Chapter 11: Chapter 9

“This can’t be right,” I mumble, staring at the laptop screen.

“A problem, vespetta?” The deep voice comes from the corner of the office where Rafael is sitting.

A pleasant shiver runs down my spine, as it does every time he calls me that in that particular tone. Husky. Seductive. Intimate. Like smooth velvet gliding over my body, teasing my skin. My naked skin.

I grind my teeth, pushing away the mental images of me in Rafael’s arms while he traces his finger down my spine, just as he’d done a week ago at Albini’s. It was a mere few light touches, hardly noticeable, but I still can’t get them out of my mind.

“I fixed the data storage repository the day before yesterday, but it looks like someone managed to fuck up the software again,” I say, refusing to allow myself to look anywhere but at the screen.

It’s hard enough to keep my focus with him just in the room, constantly feeling his attention on me. Although I’ve gotten used to men looking at me and learned to disregard their ogles years ago, Rafael’s stares are very hard to ignore. He doesn’t glare at me with lust-imbued eyes that seem to strip away my clothes, making me feel cheap and somehow dirty, as if there’s nothing more to me than shapely flesh. Instead, it feels like Rafael is trying to peel away my outer layers, eager to reveal what lies beneath.

“That’s unfortunate. You’ll have to fix it again.”

“I can’t believe that a glorified decoy of a company can sprout so many issues.”

“It may serve as a front for my clandestine enterprise, but the profits from it nearly match its shadow sister.”

“So, not all personnel of Delta Security are actual hitmen?” From what I saw while working on the systems, there are over a hundred employees in his private security company.

“Of course not. One four-man team per branch only.”

“They always go in teams? What if there’s only a single target?”

“Are you planning on becoming my competitor, Miss Petrova?”

“Nope. Just curious.” I shrug. “You don’t have to tell me.”

But I truly want to know. I want to know so much more about him. The random tidbits I’ve picked up are not enough. Not that I expect him to tell me confidential things about his business.

“Most hit contracts are for a single target,” Rafael says, surprising me. “But that doesn’t mean they’re easy. We’re talking about very public, high-ranking individuals who have tight personal protection and often reside in heavily guarded locations. If they end up on my agenda, it often means that my business rivals have chosen to pass on the job, and not for the lack of lucrative value. As such, even though it may take only one operative to execute the target, to ensure his infiltration and subsequent extraction proceed smoothly, he needs support. Two team members provide surveillance. Another serves as a backup in case things go awry.”

“Do the jobs often go wrong?”

“Sometimes.” His tone changes, voice drops and comes out sounding almost savage. “I lost an entire team once.”

“What happened?”

“One very important detail got missed.” He grabs the wineglass off the table and, with brisk steps, crosses the room, stepping out on the balcony. “I didn’t realize that the woman we were hired to assassinate was the girlfriend of a rival hitman. The bastard executed all four of my men before they even got the chance to reach their target. Fucking Mazur.”

He launches the glass at the balcony banister. The stemware shatters, the sound of the breakage echoing through the air.

“You killed the guy who slaughtered your men, I assume.”

“No.” Rafael leans back on the railing, crossing his arms over his chest.

Slight shivers run down my spine from the intensity of his darkened gaze.

He doesn’t say anything else, just watches me from a distance, as if waiting to see if I’ll ask for an explanation. I want to. The interest this man ignites within me is beyond compare. Every time I think that I get him, he does something to contradict my conclusions.

“Why not?” I ask, a bit cautiously. “Why not retaliate for the killing of your men?”

“There are rules in every trade. In mine, one does not accept a hit contract against a fellow hitman or his family, no matter what the offered price is.”

“I didn’t expect there’d be an established etiquette in a business that deals in death.”

“There is.” His jaw hardens. “I broke the rule. And my men paid with their lives for my mistake.”

A sudden urge to go to him and offer some kind of comfort overwhelms me. Even with the shadows that obscure most of his features, anger and self-blame are clearly written on his face. That doesn’t track with him seeing his men only as hired workforce. Doesn’t fit the picture of the shitty employer he hasn’t denied being. There’s more to Rafael De Santi than he wants to let on.

I glance at the sticky note I found stuck to the corner of the laptop screen. It’s a drawing of a scene from this morning—of me, while I was having breakfast on the terrace. Alone. I believed he had already gone to work at that point.

The proof of that erroneous thought is in my hand. I smile at his attempt to capture little details, especially by using nothing more than a simple ballpoint pen. No one but me would ever be able to tell that the half-smudged blobs on the ends of the “doodle-me’s” fingers are the marmalade stains from when I was stuffing a croissant into my mouth.

There are four more sketches just like this one, hidden in the drawer of my nightstand. Every time I stumble upon one, I need to fight not to give in to giggles like a schoolgirl. I wonder, what does he do with the doodles I leave for him? Probably throws my crude drawings in the trash.

Rafael’s phone rings.

“Pronto,” he barks.

I’m still staring at the sticky note when my desk chair is suddenly yanked back, the casters smoothly rolling over the floor. “What—”

“How the fuck did that happen?” Rafael leans over the laptop with the phone pressed to his ear.

With him this close, I can hear the muffled speech of a man on the other side of the line, but his English is heavily accented, which makes it hard to grasp what the guy is talking about. Rafael grabs the wireless mouse with his free hand and just nods to whatever the man is saying while minimizing the multitude of windows on the screen.

“Wait a second, Hans.” He lowers the phone to the desk and looks at me.

“You want the chair?” I ask.

“Yes.”

I nod and start untangling my legs from beneath my ass as I rise, but Rafael wraps his arm around my waist and lifts me.

“Chill, man!” I protest. “I was getting up.”

“I may need you. You’re staying.” He drops onto the chair and sets me on his lap.

I stare at Rafael’s profile as he rolls the chair closer to the desk and picks up the phone again while keeping his other arm tightly wrapped around my middle. He hits the video call option and leans the phone against the desktop pen holder. A video feed of a man wearing a black balaclava, so only his eyes are visible, fills the screen. His location appears to be a swanky room, with luxurious furniture and paintings in the background.

“Continue,” Rafael tells the guy as he once again reaches for the mouse.

“The target pushed a hidden control of some kind, just before Allard executed him, and that sealed both of them inside the panic room.”

“You can’t get to Allard from the outside?”

“Negative. The door is reinforced steel, and we don’t have anything to break through it. There’s no other way in. We tried overriding the system from the main control board inside the house, but the panic room is an isolated network. Its circuits are not integrated with the primary house security.”

On the screen, two windows pop open side by side. The first shows a guy dressed in tactical gear, complete with several weapons strapped to his chest, lounging in an antique-looking chair with a tumbler of amber liquid in his hand. I’m guessing he’s the one stuck inside the panic room. The other video feed shows Mitch, Rafael’s head IT guy whom I finally met in person at the Delta Security headquarters while doing a firmware update on the main server yesterday. He’s sitting up in bed, wearing a familiar-looking bright-green T-shirt. I’m pretty sure it’s Guido’s.

“What about overriding it from the inside? Allard?”

“Not possible.” The guy with the drink says. “The locking mechanism requires a thirteen-digit code to open the door. Only a single try is allowed, otherwise, an alarm is sent directly to their guard force.”

Rafael squeezes the bridge of his nose. “Mitch?”

“I’m inside the security company’s system, trying to find the access code for the door, but all their client data is encrypted. The decryption tools I’ve tried so far have failed.”

“Keep trying. How much time do we have?”

Mitch takes a look at his wristwatch. “A little over an hour. We need to get Allard out before the staff arrive at seven. Punctuality is like a goddamn religion in Japan.”

The pressure from the arm around my waist heightens. Rafael tilts his head, pinning me with his gaze. “How long would it take you to break a thirteen-digit code?”

“About four hours,” I say.

“Fuck.”

“It’s been an honor working for you, boss.” The man—Allard—takes a sip of his beverage and then sets it on the nearby table. “Tell the guys to retreat,” he says and cocks his gun.

“Allard!” Rafael snarls and hits the top of the desk with his fist so hard that I jump on his lap. “Holster your fucking gun!”

“We all know how Yakuzas handle those who kill one of their own. They take torture to another level. We can’t risk them finding me alive.”

I bite my lower lip, my gaze bouncing between Rafael and the trapped man on the video screen. No run-of-the-mill employee would be ready to kill himself to protect his employer. No matter what Rafael has told me, his men obviously care about him. And he for them.

“Is there a computer anywhere in the house?” I ask.

Three pairs of eyes snap to me immediately through the screens. I didn’t realize that the camera on our end of the conversation had been broadcasting, as well.

“Why?” Rafael’s voice rumbles next to my ear.

I turn to face him and bump his nose with mine. “Everything nowadays requires login credentials. Food delivery apps. Streaming services. Even the goddamned app to run a robot vac. No one can keep all that crap in their head.”

“I’m fairly certain the kumichō of the Yakuza organization doesn’t bother with vacuum cleaners, vespetta.”

“Sooooo not the point here.” I’d roll my eyes but the situation sounds precarious. “What I mean is, everyone has a secret file on their PC where they keep a list of their passwords and codes. Don’t you?”

“Yes.”

“There you go.” I look directly at the camera and direct my question to the guy wearing the balaclava. “Did you see a laptop or a desktop computer anywhere?”

“One. In the study,” he responds in heavily accented English. He sounds German. I assumed that the men working for Rafael would all be Italian, but based on the fact this conversation is happening in English, and the array of accents on the line, it appears that The Sicilian’s crew has been gathered from across the globe.

“Good. I’ll access it from here. Go there and get me the IP address.”

“What if it’s locked?”

“People are lazy,” I say. “Personal computer passwords are typically less than eight characters long. Connect your phone to the laptop and run the program. I’ll have Rafael send you the link. It should take no longer than ten minutes to break in.”

The balaclava guy nods and, in the next breath, he’s sprinting through the house.

As it happens, the owner of the swanky panic room must have been one of the laziest humans. His laptop password was only six digits, nothing more. My forwarded code breaker cracks it nearly instantly, allowing me to connect Rafael’s laptop with the dead guy’s in under a minute.

Finding the file we need, however, takes nearly a full hour. Generally, people tend to use the same word as their password in multiple applications. They vary it slightly with special characters, but the root remains unchanged. I first run a scan for the same keyword as the laptop login, then set up filters to search all files for documents that contain multiple repeated strings of letters. With narrowed-down options, I look through each flagged result manually, hoping that the next one I open will be the list of passwords. The fact that I’m simultaneously using the translator app in order to read each document, just to figure out if it’s what I’m after or a recipe for homemade miso soup, makes the whole thing more difficult. My eyes sting and my head is killing me from the constant strain by the time I finally find what I’m looking for.

“There.” I point at the number combination in the middle of the document, one that is right under the login credentials for a porn streaming site. “The panic room access code.”

A slight shiver runs down my spine when Rafael takes my chin and tilts my head to face him. His eyes bore into mine and, for a moment, I forget how to breathe.

“If you’re wrong, you’ve just signed my man’s death sentence.” His voice is low and slightly menacing, but the look in his eyes holds no threat. Just awe. “Are you sure?”

“I’m sure,” I say, exhaling the pent-up breath.

Rafael nods and releases my chin, then turns and dictates the code to Allard. Bewildered, I stare at Rafael’s harsh profile. No further questions. He doesn’t ask me to confirm one more time. Does not demand an explanation of why I’m confident that my conclusion is correct, or has Mitch double-check it. He is simply ready to risk his man’s life on my word alone. He’s trusting me and my skills by doing so. Believes in me.

A sense of satisfaction and pride swells within me, invading every single cell of my being. All those times I’ve aced tests in college can’t compare to this feeling.

I look back to the screen where Allard is now facing the control panel at the door, his camera zoomed on the tiny narrow screen above the keypad. I suck air into my lungs and hold it, watching him input the numbers. When he enters the last digit, there’s a barely audible click, but it echoes like thunder through the line.

It worked.

Rafael reaches out to his phone and turns it off, then closes the lid of the laptop. In that instant, sitting on his lap completely still, I become hyperaware of every point of contact between our bodies and every sensation that each connection evokes. His thick, heavily muscled arm wrapped around my waist. The warmth that seeps from his chest as he presses it to my aching back. The faint tingling of my cheek where his stubble brushes my skin.

“I never would have thought of that.” Deep, smoky voice right next to my ear. “Have you found a list of my passwords, as well?”

“Yes,” I utter. “You really need something more creative than desanti1234 for your online banking app.”

A sultry rumble of a laugh vibrates through me. “Have you been tempted to send another donation to a church choir, perhaps?”

I can’t suppress the grin pulling at my lips. “Very much.”

Rafael lightly brushes my chin with his thumb. “Thank you for helping save my friend’s life.”

“A friend?” I raise an eyebrow. “And here I thought your employees are just that—employees. Would he have really killed himself to avoid being captured?”

“Undoubtedly. When I first met Allard, he was rotting away in a cell of a Chinese prison, convicted of political espionage on behalf of France. His less-than-gracious hosts had been ‘working’ him for weeks, and he kept insisting on his innocence and that he came to China as a student in a foreign exchange program. I busted him out of that hellhole.”

“So you saved an innocent man. That’s noble. But what were you doing in a Chinese prison?”

“Following through on the hit contract for the French government—eliminating their most praised, yet recently compromised asset.” A wicked smile pulls on Rafael’s lips. “Zacharie Allard.”

I snort. “So, not innocent after all?”

“Nope.”

“You dropped the job, then?”

“I called my contact in the French government and told them I had the kid. I also relayed to them that their man hadn’t broken his cover. They still insisted I proceed with neutralizing him anyway.” Rafael’s jaw hardens. “Allard withstood days of intense physical and mental torture, all without spilling a single secret. And his superiors still decided to reward his loyalty with a death sentence. So, yes, I dropped the contract.”

“And recruited Allard to work for you.”

“Of course. I offered him triple the pay he was getting from his treacherous agency. It was one of the best deals I’ve ever made.”

“Don’t you think that, maybe, you saving his life had something to do with him agreeing to work for you? Not the money.”

“Money is the ultimate force that makes the world go round. People may not like that truth, but it doesn’t make it less real.” His finger is on my lips now, tracing the shape of the lower one.

“You’re wrong,” I mutter, captivated by his eyes peering into mine.

“I didn’t peg you for naive, vespetta. But you’re young and still have much to learn.”

Rafael’s phone starts to ring again. The touch on my lips disappears as he picks up the device off the desk and presses it to his ear.

“Guido? Cosa è successo?”

As soon as Guido starts talking on the other end of the line, Rafael leaps out of the chair. With me still seated on his lap, and him maintaining a viselike hold around my waist, I end up dangling half a foot above the floor, my back plastered to his chest.

“Rafael!” I tug on his forearm. “Do you mind?”

The hold around my middle loosens just a tiny bit. Just enough to let me slowly slide down his body, allowing me to feel the brush of every inch of that rock-hard front against me.

“Merda. Venti minuti,” he barks into the phone.

The hand still on my hip disappears and, the next moment, Rafael is heading across the room, toward the door that leads to the bedroom. He’s still speaking in rapid Italian, and even though I don’t have the faintest idea what he’s saying, the clipped tone of his voice makes it clear that something is wrong. In a few long strides, he cuts the call and steps inside “my” room.

I dash after him, my heels clicking on the hardwood floor. With no hoodies or baggy pants available at Albini’s, my new wardrobe consists of skinny jeans, shorts, and pretty blouses. I did get some canvas sneakers, but they’re still boxed and pushed under the bed because I’ve been wearing heels most of the time.

I can’t remember the last time I dressed so prettily and didn’t feel bad as a result. There’s no difference in Rafael’s behavior toward me, either—he treats me exactly the same as he did while I walked around in his tent-size shirts. It’s such a fucking relief. Yet, at the same time, I’ve been feeling slightly frustrated. Today, I put on a blouse with a particularly low neckline, and he hasn’t glanced at my breasts even once. Not that I want him to.

Well, maybe a little.

Ugh.

This man confuses all my senses, and I don’t even know what I want anymore.

I catch up with Rafael as he’s stepping into the walk-in closet. Momentarily confused about his intentions, I almost miss as he presses his thumb to the small wall-mounted screen behind the row of his suits. A barely audible click sounds and the back wall of the closet begins to slide to the side. The next instant, Rafael disappears into a previously hidden room.

Trying to be as silent as I can, I tiptoe through the gap where Rafael pushed the suit jackets apart and find myself in a room that’s about half the size of the walk-in closet. A counter runs along the entirety of the opposite wall, the space below it is filled with dozens of drawers. Above, nearly all the way to the ceiling, are cubbies, shelves, and brackets, but it’s not clothes they hold. It’s weapons. Knives. Dozens of various caliber handguns. Long-range rifles. In one of the corners, utility crates are stacked nearly waist-high, and more weapons are slotted into gun racks mounted on both sides of the room.

The last time I saw so many weapons in one place, was when Uncle Sergei showed me his armory (well, one of them, at least). I made the mistake of telling Dad and ended up grounded for a week. Uncle Sergei sported a busted lip for days afterward. If Dad ever finds out that my uncle taught me how to use most of the weapons in that armory (the other one contains explosives and assault weapons, and Uncle Sergei has never allowed me to see those, unfortunately), he would totally go apeshit.

Rafael opens one of the top drawers below the counter and takes out a few small boxes, setting them on the countertop in front of him. Ammunition. He removes his black suit jacket and throws it onto the counter, too, revealing the dark-gray dress shirt he has on underneath. Reaching into another drawer, he selects a shoulder harness and puts it on, adjusting the straps. After grabbing two handguns off the shelf before him, he checks their ammo, then slots the pistols and the extra magazines into their holsters.

“Rafael? What’s going on?”

“This is turning out to be an eventful evening. I have to go resolve a misunderstanding at the port.” He approaches the side wall and takes down one of the mounted rifles, then pulls out a box with ammunition from another nearby drawer.

“You usually solve misunderstandings with a Remington?” I choke out as panic builds in my chest.

Rafael’s head snaps up, his gaze collides with mine while a corner of his lips quirks upward. “Is that worry I hear in your voice, Miss Petrova?”

My body goes rigid. “Nope. I think you mistook it for excitement.”

A strange look settles on his face, and with his eyes never leaving mine, Rafael takes a step toward me. I take one back. He keeps advancing, I keep retreating. Until I’m in the walk-in closet again, and my back is pressed against the rack of his shirts. Rafael stops in front of me and leans over until our faces align.

“I’ve never met a woman who can identify a particular make of tactical rifle,” he says, astonishment glowing in his eyes.

I draw in a breath, and my olfactory receptors swell with his scent. Fresh. Seductive. My gaze lowers to his lips. Two thick scars bisect the lower one, making it misshapen, before continuing down his chin. How would it feel to have those lips on mine? What would they taste like? I raise a hand, pressing my palm to his chest. Hopefully, that will be enough to stop me from leaning in further and trying to find out for myself.

Rafael reaches out and brushes his knuckles down my cheek. “You can keep the laptop to finish what you started, but the activity on that device is monitored. If you get inspired to contact someone online or share things you know you shouldn’t, please remember that one word from me, and your family will lose their lives in minutes.”

And just like that, my worry for him transforms into rage.

I push him away and I scurry out of the walk-in and back to the office to get the fucking laptop. I can’t wait to be done with this crap so I can return home. I thought this “job” would last only a few days, but I’ve been here almost three weeks.

We both enter the bedroom at the same time. I’m heading toward the bed with the laptop under my arm, while Rafael makes a beeline from the walk-in to the door. As we pass each other, our hands brush ever so slightly.

The touch lasts less than a heartbeat, but it feels like the back of my hand is singed. I climb into the huge bed and, folding my legs under my ass, open the laptop in front of me.

“Sleep well, vespetta.” His husky voice comes from the entryway.

I don’t bother looking up from the screen, simply raise my hand and flip him the bird. A thunderous laugh fills the space between us before the door shuts in his wake.

An hour later, I can still hear the roaring in my head.

I step out of the car. “Who started it?”

“Rizzuto,” Aurelio, my main man at the Catania Port, says. “One of the cranes has been out of commission since Friday, causing delays. Rizzuto tried to bribe the freight forwarder to get bumped to the top of the import customs queue and then through the inspections and out the gate. He went ballistic when they wouldn’t do it. Port security got involved, and there was a confrontation. Rizzuto holed up in the admin offices, taking the terminal operators hostage, and is threatening to start shooting unless his cargo is processed and released tonight.”

I look up at the third floor of the building that serves as the port control tower. Rizzuto is one of the biggest alcohol smugglers in Sicily. He brings in high-end French and Spanish wines and pays hefty bribes to have port and customs officials rubber-stamp the necessary clearances. I don’t give a fuck what he’s peddling as long as he keeps up his part of our deal and drops half a million into my bank account annually for letting him use the Catania harbor. Delays are not uncommon, as Rizzuto is well aware of. And he doesn’t have a history of being unreasonable.

“Has anyone checked his containers?” I ask.

“No. They’re still at the stacks.”

“Let’s have a look at them.”

Even at such a late hour, the port is buzzing with life. Shouted orders fill the air as the cargo is loaded and unloaded from the vessels by gantry cranes. Forklifts and terminal tractors move around the storage yard, stacking the containers that then undergo final inspections before being released for dispatch and loaded onto the distribution trucks. I don’t like all that commotion, so only come here when it’s absolutely necessary. Assassinating people is so much easier than working with them.

“Open the first one,” I tell the dockworker standing by the three green containers in the temporary storage area.

The man hurries to unlock the heavy-duty swing doors and then moves out of the way. I take the crowbar from Aurelio and step inside.

Wooden crates bearing the logo of a well-known French winery in Bordeaux are neatly stacked one on top of the other, filling nearly the entire steel container. A faint woody odor permeates the air. I jam the chisel end of the crowbar between the two boards of the closest crate and push. The planks break and splinter. White powder spills from the plastic package that got torn up by the busted edge of the destroyed box frame and drips to the floor next to my shoe. I catch a dribble of the fine particles with my fingers and bring them to my mouth. Cocaine.

Spitting out the bitter traces, I throw the crowbar aside. “Find a suitable place and incinerate the whole load. I want it done by morning, Aurelio.”

“Sure, boss.”

I nod and head back out, while fury rages inside me. There’s only one person on the island who can get his hands on coke this pure.

Guido is lounging by his sports car, chatting with one of the forklift drivers, but when he sees me returning to the control tower, he heads toward me. “Aurelio messaged me. What’s going on?”

“Calogero tried to smuggle his drugs in Rizzuto’s cargo.” I grab the rifle out of the back of my SUV and slam the door shut.

“Fuck. You sure it’s his?”

“Yes.” I cock the rifle and head to the tower’s main entrance. “Go help Aurelio organize the torching of that shit,” I tell my brother over my shoulder.

The bottom level of the building is a vast warehouse, used to store machinery and cargo that’s been held up at port for various reasons. The floors above are filled with administrative offices. My footfalls make hollow sounds as I climb the metal stairs to the top level where the control room and port operator center are located.

“Has he calmed down?” I ask the man standing guard at the door.

“A little. He still won’t let anyone leave the room, but he stopped waving his gun after we told him you’re here.”

I nod and step inside the control room.

Rizzuto is sitting in one of the chairs facing the wall of windows with a view of the container terminal, his gun is casually draped across his thighs. Four operators are gathered in the opposite corner, their eyes frantic.

“Rafael!” Rizzuto smiles. “I’m so glad you could make it. Hopefully, we can resolve this misunderstanding quickly so I can have my cargo processed and on its way as planned.”

His eyes fall to the rifle in my hand, and that smile gets wiped off his face immediately. “Umm . . . I’m sorry if I overreacted, but I’m on a really tight schedule.”

I pull a chair toward me, positioning it across from Rizzuto, and take a seat. “Why the haste?”

“I have a new buyer. Not a very patient fellow that one.” He tries to hide his nervousness behind his casual posture, but I see the beads of sweat along his temple.

“Mm-hmm. Tell me, how much did Calogero pay you to smuggle his cocaine through my port?”

Rizzuto’s face pales.

“It’s mine,” he chokes out while his hold on the gun tightens. “You know I wouldn’t dare bringing Cosa Nostra’s drugs here. I swear on my mother’s grave, Rafael. I—”

I press the barrel of my rifle to his forehead and pull the trigger. The top of Rizzuto’s head explodes in a mess of bone, blood, and brain matter, with some of the carnage propelled through the shattered glass. Lowering the rifle, I rise and leave the room, passing the group of hysterical workers on my way out.

Outside the building, I find Guido by his car again, staring at the blood and chunks of flesh scattered across his windshield.

“The fuck, Rafael!” he grunts. “Will you stop littering my car with people’s remains? That’s disgusting!”

“Sorry. I forgot you parked just below.” I throw the bloodied rifle in the back my vehicle. “Make sure everyone keeps their mouths shut about what happened here tonight. Let’s see what Calogero does when he realizes his drugs never left the port.”

“He’ll probably send his men to investigate.”

“If he does, you know what needs to be done.” I slide behind the wheel and step on the gas.

When I get home, I take a shower in the guest room, then slip inside my bedroom. My little hacker is curled up in my bed—asleep—still wearing the same outfit she was in when I left. The top two buttons of the pale-peach silk blouse are undone, revealing a glimpse of the white lace bra underneath. My eyes slide down her legs, clad in white skinny jeans, to the ivory stiletto sandals strapped to her delicate feet. She obviously dozed off while working, since my laptop is lying open next to her in bed.

I lean over and carefully unbuckle her shoes. As I’m doing so, my eyes fall on the lit-up laptop screen. It displays the website of my front company. The URL and the corporate name are correct, but instead of the dark-navy header and silver text, the feature image is of two cartoon frogs wearing pink hats. And the little green croakers are winking. Meanwhile, our customers’ reviews on the slider, have been changed to a cursive font with hearts dotting every lowercase “i” on the page.

Setting the heeled sandals by the bed, I move the laptop to the nightstand and pull up the duvet to Vasilisa’s chin. My little trickster. I reach into my pocket and take out the jewelry box I picked up on my way home, then place it by the laptop. The store owner nearly had a stroke when he found me on his doorstep at four in the morning. The blood all over my jacket and shirt didn’t help. It took him several attempts to spit out the words that the bracelet I ordered would arrive tomorrow. I had to pacify my irritation by buying a pair of ruby earrings instead.

They aren’t exquisite enough. Hardly the exceptional pieces I need, since the stones are nothing but a common cut. But they were the most expensive thing he had in the store. If it comes to it, I’m prepared to buy every exclusive piece of jewelry in Sicily for Vasilisa, in hopes that she may be open to accepting my advances. Maybe she’ll even consider going out to dinner with me.

After lightly brushing the tips of my fingers across Vasilisa’s cheek, I head to the recliner by the fireplace. It has a direct view of my sleeping tormentor, so I get comfortable in what has become my coveted nightly spot. It’s too late to get my own shut-eye anyway, and watching my sweet prisoner is much more enjoyable than a couple of hours of rest.