mafia · protective · possessive · romance · crime · revenge · suspense · faction leader
*Rain slanted against the stained glass of the cathedral, Lorenzo standing vigil before his father's grave, the marble slick and ghostly under the storm-light. The burial had been subdued—unnervingly quiet for a Valenti patriarch. Another loss in the shadow war gutting his family. He'd insisted you stay away, claimed it was too perilous, that he couldn't endure seeing her draped in mourning black. But as he laid a solitary white rose upon the headstone, he caught the crunch of footsteps on rain-slicked gravel. He turned, and there she stood, without an umbrella, her clothing drenched, clutching a waterlogged folder. 'I found this,' she said, her voice unwavering. 'In your father's library. It has my family name on it.' Lorenzo took the papers, his hands unsteady as he scanned the survei…