Chapter 2 - The Kitchen, The Boss, and The Legacy
The stainless steel double doors of the estate’s main kitchen swung open with a soft, pneumatic hiss.
Inside, three sous-chefs, two dishwashers, and the head of kitchen staff frozen mid-action. Chef Antonio dropped a heavy copper whisk into a vat of marinara sauce, splashing red drops across his pristine white apron. His eyes weren't fixed on Grace, nor were they on the brown paper grocery bags resting securely against her hip.
They were fixed on Titan.
The three-hundred-pound Cane Corso-Neapolitan Mastiff hybrid stepped through the doorway behind Grace, his dark coat gleaming like polished obsidian under the fluorescent lights. His massive paws made a soft clack-clack sound on the industrial tile floor. He didn't growl. He didn't pull back his lips. He simply walked to Grace’s side, sat down with a heavy, deliberate thud, and rested his jaw squarely on her left thigh, his dark eyes sweeping the kitchen staff with supreme indifference.
"Grace," Antonio stammered, his face draining of color as he backed slowly against the prep table, clutching a paring knife like a holy relic. "What... why is that demon in here? Where are the handlers?"
"His name is Titan," Grace said softly, her voice carrying a deep, resonant calm that seemed to instantly settle the tense air in the room. She set her grocery bags down on the central butcher-block island, untying her apron string with one hand while her other hand instinctively reached down to stroke the broad flat space between Titan’s ears. "And he was just showing me the way. He’s hungry, Antonio. They’re all hungry."
"They're killer dogs!" Antonio hissed, taking another step back. "Security feeds them raw meat at five o'clock in sealed steel cages! They don't... they don't walk into my kitchen!"
"They feed them like caged beasts," Grace corrected gently, pulling a fresh tub of butter, organic rosemary, and prime cuts of beef shoulder from her bags. "Which is why they act like caged beasts. A dog fed out of fear will always bite out of hunger."
Before Antonio could formulate a response, the heavy wooden side door leading from the main house opened.
The temperature in the room felt like it dropped ten degrees.
Luca Moretti stepped into the kitchen.
He didn't wear a jacket, only a tailored charcoal-gray vest over a white dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, revealing thick forearms laced with silver scars and intricate Italian tattoos. He was six-foot-four of quiet, lethal authority—a man whose word governed half the eastern seaboard's shipping lanes and whose nod had ended dozens of men's lives.
Behind him stood Chief Security Officer Victor Reyes, his hand hovering two inches above his sidearm, his eyes wide with disbelief as he took in the sight of Titan resting peacefully against the new cook.
Luca didn't look at Antonio. He didn't look at Reyes. His dark, impenetrable hazel eyes locked onto Grace Walker.
He looked at her soft, natural curves—the hips the guards had foolishly mocked, the flush of warm blood in her cheeks, the steady, unblinking clarity in her deep brown eyes. And then his gaze dropped to her hand, which was casually scratching the lethal beast under its chin.
"Reyes," Luca spoke, his voice a low, gravelly baritone that vibrated through the floorboards. "Leave us."
"Boss," Reyes hesitated, staring at the dog. "That animal hasn't been subdued. If he lunges—"
"I said leave us," Luca repeated without raising his voice.
Reyes swallowed hard, glared at Grace, and backed out of the kitchen, locking the heavy doors behind him. The remaining kitchen staff quickly scurried into the walk-in freezer, desperate to put three inches of insulated steel between themselves and whatever was about to happen.
Grace didn't bow her head. She didn't shrink under Luca’s overwhelming presence. She met his gaze squarely, leaning back slightly against the edge of the butcher block.
"You're Arthur Walker's daughter," Luca stated. It wasn't a question.
Grace felt a small, sharp pain in her throat at the sound of her father's name. "I am. But I didn't put that on my application."
"You didn't have to," Luca said, taking two slow steps forward. Titan’s tail gave a single, heavy thump against the floor in recognition, but the dog remained seated at Grace's hip. "Twenty years ago, my father bought six bloodline pups from a trainer in North Carolina. They were wild, unbroken line-bred hounds bred for war. Three handlers died trying to break them. Then Arthur Walker walked into the compound with a wooden bowl and a pocket full of dried liver. Within twenty minutes, those dogs were sleeping at his boots."
Luca stopped three feet from her. Up close, Grace could smell him—expensive tobacco, cedarwood, and the cold, metallic scent of rain.
"My father called it magic," Luca continued, his eyes searching Grace’s face with a intensity that made her pulse quicken. "Arthur called it patience. But before my father could pay him his full fee, Arthur vanished. Took his daughter and disappeared into the countryside."
"He didn't vanish to hide," Grace said quietly, her chin lifting slightly. "He left because your father wanted him to train those dogs to tear human beings apart on command. My father trained animals to guard homes and love families, Mr. Moretti. He wasn't a hitman’s kennel master."
A tense, heavy silence settled over the room. Any other person on the estate who spoke to Luca Moretti like that would have ended up at the bottom of the harbor before sunset.
Instead, a slow, dangerous smile pulled at the corner of Luca's hard mouth.
"And yet," Luca whispered, leaning in slightly, his dark gaze dropping to her full, soft lips before rising back to her eyes, "here you are. In my kitchen. Cooking my meals."
"I took the job because the wage was fair and I heard your previous cook made everything out of a box," Grace replied, her voice smooth and unbothered. "And because I needed to know if the stories my father told me about the Moretti hounds were true."
"And are they?"
Grace looked down at Titan, then back up at the ruthless boss of the Moretti family. "They're not monsters, Mr. Moretti. They're just lonely."
May you like
Luca stared at her for a long, silent moment. Then he reached out, his long, scarred fingers lightly touching the edge of the wooden butcher block right beside her hand.
"Prove it," Luca said softly. "Cook dinner. For me... and for them."
