I Fed A Ruthless Mafia Boss My Leftovers — Now A Rival Syndicate Is Hunting Me

Part 1

The heavy oak doors of the corporate penthouse swung open, and I nearly knocked over my squeaky catering cart in sheer panic.

Inside the freezing boardroom stood Tyler Rossi, the undisputed king of Chicago’s modern underworld, staring dead-eyed at ten flawless supermodels.

I was twenty-five, decidedly curvy, and sweating through a catering uniform that was at least one size too small.

My only job was to provide coffee for the elite agency girls auditioning to be the face of Tyler’s opulent new restaurant venture.

The frigid air inside the room was intentional, keeping his men constantly alert and his numerous enemies trembling in fear.

Beneath the pristine veneer of his legitimate real estate conglomerates lay a dark labyrinth of extortion and buried bodies.

He wore a bespoke charcoal suit that clung perfectly to his broad shoulders, his dark eyes entirely devoid of warmth.

Between paying off my father’s mountain of medical debts and working double shifts, I barely had time to breathe let alone eat properly.

I definitely couldn’t afford exorbitant downtown lunch prices, so I had brought my own meal in a battered plastic container.

I had just popped the lid off my lunch in the service corridor, hoping to eat quickly before the terrifying men in suits noticed me.

The heavy, intoxicating aroma of slow-simmered rustic ragu immediately billowed out into the sterile corporate hallway.

It was a special recipe I learned from a sweet older lady named Brenda when I was just a little girl living in a run-down apartment complex.

It featured a highly unorthodox twist involving roasted fennel, a splash of cheap red wine, dark cocoa powder, and fresh orange zest.

Suddenly, the harsh shouting inside the boardroom stopped dead.

Tyler Rossi burst through the heavy doors, his dark, calculating eyes locking directly onto my cheap plastic container.

Every instinct in my body screamed at me to run, but my legs felt like they were made of wet sand.

He stepped directly into my personal space, completely ignoring my stained apron and worn-out shoes.

His large scarred hand wrapped firmly around my trembling fingers, pulling the container toward him as he inhaled deeply.

He closed his eyes, a violent spasm of emotion crossing his hardened face as the scent washed over him.

It was the scent of safety, of childhood, and of a mother’s unconditional love completely disarming the ruthless crime lord.

“Fire them,” Tyler commanded his underboss, Greg, without ever looking away from my terrified eyes.

“Pay their agency fees and get them out of my building right now.”

He turned his intense, burning gaze back to me and ordered me to bring my food and follow him immediately.

I clutched my lunch to my chest like a shield, convinced I was about to be thrown into the lake for stinking up a mafia boss’s hallway.

Instead, he escorted me into his private residential penthouse and commanded me to sit at his gleaming marble kitchen island.

I held my breath as the most feared man in the Midwest took a bite of my leftover lunch.

For a terrifying thirty seconds, he remained completely silent, the deeply etched lines of his face softening slightly.

A single treacherous tear escaped the corner of his eye before he aggressively wiped it away.

His voice was thick with restrained emotion when he demanded to know exactly where I had gotten that recipe.

I stammered out the story about the sweet lady on my childhood street who hid in her apartment all day.

I told him she taught me that cocoa reminded a son that life is bitter, but orange zest meant it could still be sweet.

Tyler gripped the edge of the counter until his knuckles turned white, realizing I had been babysat by his late mother.

During the bloody syndicate wars fifteen years ago, he had hidden her in that exact run-down safe house on Taylor Street.

He had spent hundreds of thousands of dollars trying to get Michelin-starred chefs to recreate her secret dish, and they all missed the spice ratio.

In that exact second, he pulled out his sleek black checkbook and declared that I was no longer a struggling caterer.

He announced that I was the new executive chef of his restaurant and the face of his entire empire.

I tried to protest, pointing out that I was a size fourteen on a good day and knew absolutely nothing about running a high-end kitchen.

Tyler gently brushed a smudge of powdered sugar off my cheek, sending a violent jolt of electricity straight down my spine.

He told me that I carried his mother’s legacy in my hands and possessed more substance than any supermodel in the city.

Within forty-eight hours, my entire existence became completely unrecognizable.

I was moved out of my cramped apartment and into a luxury suite right inside the syndicate’s towering skyscraper.

My father’s crippling medical debts were magically paid off in full by an anonymous philanthropic trust.

I spent my days in the pristine test kitchen, cooking alongside Tyler, who would roll up his custom silk sleeves.

He began to visit me daily, laughing for the first time in a decade as we chopped onions together.

He tasted my reduction sauces, his massive frame standing right behind me, his deep voice vibrating against my spine.

A terrifyingly deep romance began to simmer between the hardened criminal and me.

I was no longer just an invisible civilian pouring coffee for ungrateful executives.

I was the woman who had brought light back into the darkest corners of Tyler’s isolated world.

His dark eyes would follow my every move around the kitchen, filled with a hunger that had absolutely nothing to do with food.

But in this dangerous city, weakness was just blood in the water.

Word spread rapidly across the dark underbelly that the impenetrable Tyler Rossi had developed a reckless new obsession.

Across town in a smoke-filled speakeasy, Craig Henderson slammed his glass of bourbon onto the sticky table.

Craig was the brutal patriarch of a rival syndicate who had been looking for a vulnerability in Tyler’s armor for five years.

His lieutenant reported that Tyler had fired an entire campaign just to hand the keys of his fortress to a curvy baker.

Craig’s scarred face twisted into a vicious, yellow-toothed smile as he formulated a dark plan.

He ordered his heavily armed men to find out absolutely everything about me.

He wanted to know where I walked, who I loved, and exactly where my sick father lived.

Craig intended to use me to force Tyler to sign over the lucrative shipping routes and union contracts.

The storm was gathering, and entirely consumed by the warmth of Tyler’s kitchen, I had absolutely no idea I had just become the most high-value target in the city.