Chapter 1 - The Button in Her Hand
## A Girl Sleepwalks During the Night and Is Shocked to Find Herself in Mafia Boss’s Bed When She Wakes
She woke with her mouth against his throat.
He knew she had walked there asleep.
Then the button in her hand became the first piece of proof.
Emma Carter woke with her lips resting against a man’s throat.
For three seconds, she did not understand the room.
Morning sunlight spilled through half-open curtains, pale gold over black silk sheets twisted around two bodies that should never have touched. The air smelled of cedar, expensive soap, cold fireplace ash, and something warmer that made her stomach tighten before her mind found language for it.
Her bare knee was trapped between his legs.
One of his arms rested loosely around her waist.
Her hair spread across his pillow.
Her simple white nightgown had ridden above her knees.
And beneath her mouth, the pulse in his throat beat slow and steady against lips that felt tender enough to terrify her.
Emma pulled away so sharply the sheet dragged with her.
The man beneath her opened his eyes.
Lucian Moretti did not look surprised to find the newest maid in his bed.
That was the first thing that frightened her.
Not his age, though he was old enough to have silver at both temples and power settled into his face like weathered stone. Not his reputation, though every servant in the house knew his private floor was forbidden unless Teresa assigned a task and personally cleared the guard. Not the open collar of his black shirt, the missing button lying near her hand, or the faint red mark beneath his jaw.
It was his expression.
Awake.
Controlled.
As if he had spent the entire night waiting for this exact moment.
Emma clutched the sheet to her chest.
“How did I get here?”
Her voice barely existed.
Lucian sat up slowly, careful not to touch her again. The movement shifted the ruined sheets and exposed the torn front of his shirt, one side pulled loose where the button had snapped. His gray eyes moved over her face, not her body, and the restraint almost made things worse.
“You walked in,” he said.
Emma stared at the open shirt.
“Why is that button missing?”
His gaze dropped to the black button near her trembling fingers.
“Because you would not let go of me.”
Heat and terror rushed through her together.
A broken image flashed behind her eyes.
His hand at her waist.
Her fingers twisted in his collar.
His mouth against hers.
Then nothing.
A blank wall.
A missing staircase.
“Did you kiss me?” she whispered.
Lucian was silent for one dangerous second.
“You kissed me first.”
Emma’s hand flew to her mouth.
“And you kissed me back.”
His jaw tightened.
“Long enough to realize you were not awake.”
She looked at the bed.
At his shirt.
At the way the blanket between them had been dragged almost to the floor.
“How far did it go?”
Lucian’s eyes did not leave hers.
“Farther than it should have. Not as far as you fear.”
“That is not an answer.”
“No,” he said quietly. “It is not.”
She swallowed.
“I need the answer.”
“You will have it.” His voice was low, tired, and very precise. “But before I tell you everything, I need you to explain why you came into my room crying and begged me not to put your suitcase outside.”
Emma stopped.
“My suitcase?”
“Yes.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You said it four times.”
“I don’t remember.”
“I know.”
Lucian got out of bed.
Emma immediately looked away.
He was still wearing black trousers from the previous evening.
That helped.
So did the fact that his shirt had never fully come off.
He crossed the room and lifted something from a chair.
Her robe.
He handed it to her without comment.
Emma pulled it around herself.
“When did I come here?”
“Two seventeen.”
“You know exactly?”
“I was awake.”
“Why?”
“I usually am.”
That sounded less glamorous than the other maids made him seem.
Lucian Moretti was forty-one, head of one of Boston’s most feared crime families, and apparently slept as badly as people who worked minimum wage.
Emma sat on the edge of the bed.
“Tell me what happened.”
He remained standing several feet away.
“You entered through that door.”
He pointed toward the private hallway.
“The guard stopped you.”
Emma’s stomach dropped.
“Oh God.”
“You did not respond to him.”
“What did I do?”
“Continued walking.”
“That’s impossible. That floor requires a code.”
“You entered it.”
Emma stared.
“I don’t know the code.”
“That is the second problem.”
“Second?”
Lucian’s eyes dropped toward her fist.
“The first is in your hand.”
Emma frowned.
She thought she still held his shirt button.
She opened her fingers.
Two objects lay against her palm.
One was the black button.
The other was small.
Brass.
A tiny round disk stamped with a number.
14.
“What is that?”
Lucian took one slow step closer.
“That,” he said, “is not mine.”
She held it toward the window.
It looked like a coat-check token.
Old.
Scratched.
A small hole punched near the edge.
Lucian did not touch it.
“Where did you get it?”
“I don’t know.”
“You had it when you walked into my room.”
Emma’s heart started beating faster.
“What did I do after I came in?”
“You stood at the foot of the bed.”
“Then?”
“You asked where your suitcase was.”
Emma stared at him.
“I don’t own a suitcase.”
Lucian’s expression changed.
“What?”
“My luggage is a blue duffel bag. Teresa complained because the zipper sounds broken.”
He turned toward her.
“You said suitcase.”
“Yes.”
“Black?”
Emma’s mouth went dry.
“Why?”
“You said, ‘Please don’t put the black suitcase outside.’”
A memory flashed.
Not from last night.
Three nights earlier.
Emma had been cleaning the west hall when she saw an old black suitcase beside a service staircase.
She assumed it belonged to a guest.
An hour later, it was gone.
She had never touched it.
She told Lucian.
His face became still.
“Which staircase?”
“West corridor.”
“Show me.”
“Now?”
“Yes.”
“You haven’t told me what happened after I entered your bed.”
Something almost human crossed his face.
Guilt.
“You were crying.”
Emma waited.
“You walked toward the balcony. I stopped you because you were trying to open the door.”
“Then?”
“You turned around, grabbed my shirt and kissed me.”
Her cheeks burned.
Lucian continued before she could speak.
“I reacted.”
“How long?”
“Seconds.”
“And then?”
“You said something that made me realize you were asleep.”
“What?”
His gaze held hers.
“You called me Daniel.”
Emma’s breath stopped.
Daniel Carter.
Her older brother.
Dead for eleven years.
She had been nine when he died.
Lucian continued.
“You began asking why he had locked you in the pantry.”
Emma’s stomach twisted.
“That never happened.”
“You were terrified.”
“No.”
“You were.”
“No.”
She stood.
“My brother never locked me anywhere.”
Lucian looked at her carefully.
“Then somebody wanted you to believe he did.”
Emma stared at him.
“What does that mean?”
“I don’t know yet.”
He reached for his phone.
“Teresa will cover your work today.”
“I’m not staying in bed.”
“I didn’t say you were.”
He looked at the brass disk in her hand.
“We are going to find out what number fourteen opens.”
Emma glanced toward his torn shirt.
“And this?”
Lucian followed her eyes to the missing button.
For the first time that morning, he looked uncomfortable.
“I owe you an apology.”
She waited.
“I should have recognized sooner that you weren’t awake.”
Emma’s voice softened despite herself.
“But you stopped.”
“Yes.”
“Nothing else happened?”
“No.”
She believed him.
That frightened her too.
Trusting a Mafia boss was not how she had planned to survive her new job.
Emma moved toward the door.
Lucian spoke behind her.
“Emma.”
She turned.
“If this happens again, I want you to know something.”
“What?”
“No one in this house touches you while you are asleep.”
His voice changed.
Not romantic.
Absolute.
“Not me. Not anyone.”
She swallowed.
“Thank you.”
Then he looked at the brass disk.
“Because I don’t think last night was an accident.”
Thirty minutes later, they stood in the west service corridor.
Emma pointed toward the staircase.
“That’s where I saw the suitcase.”
Lucian examined the wall.
Nothing.
Then Emma noticed fourteen tiny scratches on the brass plate beside an old dumbwaiter.
She lifted the disk.
Same metal.
Same age.
Lucian inserted it into a narrow slot.
Something clicked inside the wall.
A door Emma had never seen opened six inches.
Cold air moved through the gap.
Behind it was darkness.
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And on the floor—
A black suitcase.
