"YOU’RE NOT DATING HIM," THE MAFIA BOSS SNARLED—THEN TOOK HER HOME IN FRONT OF BILLIONAIRES AND HIGH SOCIETY

The interior of Gabriel’s estate was a striking blend of modern luxury and ancient history. Vaulted ceilings supported exposed timber beams, and the walls were adorned with museum-grade artwork—paintings from the Dutch Masters, Renaissance sketches, and classical sculptures.

A housekeeper named Elena, a woman in her fifties with kind eyes and a silent demeanor, led me to a massive guest suite on the second floor. She provided me with soft cashmere loungewear, running a warm bath in the adjoining marble bathroom.

After washing away the scent of the gala and Spencer’s lingering touch, I put on the oversized gray sweater and trousers. I felt small, exhausted, and deeply unsettled.

A soft knock sounded at the door.

“Come in,” I called out.

Gabriel entered. He had discarded his tuxedo jacket and tie, unbuttoning the top two buttons of his crisp white dress shirt and rolling his sleeves up to his forearms, revealing strong, corded muscles and the edge of a dark tattoo on his left wrist.

In his hands, he carried a wooden box.

“You should eat,” he said, nodding toward a silver tray of roast chicken and fresh bread Elena had left on the table.

“I can’t eat,” I replied, sitting on the edge of the large four-poster bed. “I need answers, Gabriel. You said my father had something to do with this. My father was a quiet professor who spent his life restoring church frescoes.”

Gabriel pulled a chair across from me and sat down, placing the wooden box on the small coffee table between us.

“Your father, Julian Vance, was indeed a master restorer,” Gabriel began, his tone respectful. “Seven years ago, a priceless piece of Italian history—The Madonna of the Shadows, painted by a student of Caravaggio—vanished from a private collection in Palermo. It wasn't just a painting. The wooden substrate beneath the canvas contained microscopic engravings: the routing numbers and access codes to an offshore trust fund worth over eighty million dollars, belonging to the Old Syndicate.”

My eyes widened. “My father never mentioned anything like that.”

“Because he was trying to protect you,” Gabriel said. “The men who stole the painting needed it authenticated and cleaned before they could extract the data. They brought it to Julian under false pretenses. But your father was too smart. He realized what was hidden beneath the pigment. Instead of handing it back, he hid the original canvas and returned a masterfully aged forgery.”

“And you were one of the men looking for it?” I asked bitterly.

Gabriel shook his head. “The trust fund belonged to my family, Shantel. It was stolen by Viktor Vane’s father during the coup in Sicily fifteen years ago. When your father died in that hit-and-run accident five years ago—”

I froze. “The police said it was a drunk driver!”

“The police were paid to say that,” Gabriel said, his voice dropping into a lethal register. “Vane killed your father because Julian refused to reveal where he hid the real canvas. For five years, the trail went cold. Until six months ago.”

“When you brought that painting to my Chelsea studio,” I realized, my pulse accelerating.

“I didn't bring you a random Italian canvas,” Gabriel confessed. “I brought you a piece from the same collection to test your skill. I wanted to see if Julian had passed his techniques on to you. And in those three hours, watching you analyze the brushwork, I realized two things.”

“What?”

“First, that you had no idea about your father’s secret war,” Gabriel said softly, leaning closer. “And second... that I couldn't walk away from you, even after the inspection was over.”

The room went dead silent. The crackle of the fireplace was the only sound between us.

“Spencer found out about the painting through your father’s old notebooks,” Gabriel continued, breaking the silence. “He tried to use you as a bargaining chip to buy his way into Vane’s good graces. But he miscalculated.”