Part 2
The silence in the narrow hallway was suffocating.
Tomaso stood frozen.
The man who controlled half of Europe's underworld.
The man whose name made grown men tremble.
He was completely paralyzed by the gaze of two little boys.
They had his eyes.
The exact same stormy gray color.
The exact same sharp, observant stare.
The smaller boy, holding a worn-out toy car, looked up at Tomaso.
Then he looked at his mother.
"Mommy?" the boy’s voice echoed in the quiet space.
"Is this the man from the bad dreams?"
Lucia’s breath hitched.
She pulled both boys tighter against her legs, her knuckles turning white.
She could feel the cold aura radiating from Tomaso.
He looked older.
More dangerous.
The tailored suit he wore cost more than her entire apartment building.
"No, Matteo," Lucia whispered, her voice trembling but fierce.
"He is nobody. He was just leaving."
Tomaso’s eyes snapped from the boys to Lucia.
A dark, dangerous flash crossed his face.
Nobody?
Five years of burning agony, five years of tearing the world apart to find her.
And she called him nobody.
"Lucia," Tomaso said, his voice low, like thunder rolling in the distance.
"Do not lie to them. And do not lie to me."
He took another step forward.
The heavy gold ring on his pinky finger caught the dim light of the hallway.
The very same ring that signified his position as the head of the Sylvestri family.
"We need to go inside. Now," Tomaso commanded.
"Get out," Lucia hissed, standing her ground despite the terror screaming in her veins.
"You have no right to be here. You lost that right five years ago."
Tomaso didn't argue.
Instead, he reached out and gently but firmly pushed the apartment door open wide.
He looked down the dark stairwell behind him.
"The two men I just stopped downstairs were not mine, Lucia," he said softly.
"They belong to the Rossi family."
"They didn't come here to talk."
"They came to take what is mine to hurt me."
Lucia’s blood ran cold.
The Rossi family.
She remembered that name from her past life.
A ruthless clan that had been at war with Tomaso for a decade.
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"They know about the boys," Tomaso added, his voice dropping an octave.
"If you want them to live past tonight, you will let me in."
