Taken By The Mafia Lord

Beatrice's idea of keeping her company was feeding her tales and adventures of Marcel. Unfortunately, those stories were not useful to her because they were mostly about Marcel when he was younger. Arianna needed real shit on him, not child's stuff.

However, the tales were quite interesting and she found herself curious for more, like why the father and son hated each other. She heard rumors that Marcel's father had been abusive, she just needed more information. Since she has literally nothing to do in this place, Arianna has grown addicted to gathering information and was on her way to becoming a reporter.

Well, that doesn't sound like a bad career since she'd get to expose crime families like the Luciano's - if they don't kill her first. Yeah, hurray - note the sarcasm. She better figure out what to do with her life once she gets out of here - hopefully.

The both of them were in the kitchen and she was helping the woman with dinner. Although there were chefs who took care of everything cooking-related, Beatrice liked to dominate the kitchen and her foods weren't bad. They tasted like home and she made use of fresh, local ingredients. Arianna preferred it to the sophisticated dishes prepared by the chefs. Beatrice's food was warm and filled her stomach better. She liked the woman, period.

"Do you know that Marcel likes to collect stuff?" The woman told her while they worked. Arianna was dicing the tomatoes while Beatrice was working on the broccoli. The woman was making Broccoli salad with everything bagel seasoning.

"That doesn't surprise me," Arianna said, and with good reasons. After that time she destroyed the stuff in his room and Marcel punished her by, you know, spanking her - and she wasn't thinking about that - Arianna came to know that most things in his room were limited edition.

Marcel never hit her as the sentimental type considering what he does for a living? If that was the case, does he remember the faces of the people he had taken their lives? It was just hard to believe he was nostalgic when he seemed so… detached?

"Marcel is in the business of collecting anything ranging from paintings to antiques, figurines, and of course, stamps."

And that last one made her brows raise, " Stamps?"

"Of course, he's collected over hundreds of them since he was a kid and has a room in here where he stores his 'precious'" Beatrice tried to imitate Sméagol's voice, which didn't sound creepy at all. Yep, not creepy.

However, Arianna was now curious to see where Marcel stores his "precious". Who knows what else he was hiding in there? Mimi's father had a habit of collecting stamps as well and she was sure he and Marcel would be best friends once they met - which she hoped not.

"Anyway, Marcel was a lonely child, it wasn't hard for him to grow attached to the hubby. Moreover, do you know that Marcel had once run away from home?"

"He did? What happened? Why?" Arianna stopped what she was doing and faced the woman.

Seeing that she couldn't stop now after getting Arianna hooked on the story, Beatrice went ahead to finish her tale.

"That was the period when his mother died, I think so. It was the hardest time for him, the poor boy loved no one else but his mother. Even though his father was around, Marcel might as well have been an orphan." She took a deep breath, "As you must have heard, Sir Daniel is not the best at parenting nor would he win the best father role even in a million years to come. Not that anyone's going to say that to his face and you shouldn't either," Beatrice warned her.

Why would she? Arianna gave the woman a stupid look. She wasn't suicidal. She was having a hard time escaping Marcel, why would she put herself on the radar of the bigger monster?

Well, for one, she was infiltrating his house in two days? That was quite an issue but she wouldn't make herself get noticed, Arianna told herself. She would go in, get the job done and be out in a twinkle of an eye. Yes, Daniel had bigger things than her to think about.

She went ahead to ask, "What age was he then?"

Beatrice thought over it, "Around ten, I think. That was the same time Victor was taken -"

"I think that's enough, Beatrice." A voice said from behind and the woman was startled, looking like a kid caught doing something bad.

Arianna knew who it was before she turned, but even at that, she was not prepared for the sight that greeted her.

Marcel was dressed in a black suit, with the tie missing as usual. However, there was only one word that could describe him, immaculate.

Even the models she saw in magazines didn't hold a candle to him, Marcel was all male and as hot as sin. He would have no problem becoming a model himself with that look. His genes were indeed blessed.

She was a bit jealous.

And of course, his heated gaze caught her staring before moving to Beatrice and he tilted his head to the side which was as a gesture for her to give them space. Of course, the woman didn't hesitate to leave the both of them. No one ever disobeyed Marcel Luciano - except her.

"You didn't have to chase her away, she was telling me something interesting," Arianna told him, trying hard to remember how to breathe. Marcel had this habit of stealing her air whenever he was nearby. And it was much worse with him looking so attractive, her heart missing a beat.

"Yeah, my childhood is not interesting." He grumbled, still standing at that point and she was grateful for that. Any closer and her face would be as red as an overripe tomato. What was happening to her?

"You ran away from home when you were young?" Arianna asked, trying to distract herself and hoping he gave her the details.

From the look he gave Beatrice earlier, Arianna was sure the woman wouldn't continue the tale. She had been talking about Victor's involvement in the incident before they were interrupted. She needed to know, because there weren't two Victors in this family as far as she knows.