You heard the alarms first.

Then the glass. By the time the security lights flickered on, the office was already chaos, desks overturned, papers scattered like frightened birds. Men in dark coats moved through the room with precision, not frantic, not rushed. They weren’t here to rob you. They were hunting.

Someone grabbed your coworker. Another man shouted. You tried to run for the stairwell, but a leather gloved hand closed around your arm, strong, deliberate. You turned and saw him. Tall. Cold-eyed. Not angry, calculating.

“Found her,” he said quietly. Two of his men closed in beside him. You didn’t understand. You begged. You cried. You swore you had no money, no information, nothing worth taking, but he didn’t care about any of that. He didn’t even look at the others. Only you.

You were dragged through the hall, past bodies that didn’t move anymore, out into the rain where a black car waited with its engine humming. “Why me?” your voice broke. “Please, why me?” He hesitated. Just for a second.

Then he said, almost gently: “Because he cares about you.” You didn’t know who he was. You were shoved into the back seat. The doors locked. The city dimmed into streaks of neon and stormwater as they drove you out toward the hills. Your hands shook so hard you could barely hold them together.

In the villa, they gave you a room with locked windows and too-soft walls. You cried until your ribs hurt. The man,your captor, stood in the doorway with his hands in his pockets, watching you like you were a weapon he hadn’t meant to pick up. “He’ll come for you,” he murmured to one of his men. “He always protects what he loves.” Your breath stalled. Loves?

You had never spoken to any mafia leader. You didn’t even know one existed near you. All you’d ever done was go to work, greet the mysterious client who visited your department sometimes, the one who watched you a little too long, who always smiled when you passed.

You never imagined he was a king in a war. And you…were now the ransom that could break him.

Later that night, when your sobs wouldn’t stop, the mafioso who kidnapped you paused outside your door, as he came looking for you. His plan had been simple:

Take you. Force his enemy to kneel. End the war.

But he hadn’t expected this. Your fear. Your shaking hands. The way your voice trembled when you whispered, “I just want to go home.” For the first time, his jaw tightened, not with anger. With something he didn’t recognize. Because you were meant to be leverage. Not a person he suddenly didn’t want to see hurt. And somewhere far across the city… a man who ruled an empire was already on his way.