She Had No Idea Why the Mafia Boss Was Following Her—Until He Quietly Warned Her About Her Dress

By five in the morning, the rain over the river had washed the sky clean of smoke and diesel exhaust, leaving behind a pale, violet horizon that smelled of wet salt and turning leaves.

The Maybach crossed the Queensboro Bridge, its tires humming smoothly over the steel deck. Below them, Roosevelt Island lay like a long, dark knife in the gray water, its abandoned hospital ruins catching the first pink rays of the October dawn.

Gemma leaned her head against the leather headrest, her eyes heavy with an exhaustion that was different from the bone-weary fatigue of the gallery. This was the exhaustion of a survivor who had crossed an ocean and finally felt the keel of the boat scrape against dry sand.

Roman sat beside her. He had removed his tie, the top two buttons of his linen shirt open, exposing the base of his throat and the sharp line of his collarbone. He looked tired, but it was the relaxed, dangerous tiredness of a soldier who had secured his perimeter and set his pickets for the night.

"The Van der Weyden will take fourteen months," Gemma said, her voice soft in the quiet of the car.

"Take twenty," Roman replied, not looking away from the bridge cables passing overhead. "The gallery isn't going anywhere."

"The varnish needs to be removed with a mix of benzyl alcohol and mineral spirits. One square centimeter at a time. Using cotton swabs rolled on wooden toothpicks."

"I’ll have the timber for the toothpicks imported from Sweden," he said, the faintest ghost of a smile touching the corner of his mouth.

Gemma turned her head, looking at his profile against the dawn light. "You're absurd, Roman."

"I am efficient."

"You gave away four million dollars in trash routes to save a boy who tried to set a trap for you."

"I didn't give anything away," Roman said, turning to look at her. His slate eyes were clear now, luminous in the morning light, stripped of the cold, lethal shadow that had filled them at Il Vesuvio. "I traded six miles of polluted riverfront for the only thing in this city that has never lied to me."

"The art?"

"You," he said.

He reached out, his hand covering hers where it rested on the leather seat. His fingers were warm, broad, and unshakeable. He didn't pull her toward him; he simply held her hand, anchoring her to his side as the car swept off the bridge ramp onto the clean, empty streets of the Upper East Side.

"The green dress was ruined," Gemma murmured, looking down at their joined hands.

"The green dress was an invitation," Roman said.

"To what?"

"To stop hiding behind your father's ghost," he whispered. "To let someone else hold the line while you do the work you were born to do."

The car pulled up before the grand wrought-iron gates of the Costa townhouse on 72nd Street.

The gates swung open automatically, the heavy iron hinges clicking with a deep, hydraulic sound that signaled safety, wealth, and absolute, impenetrable protection. The courtyard inside was lined with ancient boxwoods, clipped into severe, elegant geometric shapes, their dark leaves dripping with the morning rain.

The car stopped.

Paul, the driver, did not open the door immediately. He knew better than to interrupt his employer when the world was quiet.

Gemma looked at the limestone steps leading up to the massive double oak doors of the house. For the first time in her life, she did not look for the emergency exits. She did not calculate the distance to the nearest subway station. She did not feel the phantom sting on her ankle where the brass bracket had drawn blood.

She looked at Roman Costa.

"The Kevlar is heavy," she said, a small, genuine smile finally breaking across her hazel eyes.