Chapter 3

Alex’s place was the basement of an abandoned auto repair shop tucked away in Brooklyn.

There were no Persian rugs, no crystal chandeliers here. Only scattered wrenches, piles of worn tires, and the thick, permanent stench of motor oil hanging thick in the air.

The basement was freezing cold, lit only by a beat-up space heater glowing a faint red.

I pushed open the rusted roll-up garage door. The space was dim and damp, a stripped-apart Ford Mustang sitting dead center. A man slid out from underneath the chassis, covered head-to-toe in grease-stained work overalls.

This was Alex.

His black hair was matted and messy, his jaw lined with dark stubble. His eyes looked unnervingly deep in the dim light—still as stagnant water, yet sharp with a bone-chilling edge lurking beneath. 

He stared at me, soaked through with melting snow, blood crusted at the corner of my mouth. No shock crossed his face, not a single word left his lips.

“Dante sold me to you.” I held out my palm and set the two blood-stained coins down on his oil-caked toolbox beside him. 

Alex flicked a glance at the two dollars, a faint, barely perceptible smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth.

He stood to his full height, his massive frame casting a towering shadow across the wall. He didn’t reach for me. Instead he turned toward the metal stove in the corner, poured a mug of steaming black coffee, and held it out to me.

“Drink it. Don’t drop dead on my property.” His voice was low, gravelly, with a strange, magnetic undertone.

I took the chipped ceramic mug, scorching warmth seeping into my palms—the first flicker of heat I’d felt all day. I gulped down the bitter liquid in big mouthfuls, and hot tears splashed unbidden straight into the coffee.

“You wanna go back?” Alex leaned against an old discarded tire, pulled a crumpled cigarette from his pocket and lit it. Through swirling smoke, his gaze cut sharp as a blade.

“No.” I lifted my head, my eyes hollow and dead. “I’d rather die than step foot in the Costello estate ever again.”

He let out a quiet, careless laugh. “Life with me’s nothing but hardship. All I’ve got’s motor oil, wrenches, and street punks rolling up looking for trouble any day.”

“I’m not afraid.” I met his gaze evenly. “If you’ll take me in, I’ll marry you without hesitation.”

His fingers holding the cigarette paused mid-air. He fixed me with a long, penetrating stare, like he could peer straight through my soul and see all the despair and unyielding resolve buried deep inside. 

After a long beat, he tossed the cigarette butt onto the concrete and crushed it beneath his oil-stained work boot.

“Fine.” He stepped forward, his rough calloused thumb brushing gently over the dried blood on my jaw. His touch was shockingly soft. “You’re mine starting today.”

Later that night, Alex led me over to a folding cot and nodded at it. “Sleep there.”

He didn’t press me for a single detail about everything that had gone down at the manor, nor did he shower me with unnecessary pity or curiosity.

He turned to the sink in the corner, twisted on the faucet, and scrubbed the grease off his hands with coarse industrial soap.

I wrapped myself in his oversized jacket and perched on the edge of the cot. The cigar burn on my shoulder throbbed relentlessly, dried blood fused to the fabric. I tried to slip the jacket off to tend the wound, but every small shift sent a tearing agony shooting through my chest, making me gasp.

Alex spun around, a rusted metal first-aid kit clutched in his hand. He crossed to stand over me, his broad frame blocking the dim light, swallowing me in his shadow.

“Take it off.” His voice stayed rough.

I hesitated, then gritted my teeth, fumbling to undo the jacket buttons with shaking hands. I parted the heavy fabric and let the tattered silk of my dress slip down. The material pooled around my waist, completely exposing the pale swell of my breasts, and the ugly, raw crater of the cigar burn seared right into the delicate skin above my heart.

Alex dropped to one knee. His usually unreadable gaze visibly darkened. He leaned in close, bringing the scent of motor oil and tobacco with him, his warm breath ghosting over my bare collarbone.

“This’ll burn,” he murmured, pressing the alcohol pad directly against the wound.

"Ah—" I gasped, my back arching instinctively. The sudden movement thrust my chest forward, and Alex’s heavily calloused knuckles accidentally grazed the soft, uninjured curve of my breast. 

The electric contrast of his rough touch against my cold skin made me shiver. 

He didn’t pull back. His dark eyes flicked up to meet mine, watching the flush creep up my neck and my chest rising with ragged breaths. For one breathless second, the basement air thickened with a dark, unspoken heat. He looked less like a mechanic, and more like a hungry predator.

Then, his jaw tightened. He pulled his gaze away, bandaging the wound with fluid, precise motions—far too skilled for a grease monkey, more like someone used to patching bullet holes.

“You’ve got a spine of steel,” he finally said, his voice laced with a dark, heavy friction as he taped the bandage down right over my racing heart.

“Why didn’t you beg him?” He spoke out of nowhere once the bandage was secured.

I stared into his bottomless eyes and let out a bitter, self-deprecating huff. “That’s a joke… Dante thought breaking every bone in my body would make me crawl back to him like a stray dog begging for scraps. But Alex, once something shatters completely, it can never be glued back together. I’d rot away in this basement before I’d glance his way again.”

Alex held my gaze for several long seconds, then stood and tossed the first-aid kit back into the corner.

“He’s got men posted watching this shop.” He crossed to the window, pulled the curtain aside a crack to stare out at the pitch-black street. “He’s convinced you won’t last one night in this cold, that you’ll come knocking on his door first thing tomorrow morning.”

“Let him wait.” I closed my eyes and leaned back against the frigid concrete wall. “Wait till his own bones rot six feet under.”

For the next two days, I existed like a ghost trapped in the basement.

Alex worked on cars upstairs during daylight hours, and every night he brought back simple scraps of food—stale hard bread and cold milk.

He barely spoke a word, but I could tell he wasn’t the raving lunatic the rumors painted him as. Every single move he made carried unwavering restraint and pinpoint precision.

On the evening of the third day, heavy knocks boomed against the basement’s metal door.

It was Paul, Dante’s right-hand man.

Paul stood outside, his eyes flicking with open contempt as he took in my plain rough clothes and pale face. “Miss Lucia, the three days are up. Young Master Dante’s waiting for you. He says your little pity party’s run its course. Kneel down and apologize right now, and he’ll still set you up with a nice apartment in the city. Why suffer alongside this crazy grease monkey?”

I stared back at them, the whole scene absurd beyond words.

“Go back and pass this along to Dante,” I said flatly. “Lucia’s dead. The woman you see standing here’s nothing more than a grease monkey’s girl—worth barely two lousy cents.”

Alex grabbed a heavy steel wrench off the workbench without a second thought. He didn’t even glance my way, just said flatly, “Close your eyes.”

I didn’t shut them. I watched the grease-covered man move like a waking leopard as he charged straight into the group of enforcers.

No wasted movements, every swing brutal and perfectly aimed to cripple. The sick crunch of broken bones and screams echoed through the garage. In less than a minute, all seven or eight burly men lay writhing in pools of their own blood.

Alex dropped the bloodied wrench, strode over to the lead man, and planted one boot hard against his chest. The wild, unhinged glint of the local mechanic vanished entirely, replaced by the cold, unyielding dominance of someone born to command.

“Go back and deliver a message to Dante Costello.” Alex’s voice rang cold and hollow through the empty garage. “I took his two dollars. Lucia’s my wife now. Send another crew after us, and I’ll rip his head clean off and kick it around like a ball.”

The men scrambled to their feet and fled, tripping over each other in terror. I looked at Alex, a strange, unnameable emotion swelling in my chest.

This man was far more than just a run-of-the-mill auto mechanic.