Signed To The Mafia King - Chapter 109: Chapter 109

ALINA
I jumped off my chair as Luca followed Marco away from us.
“Leo? Maya? Let's go into the house.”
Leo pouted. “We want to play some more.”
I nodded, settling into the bench again. Luca and Marco were almost at the edge of the garden.
I felt faint, like I couldn't pull a complete drag of air into my lungs, like if I closed my eyes I would float away, as though the world had tilted on its axis and gone berserk.
Victoria couldn't be dead. She had last been seen coming here and how many people knew she was here?
Shit! It was going to be a nightmare covering this up because I knew damned well, Luca was not going to prison.
The back door opened behind me and Megan stepped out, wiping her hands on a towel.
“Everything alright?” she asked, looking from the kids to me, and then go Marco and Luca disappearing away from us.
I stood quickly and took her arm, grateful she had appeared just when I needed her to. My hands were shaking and I saw her brow lift in question so I let her arm go.
“Yes. Megan, but I need you to take the kids inside when they're done playing.”
Her eyes narrowed, but she didn’t say a word, instead she folded the towel neatly and settled down in the bench.
“Alright. Come on, you two,” she said gently to the children. “We have thirty more minutes of play time.”
Leo and Maya nodded as I backed away and ran into the house. Victoria’s death was the worst conclusion to what was already a terrible day.
I chased after Luca and Marco who I was sure were already in the dungeon. They had moved fast like they had been lit on fire.
I rounded the last hallway and saw Luca just slipping into the dark room.
“Luca!” I called out, but he didn’t stop though I was almost certain he had heard me.
I tried to follow them in, but Marco turned and blocked the doorway with his arm.
“Not you,” he said firmly. “Luca wouldn't want you seeing this.”
“What the hell? Back away from me,” I blinked at him. “I need to be in there.”
Marco shook his head, refusing to move. “This isn't for you to see. She's dead, there's nothing you can do.”
“She was alive when we left her!” I hissed, my voice catching frantically. “She was alive. I saw her breathing. What happened after, what happened to her, I have a right to know.”
He didn’t flinch. Instead, he glared at me “That’s exactly why you can’t go in. Stop being difficult, Alina. Go back to your room and wait there for Luca. Let the men deal with this.”
What the hell did he just say to me? It was obvious Marco was a sexist. I was damned tired of him.
I was about to give him a piece of my mind, but Luca appeared behind him.
Luca was half hidden in the shadows, but I could see the sharp cut of his jaw. His face was harder than a rock.
“Alina.” His voice was cold, unruffled like the surface of a still lake. “Go back upstairs.”
“No,” I snapped. “I’m not just some bystander. I’m part of this. I have to be. You brought her here because she hurt me. I have to know.”
Luca stepped forward until he stood beside Marco. His eyes found mine, and for a second, I didn’t see the man who held me through the night. I saw The Monster.
The one whose hand had just become stained in a way that soap couldn’t ever wash clean. He had killed hundreds before, but I could see that his one hit hard.
“You can’t be part of this,” he said. “You’re innocent in all of it. You have to stay innocent.”
My chest heaved, and I felt tears press against my lids. Why?”
“Because if this goes south,” Luca said quietly, “you need to be able to say with certainty that Victoria was alive when I left that room. You saw her. She was breathing.”
I took a step back, the truth of what he meant crashing into me like ice water.
He was protecting me. Not just from what was behind that door, but from implication.
If he had to face a trial, I couldn’t be a witness to anything that might condemn him.
And if I was going to fight for him, I had to hold onto the one truth I could swear by: Victoria had been alive when I saw her.
So what killed her? No, not what, who?
Marco pulled the door shut without another word, and I didn’t stop him.
My breath came fast and shallow, my thoughts twisting around each other in knots.
What had happened in the hour between then and now? Who had gone in after us? Had she done something? Taken something? Was it Shock?
I pressed a hand to my chest, backing away from the door.
Only Marco had been inside that room after we left, and I wanted to know how Victoria could have died so soon.
She was alive.
And now she wasn’t.
And someone, maybe someone we trusted, had killed her. I stood outside the door for near thirty minutes.
I couldn't move. Going into room to pace was impossible. I stood against the wall, waiting with bated breathe for that door to open.
When it did, Marco was carrying a body bag. They both stopped when they saw me lurking there like I had nowhere else to be.
“I told you to go away,” Luca said. “Go away, Alina.”
“I can't.” I insisted.
His eyes darkened and he slammed his fist into the wall beside me head. “Go! Now!” He snarled into my face.
I shrank into the wall away from him, then turned and disappeared down the hallway.
When Luca stepped into the room, he barely gave me a look. He pulled on his dark shirt and pants combo, and his holster.
“If anyone asks, Alina. Victoria was never here. She never came to see you. You never saw her. Do you understand me?”