My Online Lover Was the Mafia Boss Who Fired Me Chapter 09
“Elio.”
I looked him straight in the eye.
“Do you know who spread the rumors around the office?”
His forehead creased.
“What do you mean?”
“The first person who said I was your mistress was
Dario’s assistant.
“Dario was also the one who kept calling me into your office over and over.
“He made up the rumors and let everyone see me
going in and out of the top floor all the time.”
The exhaustion in Elio’s eyes vanished.
Cold, deadly fury took its place.
“Why didn’t you tell me this earlier?”
“I filed a complaint with HR.
“No one did anything.
“I also told you in a meeting that, my report had been altered.
“But you didn’t listen.”
I let out a soft laugh.
“You’d already decided I was a stupid, useless woman.
“Did anything I said even matter?”
Elio’s right hand slowly curled into a fist.
The silver snake bit into his skin.
“I’ll get to the bottom of this.
“Dario will pay for what he did.”
“That’s your family’s business.”
I turned to open the door.
Elio called my name again.
“Everything online was real.”
I stopped walking.
“Those nights, you were happy too.
“You said it was the first time anyone had ever complimented you.
“You said I made you feel like you weren’t as bad as you thought.
“Those feelings can’t just disappear completely.”
His voice got faster and more urgent.
“I can treat you right in real life.
“Protect you.
“Take care of you.
“Anything you want, I can give it to you.”
I looked back at him.
This man who controlled half of Chicago’s
underground business was looking at me with an almost pleading gaze.
I’d imagined meeting Nox a thousand times before.
I’d imagined him waiting for me downstairs.
I’d imagined how those hands–the ones holding a whiskey glass in his photos–would touch my body.
Now he was actually standing right in front of me.
All I wanted was to get as far away from him as possible.
“I was happy when we were dating online ”
Elio’s eyes lit up for a second.
“It was the happiest three months of my life.
“But only if that person wasn’t you.”
The light in his eyes slowly faded out.
“Now when I think back on those things, it’s not Nox comforting me that comes to mind.
“It’s Elio Valtieri, sitting in that conference room, saying my stupidity made him sick.”
He pulled a black memory card out of his coat pocket.
“It has all the photos and messages you sent me.
“Every single thing you ever told me.
“Your mom’s favorite flowers.
“The small town you grew up in.
“The ocean you said you wanted to see one day.
“I look at it every day since you left.”
I didn’t take it.
“You saved all this stuff and you think that means you cared about me?
“A real person can’t get crushed by you during the day, then put back together piece by piece over a screen at night.
“Even if you glue it back together, the cracks stay there.”
Elio’s hand started shaking.
“Ivy.
“Give me a chance.
“I’ll tell the whole of Chicago you’re my woman.”
I soon my utau.
“I’m not your woman.
“Not your employee.
“Certainly not some thing you can summon with your
family power whenever you want.”
I pushed open the apartment door.
“I loved the man on my phone.”
Elio snapped his head up.
“But once I found out he was you, that man died.”
I walked into the room.
The second before the door clicked shut, I heard him say.
“I won’t give up.”
The next day, the Valtieri Group locked down the entire building.
Dario admitted he’d altered the South Harbor report, and confessed he’d ordered the rumors spread.
Elio announced to the entire company that my original report was completely fine.
After that, Dario lost the protection of the Valtieri family.
No one ever saw him again.
The group issued a public apology.
A lawyer showed up at my apartment with the reinstatement papers, a check, and company stock.
I only kept the statement clearing my name.
I sent everything else back exactly as it came.
A month later, I left Chicago.
I didn’t tell Elio my flight number.