Chapter 4 - THE DEAD WOMAN
Roman had kept one photograph of Isabella.
Harper knew because she had once found it accidentally while searching his desk for a tax document.
In the picture, Roman looked twenty-nine and almost happy.
Isabella stood beside him on a sailboat, her dark hair whipping across her face while Roman smiled at something outside the frame.
Harper had never seen him smile like that in real life.
Six months after the photograph was taken, Isabella’s car exploded outside Philadelphia.
No body had been recovered.
Roman buried an empty coffin.
Now the dead woman stood twenty feet from Harper.
“You’re supposed to be dead,” Harper said.
Isabella smiled.
“So I’ve heard.”
Luca strained against the ropes.
“Don’t listen to her.”
Isabella touched his shoulder.
“Your brother is always so protective.”
Harper’s transmitter remained warm beneath her coat.
Roman was listening.
That worried her.
Because Isabella knew Roman better than almost anyone.
If this was a trap, she might know exactly how he would respond.
“You framed me,” Harper said.
“I borrowed your identity.”
“Why?”
“Because Roman would burn half the city to protect the one person he refuses to admit matters.”
Harper’s pulse jumped.
Luca stared at her.
Harper kept her expression flat.
“You miscalculated.”
“Did I?”
Isabella walked closer.
“You called him toxic. You walked out. And within forty-eight hours he mobilized almost his entire security network.”
“That was because someone put a contract on me.”
“I put the contract on you.”
Harper froze.
Isabella smiled.
“No one was supposed to collect it.”
“Someone shot at me.”
“That wasn’t mine.”
The smile disappeared.
For the first time, Isabella looked genuinely concerned.
“There’s another player.”
Harper’s mind accelerated.
“Who?”
Before Isabella answered, the warehouse lights died.
Gunfire erupted.
Harper dropped behind a steel crate.
Luca’s chair crashed sideways.
Men shouted outside.
Roman’s voice exploded through Harper’s earpiece.
“Harper, get down!”
Glass shattered overhead.
A second team had entered from the river side.
Not Isabella’s.
Harper crawled toward Luca.
A bullet struck the floor beside her.
She reached his chair and pulled it behind a concrete column.
“Can you move?”
“Not unless humiliation counts.”
She found a knife taped beneath the chair.
“You knew that was there?”
“I was waiting for a dramatic moment.”
“Your family is exhausting.”
“Agreed.”
She cut him free.
Across the warehouse, Isabella disappeared through a service door.
Then Roman entered.
He moved through the chaos with frightening precision, Marco beside him.
Roman reached Harper and grabbed her shoulders.
“You’re hurt.”
“I’m not.”
“There’s blood.”
“Luca’s.”
Luca touched his mouth.
“Thanks for the concern.”
Roman barely glanced at him.
Harper noticed.
So did Luca.
Something uncomfortable passed between the brothers.
They escaped through the western loading bay.
By 1:00 a.m., everyone was back inside the armored convoy.
Except Isabella.
She had vanished.
Roman sat opposite Harper.
“You disobeyed the extraction order.”
“You never gave me one.”
“I shouted get down.”
“I got down.”
“You then crawled toward gunfire.”
“Your brother was tied to a chair.”
Roman looked at Luca.
Luca raised his hands.
“I personally appreciated that part.”
Roman turned back.
“Never do that again.”
Harper laughed once.
“See? Toxic.”
Something snapped.
Roman leaned forward.
“I watched a bullet hit six inches from your head.”
His voice was no longer quiet.
“I thought you were dead.”
The vehicle went silent.
Even Marco looked away.
Roman seemed to realize what he had revealed.
Harper’s anger softened despite herself.
“Roman.”
He turned toward the window.
Luca watched both of them.
Then he said, “Oh.”
Roman’s head turned.
Luca smiled despite his split lip.
“You’re in love with her.”
“Luca.”
“That explains so much.”
“Stop speaking.”
“The water.”
Harper frowned.
“What water?”
Luca laughed.
“You complained once that the office water tasted metallic. Roman replaced the filtration system for the entire building.”
Harper stared at Roman.
Roman looked murderous.
“That was infrastructure maintenance.”
“You imported filters from Switzerland.”
“Luca.”
“And the temperature.”
Harper blinked.
“What about it?”
Luca grinned.
“The office used to be sixty-one degrees. Harper complained her hands were cold. He raised it to sixty-four.”
Harper turned slowly toward Roman.
“You told everyone sixty-four improved alertness.”
Roman’s expression became rigid.
“It does.”
Luca laughed so hard he winced.
For one ridiculous moment, the terror disappeared.
Then Marco’s phone rang.
His expression changed.
“Boss.”
Roman took the phone.
A secure server had been breached during the warehouse attack.
Not the criminal accounts.
The legitimate Rossi Foundation.
Millions had been transferred into shell corporations.
The authorization came from Roman’s biometric key.
“That’s impossible,” Roman said.
Marco looked grim.
“Apparently not.”
Harper remembered Isabella’s warning.
Another player.
Someone who wanted Roman focused on family betrayal while money disappeared elsewhere.
“Who benefits if you and Luca turn against each other?” she asked.
Roman looked at his brother.
Luca stopped smiling.
Only one name came to both men.
Victor Rossi.
Their uncle.
The man who had helped raise them after their father died.
The man who had taught Roman that fear was more dependable than affection.
Roman stared at the dark window.
“My uncle built half this organization.”
Harper understood.
“And now he wants the other half.”
Roman’s phone buzzed.
A message appeared from an unknown number.
One photograph.
Harper standing outside her apartment that morning.
Crosshairs centered over her chest.
Below it were six words.
YOU SHOULD HAVE LET HER QUIT.
Roman’s face became terrifyingly calm.
Harper knew that expression.
She had seen it before men disappeared.
She reached across the space between them.
“No.”
Roman looked at her.
“No what?”
“No burning the city down.”
His eyes remained on hers.
Harper tightened her hand around his wrist.
May you like
“We do this differently.”
For once, Roman Rossi did not pull away.
