Gianna
I should've kept walking.
I knew it the second I turned the corner and saw them – two men, one boy, and a bad feeling winding tight around my spine. The alley behind the corner store reeked of rot and smoke, lit only by the flickering neon buzz of a broken sign that blinked "COLD BEER" like a dying heartbeat.
I should've kept walking. Pretended I didn't hear the muffled grunt. The thud against brick.
But I didn't.
I'd never been the type to walk away from something ugly. Even when I probably should've.
Even when I was wearing a dress with pink buttons and carrying lemon bars in a canvas tote bag.
The kid was maybe thirteen. Thin. Backpack barely clinging to his shoulders. He was cornered, trembling, his eyes darting between the two men like he was trying to disappear.
"Hey!" My voice cracked like old glass.
Both men turned.
One had a cigarette tucked behind his ear. The other had hands like bricks and a stare that made my breath hitch.
"What's this?" Brick Hands grinned. "Lost your way to the cupcake shop, sweetheart?"
I tried to sound steady. "Let him go."
That got a laugh. A real, greasy, someone's-gonna-bleed kind of laugh.
"Cute," the other one said, stepping closer. "You're cute."
He meant it like a threat.
I reached into my tote for the pepper spray I'd never used. I gripped it tight, trying to remember if I was supposed to aim for the eyes or just scream and hope for the best.
But I didn't get the chance.
Because something in me – that same stupid, stubborn thing – moved before my brain caught up. I stepped between the men and the kid. Not heroic. Instinct. The same instinct that makes you put your hand over a candle flame to see if it's really hot.
The one with the cigarette grabbed my arm.
His fingers dug in. Not squeezing – sinking. Like he was testing how much pressure it took to make bone shift under skin. I felt my pulse throb against his grip and something cold opened in my stomach.
"Stupid move, sweetheart."
The kid behind me made a sound. Small. Broken. The sound a bird makes when it realizes the cat is already in the cage.
But then the air shifted.
You know that feeling right before lightning strikes? Like the oxygen's too heavy, like the world's holding its breath?
That.
Something moved behind me. Silent. Lethal.
And then – chaos.
The one who grabbed my hand never saw it coming. One second he was smirking, the next he was off his feet, slammed so hard into the wall that a chunk of crumbling brick cracked and fell.
The second man barely turned before he was on the ground, a boot pressing down on his ribs like a boot presses down on a roach.
I stared.
No, I froze.
Because the man who did it wasn't a man.
He was a goddamn ghost in black.
Big. Impossibly still. Leather jacket open just enough to flash the steel glint of a shoulder holster. His hair was short, dark, neatly cut – everything about him said control.
And then he looked at me.
No expression. No words. Just those eyes – sharp, pale, rimmed with something colder than hate.
Dominic Russo.
The man my uncle sent to make bodies disappear.
He was everything I'd ever been warned about.
And he was looking at me like I was the problem.
I opened my mouth. "I – I just – he was –"
He turned away.
Just like that. Like I wasn't even worth the full attention of his scowl.
My heart dropped.
He didn't say I was stupid. He didn't need to. It was all over his face – irritation, disdain, something deeper. Something that said: You're going to get yourself killed. And you're going to make me clean it up.
He brushed past me. Cold leather. Steel underneath. He smelled like smoke, metal, and winter.
"Car's around the corner." His voice was low. Deeper than I expected. Dry. Dangerous. "Move."
I wanted to ask him not to talk to me like that.
But I moved.
Because whatever else he was, Dominic Russo wasn't a man who gave suggestions.
Dominic
She was going to get herself killed.
And for what? Some punk kid with sticky fingers and a bad instinct for alleys?
I watched her step back onto the sidewalk like she hadn't almost made me put a bullet in someone's spine. Her hands were shaking. She didn't even notice. People like her never do. They go through life thinking kindness is armor. That a little light makes them untouchable.
It doesn't.
She wore a dress like it mattered. Hair pinned back like she was heading to brunch instead of a crime scene. Skin flushed. Eyes too wide. Mouth too soft.
Gianna Moretti.
The Don's niece. Off-limits. Untouchable. Sheltered and sugar-dipped. Like biting into a cupcake and realizing it's stuffed with live wires.
She was supposed to be taking a baking class in Midtown.
Not playing vigilante in a Southside alley crawling with people who'd sell her bones for dope.
I didn't speak. I didn't scold. She wouldn't hear it, anyway. People like her think defiance is courage. Think plus size girls don't get to be heroes, so they make themselves into martyrs instead.
She didn't even see me until I stepped in.
Didn't realize how close she was to bleeding out until the threat was already broken at her feet.
She turned her head. Looked at me. Eyes too damn trusting for what I am.
She didn't know it yet, but I'd been following her since the moment she stepped off the subway alone.
Because someone had to.
Because the Don knew the world was teeth.
And his niece? She walked around like it wasn't already chewing on her shadow.
"Gianna Moretti," I said finally, "You shouldn't have done that."
She blinked. "What?"
I allowed the quiet to linger.
"You don't belong in places like this."
That made her straighten, stubborn. Good. I wanted her angry. I wanted her to remember.
"I wasn't going to let them hurt him."
My jaw flexed.
"And who was going to stop them from hurting you?"
She didn't have an answer.
I didn't need one.
I walked to the car without looking back.
But I could still hear her footsteps behind me.
Still feel her presence like heat in my peripheral.
Still think, She's not ready for this world.
But I also knew the truth.
It wasn't the world I was worried about.
It was her.
Because innocence doesn't survive in our world.
It gets eaten alive – or worse, it makes men like me forget they're monsters.