A Mafia Boss Found His First Love Selling Her Family’s Last Jewel — Then Discovered His Own Company Was The Reason She Lost Everything.
PART 7
“Was mine, personally.”
“You weren’t investing because you believed in the business.”
“I do believe in it.”
“You were cleaning up Warren’s theft.”
“No.”
Tears filled her eyes. “How can you say that? You found me selling my jewelry because my husband stole from you. Then you appeared with exactly enough money to fix everything.”
“I paid the missing funds into Reyes Logistics so the company would stop pursuing you. The bakery investment was separate.”
“Separate to you, maybe.” She began pacing. “To me it means every good thing that’s happened was built on a secret. The debt vanished because you erased it. The bakery survived because you funded it. Men were watching me because your organization thought I could be used against you.”
“I never wanted any of it to touch you.”
“But it did.”
“I know.”
“Did you buy the ring?”
Julian crossed to his desk, opened a drawer, removed the velvet box, and set it between them.
“I bought it that day. Planned to return it once the appraisal payment cleared.”
She opened it. The sapphire glowed under the office lights.
“My grandmother wore this when she married my grandfather,” she whispered. “My mother gave it to me two weeks before she died.”
“I remember.”
Her eyes sharpened. “I never told you that.”
“You wore it on a chain when we were teenagers. You said you’d only put it on your hand once you knew what lasting love felt like.”
Her tears escaped. “You remember that after twelve years?”
“I remember everything about you.”
“Then why did you leave?”
The question wasn’t angry anymore. It was the voice of the seventeen-year-old girl who’d waited for a call that never came. Julian had faced guns without flinching. This frightened him more.
“My father brought me into this office when I was eighteen,” he said. “Showed me photographs of people who’d betrayed him. People who’d been hurt because they loved the wrong man.”
She stayed silent.
“He knew about you. Where your parents lived, where you worked, which bus you took to school.”
Her eyes widened. “He threatened me?”
“Not directly. He didn’t need to. He wanted me to understand that becoming his successor meant cutting away anything that could control me.”
“So you obeyed him.”
“I thought I was protecting you.”
“You could have warned me.”
“I was afraid that if I saw you, I’d choose you.”
“Would that have been so terrible?”
“No.” His voice broke. “That’s what I understand now.”
He stepped closer, didn’t touch her. “I loved you before I knew what love was supposed to feel like. When I left, I told myself you’d build a normal life with someone safer.”
“I married Warren.”
“I know.”
“He lied to me for years.”
“I know.”
“And you think that proves you were the better choice?”
“No. It proves I had no right to decide your life for you.”
The admission silenced her.
“I saw you in that appraisal room,” Julian went on, “and every excuse I’d used for twelve years disappeared. You were saying goodbye to the last piece of your family because a dead man’s crimes had trapped you.”
“I didn’t need a mafia boss to rescue me.”
“No.”
“You did it anyway.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I couldn’t walk away from you twice.”
The office went quiet.
“I didn’t replace the money because Warren stole from me,” he said. “I replaced it because the company would have taken your bakery. I could have followed procedure and let you lose everything. No one in my organization would’ve questioned it.”
“But you didn’t.”
“I chose you.”
Corinne closed the velvet box. “You chose for me again.”
The words struck him. She held the ring to her chest.
“I understand why you did it. I might even be grateful someday. But you controlled the debt, the investment, the security, the truth. You decided what I got to know, every step of the way.”
Julian lowered his head. “You’re right.”
She seemed surprised he didn’t defend himself.