Rosalia's POV

We walked back into the main room. The place looked like a war had passed through it—bottles shattered, chairs overturned, tables cracked in half. The music had stopped. The lights seemed harsher now, picking out every broken glass like tiny corpses. The crowd was gone. The gunfire had frightened them off.

It was quiet. Too quiet. My body shook with the leftover terror, and I wrapped my arms around myself until Luca stopped. His eyes flicked to me, unreadable. Then, without a word, he shrugged off his suit jacket and draped it over my shoulders.

It smelled like him. Dark. Sharp. Expensive. I pulled it tight, not because it warmed me, but because it made me feel like maybe the world couldn't touch me for one second.

"What did they want from you?" he asked, voice flat.

"I—I don't know," I stammered. "They must have mistaken me for someone else."

His stare cut through me like steel. "That wasn't a mistake. So you'd better tell me the truth."

"I am telling the truth!" I snapped, fear and desperation twisting in my throat. "I don't know those men. I swear."

His jaw ticked. He turned to one of his men and gave a short nod. The man stepped forward and grabbed my arm.

My heart lurched. "What are you—"

"Since you won't tell me," Luca said coldly, "you're coming with me until I find out why they wanted you."

"What?" I yanked against the grip, useless. "You can't just take me! Is this why you saved me—just to finish what they started? Let me go, you bastard!"

His eyes narrowed. "Still got that mouth on you, eh?"

I opened mine to spit something else at him—anything—when another voice sliced through the room.

"Well, well, here you are, bitch."

I froze.

Robert.

He stepped out from his office, red-faced and fuming, his eyes darting over the wreckage like it was a bill I'd personally handed him. My stomach twisted. I had ruined his club. His voice would be the last I ever heard.

"What the hell is going on here?" Robert bellowed, storming toward us. His glare burned into me. "You, Rosa I'll deal with you later. And you he jabbed a finger at Luca, you're not taking her anywhere. She's my girl. I own her. She works for me. She pays what she owes."

The air shifted. Luca stared at him like he was nothing. Like he was dirt under a boot.

Robert puffed up, trying to reclaim space. "Look, whoever the hell you are, to avoid more trouble, give me my girl and leave in peace."

Luca's lips curled in a slow, deadly smirk. "So she's your girl, eh? Guess what. She's my woman now.

The room tilted. They were fighting over me like two children over a toy, and I had no voice. No choice. No escape.

Robert barked a laugh, but it broke on greed. "No. I own her. She's indebted to me. I had a deal with her parents."

Luca's face darkened. "The deal is over today. I'll cover her debts. You leave her alone."

"Seriously?" Robert blinked, stunned. Then his face split into a grin.

"Angelo," Luca said without looking away.

"Yes, boss."

"Get the money."

Angelo left and returned minutes later with a heavy black duffel bag. He dropped it, unzipped, and the air filled with the scent of fresh cash. Bundled stacks of bills gleamed under the lights.

Robert's eyes bulged. He'd never seen so much money in his life. He bent over the bag like a man staring into salvation.

"Take it," Luca said flatly. "That should cover everything."

Robert's hands twitched. He licked his lips. "Are you sure? She's pretty, yeah, but she ain't worth all that money. She's just a little slut—"

The word cracked across my soul. I flinched. My chest burned.

"Let me be the one worrying about that," Luca cut in, voice icy.

Robert snatched the bag like a starving rat. "Pleasure doing business, Mr..." He waited, hoping for a name. Luca gave him nothing but a look that could kill a man twice.

Robert scurried back into his office, clutching greed tighter than dignity.

Silence fell. Luca turned to me, his eyes unreadable shadows. "Move now, amore. ( love) You're coming with us."

"No, please," I whispered, tears threatening. "Let me go."

"Either you come," he said, voice like iron, "or you end up like those men back there."

My blood ran cold.

Outside, the night swallowed us. A sleek, black, bulletproof SUV waited at the curb. Luca opened the door, his hand steady, his gaze steady, his threat steady. I climbed in.

Inside, I sat in silence, jacket still wrapped around me, pulse still racing. My thoughts spun back to the scene in the club the pile of cash, the weight of his words.

He had bought me out of Robert's hands.

I should have felt free. Instead, I felt owned all over again.

Luca's POV

I had to stop myself from strangling that rat in his own club.

The way he spoke about Rosalia like she was a toy he could loan out, a whore he could brand as his property boiled something in me I thought I'd buried.

She wasn't his. She never was. She was forced, trapped. She carried shame she didn't earn. I saw it in her eyes tonight the same eyes that fight, even when her voice shakes.

I've done a lot of despicable things in my life. Brutal things. But I don't force women. I never will. My mother raised me better than that. Even criminals need codes.

Robert broke every one.

I bought her debt not because I needed her. Not because I couldn't have anyone else. I did it because the thought of her chained to a coward like him made me sick.

But I'd be lying if I said that was all.

Because when she was on that stage wrapping her body around the pole like she hated it, like she despised every second of what she had to give she still burned. Every man in that room saw it. They cheered. They gawked. They drooled.

I hated them for it.

I hated myself more for noticing the curve of her hips, the sway of her body, the fire in her movement.

She's supposed to be fragile. Untouchable. But she dances like she's made of sin and survival, and that combination is more dangerous than a loaded gun.

She's hiding. Layers upon layers. She lives two lives. Maybe three. And yet, when she looks at me, she pretends like she's still in control.

It makes me want to tear every wall down.

And I will.

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