Chapter 2 - The Contract of Convenience
The backseat of the black Maybach smelled of costly leather, cedar, and the clean, icy scent of Dominic Moretti’s cologne.
Harper sat as close to the passenger door as humanly possible, her damp uniform shoes resting on the plush carpet. Her hands were tucked beneath her thighs to hide their violent shaking. Beside her, Dominic sat with his legs crossed at the knee, reading a thick legal dossier under the soft reading lamp built into the roof frame.
Outside, the rainy lights of Michigan Avenue blurred past in ribbons of red and gold.
"You have six hundred and forty dollars in unpaid electricity bills," Dominic said, not looking up from the paper. "Your brother, Leo, is seventeen. He missed three weeks of school last month because he didn't have winter boots and was ashamed of his torn jacket. You work sixty hours a week between the Grill and the diner on 4th Street, and you're currently three days away from an eviction notice on your unit in Pilsen."
Harper’s mouth went dry. "Have you been spying on me?"
"I don't spy, Harper. I investigate investments," Dominic turned a page. "I've been watching you for six weeks."
"Why?" Her voice rose, laced with sharp, defensive panic. "Because I'm easy to pick on? Because you needed someone to play some sick game in front of Paul DeLuca?"
Dominic finally closed the folder with a soft, heavy thud. He turned his head and looked at her. Up close, without the shadows of the restaurant booth, his face was striking—hard-angled jaw, a faint pale scar cutting through his left eyebrow, and eyes so light they looked like polished steel.
"Paul DeLuca is the nephew of Frankie DeLuca," Dominic said calmly. "Frankie controls the unions at the port. For two years, Frankie has been trying to force a merger between his organization and mine by offering his daughter's hand in marriage. A classic, outdated mob maneuver. If I marry his daughter, he gets access to my shipping routes. If I refuse, he calls a union strike and freezes sixty million dollars of my freight."
Harper stared at him. "And what does that have to do with me?"
"I needed a wife," Dominic said simply. "Someone who was not connected to the families. Someone who could not be bought by Frankie, someone who was not terrified of hard work, and someone who possessed enough pride not to kneel on the floor for a scum like Paul DeLuca."
"I was going to clean it," she whispered bitterly. "Because I didn't have a choice."
"You had a choice," Dominic countered. "You looked him in the eye and told him he pushed his chair into you. I’ve watched men with guns in their hands bow lower to Paul DeLuca than you did tonight."
Silence stretched between them, heavy and suffocating, punctuated only by the soft shhh-shhh of the windshield wipers against the glass.
"I'm not built like the women you see on TV, Mr. Moretti," Harper said, her throat tight, looking down at her lap. "I know what Paul was going to say. I know what people see when they look at me. I'm not a mob boss's wife. I'm... I'm a waitress who can't pay her light bill."
Dominic didn't answer right away. He reached across the leather seat. Harper flinched, expecting him to grab her, to push her, to touch her the way men in dark cars usually wanted to touch women who owed them money.
Instead, his fingers gently caught her chin. His touch was warm, firm, and astonishingly gentle. He forced her face up until her eyes met his.
"Look at me," Dominic commanded quietly.
She looked.
"I see a woman who carries the weight of her entire family on her back without complaining," Dominic said, his gaze fixed on her face with terrifying intensity. "I see a woman who stands five-foot-eight and carries curves that belong on a marble statue in Rome, not in some trashy diner. You think you're small, Harper? You think you're meant to hide?"
Her breath hitched in her throat.
"I don't want a trophy doll who faints at the sight of blood," Dominic continued, releasing her chin slowly. "I want a woman who can stand beside me at a table full of wolves and make them afraid to bite. Here is my offer. A legal marriage. Two years. You will live in my estate in Gold Coast. Your brother will be enrolled in Saint Ignatius Prep tomorrow morning, tuition paid in full through university. Your debts will be cleared by midnight tonight. You will have a personal account with fifty thousand dollars loaded into it every month."
Harper’s mind reeled. "And in exchange?"
"In exchange, you wear my ring. You attend my dinners. You play the devoted, impossible Mrs. Moretti in front of the press and my enemies. And when two years are up, if you want to leave, you walk away with five million dollars in a tax-free trust."
"And... the bedroom?" Harper asked, her heart pounding against her ribs like a sledgehammer. "What do you expect from me there?"
Dominic leaned back into his seat, his eyes darkening slightly as he looked at her mouth, then back up to her eyes.
"I don't take women who don't ask to be taken, Harper," he said softly. "You will have your own wing of the house. The lock is on the inside of your door. If you ever decide to unlock it, that will be your choice, not mine."
May you like
The Maybach pulled up to a smooth curb. Outside the tinted windows, a pair of massive wrought-iron gates swung open automatically, revealing a towering limestone mansion illuminated by soft golden floodlights.
"We're here," Dominic said, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a velvet box. He snapped it open. Inside sat a ring—a flawless, emerald-cut canary diamond flanked by two baguettes, so large it looked like a small chandelier. "What is your answer, Miss Henkins?"
