Part 2: “I Need A Boyfriend By Tomorrow,” The Plus-Size Maid Whispered—Her Mafia Boss Heard Everything
Three weeks after Damian DeMarco placed a real engagement ring on Phoebe Sullivan’s finger, someone mailed her grandmother a photograph of a dead man.
There was no return address.
No note.
No demand.
Just a glossy photograph inside a cream-colored envelope delivered to Evelyn Sullivan’s nursing home shortly after breakfast.
The man in the photograph was lying beside a black sedan beneath an overpass somewhere in New Jersey.
His face had been turned away from the camera.
On the back, written in neat black ink, were six words.
Ask Damian what happened to Luca.
Evelyn did not ask Damian.
She called Phoebe.
“Sweetheart,” she said when Phoebe answered, her voice suspiciously calm, “I think someone is trying to frighten me.”
Phoebe stopped walking.
She was halfway across the DeMarco estate’s enormous front hall, carrying a folder Damian had forgotten on the library table.
“What happened?”
Evelyn hesitated.
That hesitation scared Phoebe more than panic would have.
“Grandma.”
“I received something.”
Twenty-four minutes later, Damian’s security convoy was racing toward the nursing home.
And for the first time since their strange love story had begun, Phoebe was not sitting beside Damian because they were pretending to be together.
She was sitting beside him because she had chosen him.
That somehow made everything more frightening.
Damian had barely spoken since seeing the photograph Evelyn had sent to Phoebe’s phone.
His jaw was tight.
His eyes were fixed ahead.
The warmth Phoebe had gradually learned existed beneath his controlled exterior had disappeared behind something colder.
Older.
Something that reminded her exactly who Damian DeMarco had been long before he carried a silver tray through his mansion just to make her laugh.
“Who is Luca?” Phoebe asked.
Damian did not answer immediately.
“Damian.”
“Luca Moretti.”
The name meant nothing to her.
She waited.
“He worked for my father.”
“Worked?”
Damian finally looked at her.
“He disappeared twelve years ago.”
Phoebe’s stomach tightened.
“And you know what happened to him?”
“Yes.”
One word.
No explanation.
Phoebe stared at the engagement ring on her hand.
Three weeks earlier, that ring had represented something beautifully simple.
No more lies.
No more borrowed boyfriend.
No more pretending.
Now she wondered if they had only stopped pretending about one part of Damian’s life.
“You told me you didn’t want me entering your world,” she said quietly.
His expression changed.
“I don’t.”
“That’s becoming difficult when your world mails photographs to my grandmother.”
His gaze hardened, but not at her.
“At the next light, turn the convoy around.”
Phoebe blinked.
Damian leaned forward.
“Take Miss Sullivan back to the estate.”
“No.”
His head turned.
The driver glanced nervously into the mirror.
Phoebe folded her arms.
“Did you just tell your security team to take me home?”
“Yes.”
“Then no.”
“Phoebe.”
“My grandmother received the envelope.”
“Which is precisely why—”
“Do not finish that sentence.”
Something almost unbelievable happened.
Damian DeMarco stopped talking.
Phoebe leaned closer.
“For months, everyone around you has obeyed the second your voice changes. Your employees. Your security. Cassandra. Probably half of New York.”
His eyebrow moved slightly.
“Is there a point approaching?”
“Yes. I am not one of them.”
“I am aware.”
“Good.”
She looked toward the windshield.
“We’re going to Evelyn.”
The driver seemed suddenly fascinated by traffic.
Damian exhaled slowly.
“You understand someone may be deliberately trying to reach me through you.”
“Yes.”
“And your solution is to move closer to the situation.”
“My solution is not abandoning my grandmother.”
He looked at her for several seconds.
Then he pressed the communication button.
“Continue to the nursing home.”
Phoebe smiled faintly.
“Thank you.”
“I wasn’t asking your permission.”
“Neither was I.”
For perhaps the hundredth time since meeting her, Damian looked as though he had discovered something simultaneously irritating and fascinating.
The nursing home had already been secured when they arrived.
Two DeMarco men stood near reception.
Another waited beside Evelyn’s hallway.
Phoebe hated it.
She hated seeing people in dark suits beside old women pushing walkers.
She hated the whispers from nurses.
Most of all, she hated what the sight represented.
Evelyn’s ordinary life had been touched by Damian’s extraordinary problems.
Phoebe entered her grandmother’s room first.
Evelyn was sitting beside the window drinking tea.
“You brought an army,” she said.
Phoebe crossed the room and hugged her.
“You scared me.”
“I’m eighty. Scaring my granddaughter is one of the few remaining hobbies available to me.”
“Grandma.”
“I’m fine.”
Damian entered behind her.
Evelyn looked at him.
For once, she did not smile.
“Close the door.”
Damian obeyed.
Phoebe almost laughed at the fact that Evelyn Sullivan might have been the only person in Manhattan capable of ordering Damian DeMarco around without hesitation.
Evelyn held out the photograph.
“Who is he?”
Damian took it.
His face revealed nothing.
“Luca Moretti.”
“And why does someone believe his name will frighten you?”
Silence.
Evelyn leaned back.
“Sit down, Damian.”
He remained standing.
“Sit.”
Phoebe whispered, “You should probably do it.”
Damian gave her a look.
Phoebe shrugged.
“She has strong opinions.”
That finally broke some of the tension.
Damian sat.
Then he told them the truth.
Luca Moretti had worked as an accountant for Damian’s father.
Not the kind who prepared tax returns.
The kind who knew which companies existed only on paper, which politicians had received money, and which men had been paid to remain silent.
Twelve years earlier, Luca discovered that someone inside the DeMarco organization had been stealing millions.
He threatened to expose it.
Then he vanished.
“My father believed Luca ran,” Damian said.
“You didn’t?” Phoebe asked.
“No.”
“How old were you?”
“Twenty-six.”
“And what did you do?”
Damian looked at the photograph.
“I found him.”
Phoebe’s skin prickled.
“Alive?”
“For another two days.”
Evelyn’s expression changed.
“What happened?”
Damian’s voice became quieter.
“Luca had been beaten badly. He had information my uncle wanted.”
“Your uncle?”
“Victor DeMarco.”
Phoebe had heard the name.
Everyone in the estate had.
Victor was Damian’s father’s younger brother and the one relative who had not attended Damian and Phoebe’s engagement dinner.
According to Gloria, he had been “unavailable.”
Phoebe was beginning to suspect unavailable meant something different inside the DeMarco family.
“Victor stole the money?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“And Luca knew?”
“Yes.”
“What happened to Luca?”
Damian stared at the photograph.
“I got him out.”
Phoebe waited.
“He died in a hospital under another name.”
The room became completely silent.
Evelyn looked at him.
“Did your uncle know you saved him?”
“No.”
“Apparently he does now,” Phoebe said.
Damian’s gaze shifted toward her.
There it was.
The danger she had known existed around him without ever seeing directly.
Not glamour.
Not expensive suits.
Not black cars.
Consequences.
That afternoon, Damian moved Evelyn to a private medical facility owned by one of his companies.
Evelyn objected for nearly forty minutes.
Then she discovered the new room had a garden balcony and decided she could tolerate “temporary imprisonment if the food improved.”
Phoebe stayed beside her until evening.
Damian disappeared with his security team.
He did not say where he was going.
That bothered her.
By midnight, it bothered her enough that she stopped pretending it didn’t.
She found him in the library when she returned to the estate.
Three men were leaving as she entered.
None met her eyes.
Damian stood behind his desk, jacket removed, sleeves rolled to his elbows.
“Where were you?”
He looked up.
“Working.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“It’s the answer I have.”
Phoebe closed the door.
“No.”
His expression sharpened.
“No?”
“You don’t get to do that.”
“Do what?”
“Invite me into your life only when the rooms are beautiful.”
Damian became still.
Phoebe stepped closer.
“You asked to spend time in my world. Remember?”
“Yes.”
“You wanted coffee shops. Bus stops. Sunday dinners with Grandma.”
“Yes.”
“And now something ugly from your life shows up, and suddenly I’m supposed to stay upstairs while the adults handle it?”
“That isn’t what I said.”
“You didn’t have to.”
Damian walked around the desk.
“What exactly do you want from me?”
“The truth.”
“You know who Luca was.”
“I want to know where you went tonight.”
His silence answered her.
Phoebe laughed once, without humor.
“That’s what I thought.”
She turned.
“Phoebe.”
She stopped.
“When I was twenty-six,” Damian said, “I made the mistake of believing Victor could be reasoned with.”
She slowly looked back.
“He was family. My father protected him. Everyone protected him.”
Damian’s hands rested against the edge of the desk.
“Luca showed me records proving Victor had been stealing from my father for almost seven years. More importantly, he had been paying people to create conflicts between families. Men were dying because chaos made Victor richer.”
Phoebe listened.
“I confronted him.”
“And?”
“He smiled.”
The way Damian said it chilled her.
“He told me I was still a boy wearing my father’s surname.”
Phoebe moved closer.
“What did you do?”
“I began collecting evidence.”
“For twelve years?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because removing a man like Victor without knowing who remains loyal to him creates a vacuum.”
“And vacuums get filled.”
Damian looked surprised.
“I watch television.”
His mouth almost moved.
Then Phoebe asked, “So tonight?”
“I learned who mailed the photograph.”
Her heart jumped.
“Victor?”
“No.”
Damian reached inside a drawer and removed another envelope.
He placed it on the desk.
Phoebe opened it.
Inside was a photograph.
This one showed her.
Leaving the nursing home two days earlier.
Underneath it was another image.
Evelyn sitting beside her new window.
Phoebe’s blood turned cold.
“Who took these?”
“We don’t know yet.”
“You said you knew who mailed the first photograph.”
“A courier working for a private security firm connected to Victor.”
“So he’s watching us.”
“Yes.”
Phoebe placed the photographs down carefully.
Damian stepped toward her.
“This is why I wanted you away from the nursing home.”
“And this is why you should have told me.”
“I was protecting you.”
“No.”
His jaw tightened.
“No?”
“You were controlling information because you were afraid of what I’d do with it.”
“Phoebe—”
“Protection gives someone choices.”
Her voice shook, but she continued.
“Control removes them.”
That landed.
Damian said nothing.
“You promised I would never have to wonder whether I could say no to you.”
“You won’t.”
“That promise has to be bigger than dating.”
Phoebe looked directly into his eyes.
“If we marry, I need to be your partner when things are ugly too.”
Something shifted in his expression.
Not anger.
Fear.
It took Phoebe a second to recognize it because she had almost never seen Damian afraid.
“I don’t know how to do that,” he admitted.
Her anger disappeared.
Not completely.
But enough.
“What?”
“Every person I’ve loved, I’ve protected by keeping them away from certain things.”
“Did it work?”
His silence lasted too long.
Phoebe stepped nearer.
“Your grandmother?”
He looked away.
“My father moved her out of New York when I was eighteen.”
“And you spent years barely seeing her.”
“Yes.”
“Your parents?”
“Dead.”
“Cassandra?”
His face hardened.
“She wanted access to the world you’re trying to keep me away from.”
“And you?”
Phoebe asked softly.
“Who protected you?”
That question stopped him.
No answer came.
Phoebe suddenly understood.
Damian knew how to surround someone with guards.
He knew how to move them into secure buildings.
He knew how to eliminate risks.
He did not know how to share fear.
She reached for his hand.
“You don’t have to become bad at protecting me.”
His fingers closed around hers.
“But?”
“You need to become better at trusting me.”
For several seconds, he stared at their joined hands.
Then he nodded.
It was a small movement.
For Damian, it felt enormous.
The next morning, Phoebe resigned from the estate staff.
Not because Damian asked her.
He actually argued against it.
She did it because she no longer wanted the complicated line between employee and fiancée hanging over every decision.
Gloria received the resignation letter in stunned silence.
“You’re serious?”
“Yes.”
“And what exactly will you do?”
Phoebe smiled.
“I have a degree.”
“I know.”
“I also had a life before I polished Mr. DeMarco’s silver.”
Gloria lowered the letter.
“Phoebe.”
She stopped near the door.
For once, Gloria looked uncomfortable.
“I was cruel to you.”
Phoebe said nothing.
“I told myself I was protecting order.”
“You were protecting hierarchy.”
Gloria winced.
“Yes.”
Phoebe waited.
“I’m sorry.”
It was not enough to erase what had happened.
But apologies were not supposed to erase history.
They were supposed to acknowledge it.
Phoebe nodded.
“Thank you.”
Then she left the servants’ corridor for the last time.
Two hours later, Damian found her sitting at the kitchen island with a laptop.
“What are you doing?”
“Job hunting.”
His brows lifted.
“You resigned forty-seven minutes ago.”
“You timed me?”
“I notice things.”
Phoebe rolled her eyes.
“I remember.”
He placed a coffee beside her.
She looked at it.
“No sugar?”
“You hate overly sweet coffee.”
“That’s you.”
Damian paused.
Phoebe smiled.
“I like vanilla.”
He frowned at the cup as though it had personally betrayed him.
She laughed.
“Sit down, Mafia Boyfriend.”
“Fiancé.”
“Currently under review.”
He sat.
Phoebe turned the laptop toward him.
“I’m applying to nonprofit management positions.”
Damian read the screen.
One organization helped families navigate medical bills.
Another assisted women returning to work after long caregiving periods.
“That one,” he said.
Phoebe stared.
“You’ve been looking for twelve seconds.”
“The director has a good reputation.”
“How do you know?”
“I know people.”
“No phone calls.”
His innocent expression was terrible.
“Damian.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You were thinking about buying the organization.”
“I was not.”
“You were.”
“I was considering making a donation.”
“No.”
He sighed.
“This relationship has many restrictions.”
“Survive.”
The moment was so normal that neither noticed the man standing outside the kitchen until he spoke.
“Domestic life has made you careless, nephew.”
Damian was on his feet instantly.
Phoebe turned.
The man in the doorway appeared to be in his early sixties.
Silver hair.
Dark suit.
Expensive watch.
Calm smile.
He looked enough like Damian to make the relationship obvious.
But where Damian’s silence felt controlled, this man’s felt poisonous.
Victor DeMarco.
Two security guards appeared behind him.
Damian’s voice went cold.
“How did you get inside?”
Victor smiled.
“I helped your father build this house.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
Phoebe stood.
Victor’s eyes moved toward her.
Slowly.
Almost lazily.
“So this is Phoebe.”
Damian stepped between them.
“Don’t.”
Victor laughed softly.
“Still dramatic.”
“Leave.”
“I came to congratulate you.”
“No, you didn’t.”
Victor looked around Damian toward Phoebe.
“The maid who became queen.”
Phoebe crossed her arms.
“Former maid.”
Victor seemed amused.
“Even better.”
Damian’s security chief entered.
“Sir, we have a problem.”
Damian did not take his eyes from Victor.
“What?”
“The east gate cameras were disabled nine minutes ago.”
Victor smiled.
“Technology.”
Damian’s men moved closer.
Still, Victor appeared completely relaxed.
He reached inside his coat.
Every security officer reacted.
Victor froze.
Then slowly removed a folded document.
He placed it on the counter.
“For you.”
Damian did not touch it.
Phoebe did.
“Phoebe.”
“What?”
“Do not—”
“It’s paper.”
Victor laughed.
“I like her.”
“The feeling isn’t mutual,” Phoebe said.
She unfolded the document.
Her smile disappeared.
It was a copy of an old medical record.
Patient name:
Luca Moretti.
Date of death.
Twelve years earlier.
Cause of death.
Cardiac failure following extensive trauma.
At the bottom was a signature.
Damian DeMarco.
Phoebe looked at him.
Victor spoke quietly.
“You told her you saved Luca.”
Damian’s face had gone completely still.
“I did.”
Victor’s smile widened.
“Then perhaps you should explain why you signed the order withdrawing life support.”
Phoebe stopped breathing.
Damian did not look at Victor.
He looked at her.
And for the first time since she had known him, she saw something in Damian’s face more terrifying than anger.
Shame.
Victor adjusted his cuffs.
“I’ll leave you two to discuss honesty.”
He turned.
Damian’s men looked toward their boss.
“Let him go,” Damian said.
Victor paused near the doorway.
“Oh, Damian.”
He looked back.
“You spent twelve years preparing for war with me.”
His eyes shifted toward Phoebe.
“But you made one mistake.”
Damian’s expression hardened.
Victor smiled.
“You finally found something you’re afraid to lose.”
Then he walked out.
Nobody moved for several seconds.
Phoebe stared at the medical record.
Her fingers had begun trembling.
“Is it true?”
Damian closed his eyes briefly.
“Yes.”
One word.
The same kind of answer he had given her in the car.
Only now it felt completely different.
“You signed this?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Damian looked toward the doorway Victor had disappeared through.
Then back at the woman wearing his ring.
“Because Luca asked me to.”
Phoebe’s anger faltered.
“What?”
“He was dying.”
Damian’s voice cracked so slightly she almost missed it.
“The doctors told him there was no recovery. Machines were keeping his heart working. Nothing else.”
Phoebe slowly lowered the paper.
“He was conscious?”
“For several hours.”
Damian swallowed.
“He made me promise Victor would never use his suffering to control his wife and daughter.”
Phoebe stared at him.
“Luca had a family?”
“Yes.”
“Where are they?”
“Alive.”
“Do they know?”
“Yes.”
Understanding came slowly.
“You’ve been supporting them.”
Damian did not answer.
He didn’t need to.
Twelve years.
The same twelve years Damian had been gathering evidence against Victor.
The same twelve years he had carried guilt over his grandmother.
The same twelve years he had quietly supported another man’s widow and child.
Phoebe walked toward him.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because the story makes me sound kinder than I was.”
Her brows pulled together.
“I hated Luca for asking me.”
The confession surprised her.
“I was twenty-six. I believed saving someone meant keeping them alive.”
Damian looked down at the document.
“When he asked me to let him go, I called him selfish.”
Phoebe’s eyes filled.
“Then he told me something I’ve remembered every day since.”
“What?”
Damian looked at her.
“He said love isn’t measured by how tightly you can hold someone.”
Phoebe’s breath caught.
“Sometimes it’s measured by whether you can hear them when holding on hurts them.”
Silence filled the kitchen.
Phoebe finally understood why Victor had brought the paper.
Not because the truth destroyed Damian.
Because half the truth might.
A photograph.
A signature.
A document without context.
Enough to poison trust if trust was already weak.
Phoebe folded the paper.
Then tore it in half.
Damian stared.
She tore it again.
“What are you doing?”
“Victor came here expecting me to run.”
“Phoebe—”
“I’m not running.”
She placed the pieces on the counter.
“But don’t misunderstand me.”
Damian’s expression changed.
“I’m still furious that you kept things from me.”
“That seems fair.”
“And if you ever send a convoy to relocate me without asking again, I will marry you just so divorcing you becomes inconvenient.”
A stunned silence followed.
Then Damian laughed.
Not the quiet laugh from the library.
A real one.
Warm.
Unexpected.
Phoebe pointed at him.
“I’m serious.”
“I know.”
“You’re impossible.”
“So I’ve been told.”
She stepped closer.
His laughter disappeared.
“Victor is right about one thing.”
Damian’s expression darkened.
“What?”
“You finally have something you’re afraid to lose.”
Phoebe placed her hand against his chest.
“But he has misunderstood what that means.”
Damian covered her hand with his.
Phoebe looked toward the doorway.
“He thinks loving someone makes you weaker.”
“Yes.”
She looked back at him.
“Then let’s teach him differently.”
For several seconds, Damian simply stared at her.
The woman who had once stood crying in his library because she needed to borrow a boyfriend for one day was gone.
Or perhaps she had never been as helpless as everyone assumed.
Not Damian.
Not Cassandra.
Not Gloria.
Not even Phoebe herself.
She had spent years believing love meant becoming easier to carry.
Quieter.
Smaller.
Less complicated.
Evelyn had spent months trying to teach her otherwise.
Now Phoebe finally understood.
She did not need Damian to rescue her from his world.
And Damian did not need to protect her by locking her outside it.
Whatever came next, they would face it with both of them fully present.
Damian reached for his phone.
Phoebe raised an eyebrow.
“Who are you calling?”
“My attorney.”
“Why?”
“Victor entered my home illegally, interfered with security systems, threatened my family, and delivered confidential medical records.”
Phoebe blinked.
“That’s your revenge?”
Damian looked almost offended.
“I’m evolving.”
She laughed.
He pulled her gently toward him.
“And after the attorney?”
“Security review.”
“After that?”
“Dinner with Evelyn.”
Phoebe smiled.
“Good answer.”
He kissed her forehead.
Then his phone rang.
Damian glanced at the screen.
Every trace of warmth disappeared.
Phoebe noticed.
“Who is it?”
He answered without taking his eyes from her.
“Speak.”
A voice came through the phone.
Damian’s face changed.
Not slowly.
Instantly.
“What happened?”
Phoebe’s stomach dropped.
Damian listened for another three seconds.
Then he ended the call.
“Damian?”
He reached for his jacket.
“Victor didn’t come here to threaten us.”
Phoebe went cold.
“Then why did he come?”
“To keep us occupied.”
Damian headed toward the door.
Phoebe followed.
“What happened?”
He stopped.
For one terrible second, she thought he might try to protect her by refusing to answer again.
He didn’t.
He kept his promise.
“Someone broke into Evelyn’s old nursing home.”
Phoebe stared.
“Why?”
Damian’s expression became frighteningly calm.
“They took the photograph.”
“What photograph?”
His eyes met hers.
The answer hit Phoebe before he spoke.
The picture from the first day.
The one where Damian’s hand rested against her back.
The one Evelyn had studied before quietly deciding their feelings had stopped being pretend.
Damian opened the door.
“And they took something else.”
Phoebe’s heart pounded.
“What?”
Damian looked at her engagement ring.
Then he said the words that changed everything.
“Your grandmother’s medical file.”
Phoebe stopped breathing.
Somewhere outside, engines roared to life.
Security men rushed across the estate.
Damian extended his hand.
This time, he did not order Phoebe to stay behind.
He simply offered.
She took it.
And together, they walked toward the waiting cars.
Because Victor DeMarco had made his second mistake.
He believed Phoebe Sullivan was the weakness in Damian’s life.
He had no idea she was about to become the reason Damian finally stopped fighting alone.
TO BE CONTINUED — PART 3
