The Mafia Boss Paid a Plus-Size Etiquette Coach to Fix His Wild Brother, but She Took One Look at Him and Said He’d Hired Her for the Wrong Man

At midnight, the Moretti estate was quiet, but Camille could not sleep.

She wore a long silk robe over her nightgown, her dark hair hanging loose down her back, as she padded barefoot down the grand staircase toward the kitchen to make herself a cup of chamomile tea.

The ground floor was dark, lit only by the faint green glow of the security panels and the moonlight streaming through the high arched windows.

As she passed the entrance to Lucian’s private study, she saw a line of amber light spilling out onto the Persian rug.

The door was slightly ajar.

Inside, Lucian sat behind a massive desk of carved oak. The room was lined with leather-bound books, floor-to-ceiling maps of Chicago, and three wall-mounted monitors displaying live security feeds from various properties across the city.

He was holding a glass of amber liquid, staring at a photograph resting on the blotter in front of him.

Camille knocked softly on the wood frame. "Lucian?"

He didn't jump. He didn't cover the photograph. He simply looked up, his gray eyes shadowed by fatigue.

"You should be sleeping," he said.

"So should you."

She pushed the door open and stepped inside. The air in the study smelled of old paper, rich tobacco, and expensive bourbon.

"What happened earlier?" she asked gently, walking over to the desk. "With Marco?"

Lucian was silent for a long moment. Then he slid the photograph toward her.

Camille looked down. It was a surveillance picture of a middle-aged man with sharp features and a thin mustache, sitting in a black sedan outside a warehouse in South Chicago.

"That is Sal Valenti," Lucian said. "He runs the North Side operations for the Valenti syndicate. My father spent twenty years fighting his father for control of the river terminals."

"What does he want?"

"He wants the Moretti Foundation to fail," Lucian said flatly. "He has been buying up debt held by two of our primary corporate sponsors. He told them today that if they attend the gala on Saturday, he will pull his capital from their expansion projects."

Camille gasped softly. "That’s illegal."

Lucian let out a short, humorless bark of laughter. "Everything Sal does is illegal, Camille. That’s the point. He doesn't care about the law. He cares about power. If those two corporate sponsors pull out, the foundation loses its matching grants. The youth centers don't get built. And the city sees that the Morettis can't protect their partners."

He leaned back in his leather chair, pouring two fingers of bourbon into a second glass and sliding it across the desk toward her.

"This is the world you walked into," Lucian whispered. "It isn't about which fork to use for the fish, Camille. It’s about who has the strength to keep the wolves away from the door."

Camille looked at the glass of bourbon, then up at Lucian’s face. She didn't take the drink. Instead, she walked around the desk, stopping right beside his chair.

"And how were you planning to handle Mr. Valenti?" she asked softly.

"The old way," Lucian said, his jaw setting hard. "Marco and six men. A meeting at three in the morning in a garage in Bridgeport."

"No," Camille said instantly.

Lucian looked up at her, surprised. "No?"

"If you go to a garage in Bridgeport at three in the morning, you give him exactly what he wants," Camille said, her eyes flashing with a sudden, fierce brilliance. "He wants you to act like a gangster, Lucian. He wants you to validate every bad rumor about your family. If you use violence, the press finds out, the sponsors panic, and the foundation dies anyway."

"And what is your alternative?" Lucian asked, leaning back and looking at her with a mix of fascination and disbelief. "Send him an invitation with a written apology?"

"No," Camille smiled—a slow, dangerous smile that made Lucian’s blood run hot. "We send him a personal invitation to sit at the head table. Right next to the Mayor."

Lucian stared at her. "Are you out of your mind?"

"Think about it," Camille stepped closer, leaning her hip against the edge of his desk. "Sal Valenti thrives in the dark. He wants to destroy you from the shadows. You drag him into the brightest light in Chicago. You assign him a seat between the Mayor and the Chief of Police. You announce his 'generous contribution' to the foundation live on television."

Lucian’s mouth slowly parted. His gray eyes flared with absolute realization.

"If he refuses to attend," Camille continued, her voice rising with quiet excitement, "he looks weak and cowardly to his own people. If he attends, he has to sit there, smile for the cameras, and hand over a check just to save face."

Lucian looked at her for ten seconds in complete, unbroken silence.

Then, slowly, a smile broke across his face—not the tight, bitter smile he used with his enemies, but a genuine, radiant smile that transformed his harsh features into something impossibly handsome.

"You," Lucian whispered, standing up from his chair until he was inches from her, "are far more ruthless than I am."

"I am an etiquette coach, Mr. Moretti," Camille said, her heart hammering against her ribs as he stepped closer. "We don't use guns. We use social pressure. It hurts much longer."

Lucian reached out, his long fingers gently catching a lock of her dark hair that had fallen over her shoulder. He smoothed it back behind her ear, his thumb brushing against the sensitive skin of her cheekbone.

"I think," Lucian murmured, his voice dropping into a register that was almost a caress, "that hiring you was the single best decision I have made in my entire life."

Camille forgot how to breathe. The ambient light of the study seemed to fade away, leaving only the heat of his hand against her skin, the sharp scent of his cologne, and the intense gray light of his eyes holding her captive.

"Lucian..." she whispered.

"Say it again," he murmured, his face dropping half an inch closer to hers.

"Say what?"

"My name."

"Lucian," she breathed.