been in the alley, I wouldn't have been in your hall, and you would have died in your bed at 7:15."
Nina swallowed hard, her throat bone-dry. The accidental text hadn't ruined her quiet, orderly life. It had saved it.
"Who authorized the codes?" she asked, her voice tight. "Who in the firm framed me?"
Alex stood up, fastening the top button of his jacket. "That is why we’re going to the thirty-second floor together. You’re going to present this report to the board. You’re going to name every discrepancy, read every fake invoice, and look right into the eyes of the man who tried to put a bullet in your head."
Nina looked down at the documents, then up at the heir of the Mancini empire. "And what do you do while I do that?"
May you like
Alex stepped around the table until he was standing directly behind her chair. He leaned down, his chest pressing against the back of her shoulders, one hand resting on the polished wood beside her arm, trapping her in his space. The scent of sandalwood and danger enveloped her completely.
"I stand behind you," Alex murmured against her ear, his breath warm, steady, and utterly possessive. "And the moment the traitor flinches, I show this city what happens to anyone who touches what is mine."
