Chapter 1 - The Manhattan Snowfall and the Billionaire’s Impossible Ultimatum
The gray December sky over Manhattan looked heavy, pressing down against the glass facade of Moretti Holdings like a frozen lid.
Inside the executive suite on the forty-eighth floor, the temperature was artificially warm, scented faintly of cedarwood and bitter espresso.
My name is Emma Hayes, and as Luca Moretti’s executive assistant, my entire professional existence was defined by a single, unyielding objective: making chaos disappear before it ever reached his desk.
By 4:30 on that freezing Friday afternoon before Christmas, Luca had already survived seventy-two emails, a state senator’s dinner disaster, a penthouse delivery mistake involving a five-thousand-dollar antique clock, and a stubborn contractor who had nearly cost him half a million dollars on a Brooklyn redevelopment project.
Through it all, I had been his shield.
My hair was twisted into a practical, no-nonsense knot at the base of my neck, my wire-rimmed glasses kept slipping down the bridge of my nose, and I was clinging to my black leather legal pad like a drowning sailor clutching a piece of driftwood.
In the sprawling, cutthroat world of Manhattan real estate and high finance, everyone knew Luca Moretti as the ruthless, untouchable head of Moretti Holdings.
He was a man who bought city blocks, restructured failing corporations, and moved millions of dollars with a single stroke of a pen—never raising his voice, never showing panic, and never losing control.
Yet, beneath the polished Armani suits, the custom cuff links, and the high-stakes luxury real estate deals, there were whispers.
Whispers that trailed behind him in hallways, causing powerful men to lower their voices whenever they spoke his name.
Nobody in the office ever used the word mafia.
Nobody needed to.
The history was written in the architecture of his family name.
Old loyalties, dangerous favors, cash-flow arrangements that defied standard banking regulations, and business rivals who entered negotiations furious and screaming, only to return hours later pale, compliant, and strangely cooperative.
His father, Vittorio Moretti, had supposedly ruled the family through open, terrifying fear—a patriarch of the old school who believed blood and iron were the only currencies that mattered.
Luca had inherited that exact same raw power, but he had refined it, sharpening it into something quieter, colder, and far more unsettling.
He didn't need to shout to make a room go dead silent; a single, slow blink of his dark eyes was enough to freeze the blood of seasoned executives.
I had lived by one unbreakable rule during my two years working beside him: never ask questions that weren't strictly part of my job description.
Curiosity in Luca Moretti’s world did not earn explanations or clarity; it earned suspicion, and I had no desire whatsoever to discover what happened when someone pushed past his boundaries.
Then, his office door clicked open.
“Emma. In here.”
Every assistant and junior analyst on the executive floor froze instantly, keyboards falling silent as I stood up, squared my shoulders, and carried my legal pad into his private domain.
Behind him, the Manhattan skyline looked bleak beneath the oncoming winter storm, while a towering white-and-gold Christmas tree glittered beside the floor-to-ceiling windows, looking as if even Christmas itself required Luca Moretti's explicit permission to exist.
He stood beside his heavy mahogany desk in his shirtsleeves, his dark hair pushed back from his forehead, his silk tie unknotted and hanging loosely around his collar.
To an outsider, he would have looked perfectly calm, almost serene.
But I had worked for him long enough to recognize the subtle, dangerous tension locked tight inside his jaw.
Something was fundamentally wrong.
“Is the Westchester security team confirmed for tonight?” I asked immediately, flipping open my legal pad and scanning my meticulous handwritten notes.
“If it’s the guest list issue at the estate gates, I can have Sienna verify every arrival window again before we leave.”
“It’s not logistics,” Luca interrupted, his deep voice carrying a quiet, resonant gravity that made my fingers freeze over the paper.
Somehow, that answer frightened me more than a logistical nightmare ever could.
Luca folded his muscular arms across his chest, his dark gaze locking onto mine with an unblinking intensity.
“My family Christmas party is tonight.”
“I know,” I replied, blinking in surprise at the obvious statement.
“Your aunt called twice about the imported wine shipment, your grandmother’s custom floral arrangements arrived at the Westchester estate an hour ago, and Julian asked me on three separate occasions today whether you were finally bringing a date.”
“I am,” Luca said smoothly.
I paused, staring at him. “All right. Shall I call the agency and have someone arrange an escort? Or did one of the socialites from the charity gala last week RSVP?”
“With you.”
For several long, agonizing seconds, I honestly wondered if sheer exhaustion had finally broken my brain.
Luca Moretti did not joke with his employees.
He did not flirt with his assistants, and he certainly did not make spontaneous, chaotic personal requests on the final Friday before the holidays.
“I’m sorry?” I whispered, my voice squeaking slightly on the vowel.
“I want you to come tonight as my girlfriend.”
My legal pad slowly slipped from my fingers, sliding down toward my lap before I caught it against my knee.
“Your… your fake girlfriend?”
“Yes.”
A breathless, nervous laugh nearly escaped my throat before I caught the expression on his face.
There was no amusement in his dark eyes.
“Why would you possibly need me to pretend to be your girlfriend?”
His gaze never wavered.
“My family has decided it’s time for me to choose someone.”
Something icy slid down my spine, chilling me straight to the bone.
“Choose someone for what?”
He pushed away from the edge of the desk and walked slowly toward me, stopping only a few feet away.
His voice dropped an octave when he answered, turning the sprawling office into a very small, very private room.
“Marriage.”
My mouth went bone-dry.
“And bringing me… fixes that?”
“For tonight.”
There was something hidden beneath those two simple words—something heavy, sharp, and entirely unspoken—that made my pulse begin pounding wildly against my ribs.
“Luca, your family knows I work for you,” I stammered, gripping the edge of my legal pad.
“They’ll know we’re pretending the moment we walk through the front doors in Westchester.”
For the first time, his expression shifted, a dark, unreadable shadow crossing his face.
“They won't after I tell them what I intend to tell them.”
I tightened my grip until my knuckles turned white.
“What exactly are you planning to tell your family?”
Luca stared at me for one long, terrifying, breathtaking second, and suddenly the entire forty-eighth floor seemed entirely too quiet.
“That you're the only woman I would ever choose.”
And in that exact moment, staring into the dark, bottomless eyes of the most dangerous man I had ever known, I realized something truly terrifying.
May you like
Pretending to be Luca Moretti's girlfriend for a family Christmas party might not be the frightening part at all.
The frightening part was wondering whether he intended to pretend.
Related Stories
