Send the Ugly One, He'll Reject Her! They Laughed — But the Mafia Boss Was Speechless!

The next morning, Adelaide went to work.

Mateo had given her the master office adjoining his own. It was a beautiful space overlooking the mountains, equipped with three massive monitors, high-speed servers, and a wall of filing cabinets containing the syndicate's legitimate and illegitimate business records.

She tied her dark hair into a messy bun, put her heavy glasses back on—Mateo had retrieved them, noting that she actually needed them to read—and dove into the digital footprint of Jones Financial.

For three days, she barely left the room.

Mateo watched her. He would often stand in the doorway holding a cup of black coffee, simply observing the way her mind worked. He admired how she attacked the financial puzzles, her fingers flying across the keyboard with ruthless efficiency. He saw the fire in her eyes that her family had tried so hard to extinguish.

“You’re skipping meals again,” Mateo said on the third evening, walking into her office and setting a plate of roasted chicken and vegetables on her desk.

“I’m close, Mateo,” Adelaide said, not taking her eyes off the center screen. “I found the routing numbers for the offshore accounts. The money went to the Cayman Islands, then to a holding company in Cyprus, and finally bounced back to a domestic real estate firm.”

Mateo pulled up a chair and sat beside her. He smelled of expensive cologne and gunpowder.

“Which real estate firm?” he asked, leaning close enough that his shoulder brushed hers.

“That’s the problem,” Adelaide sighed, pushing her glasses up her nose. “The firm is heavily encrypted. It’s a ghost company. But the architectural blueprint of these shell corporations is highly specific. My father isn't smart enough to build this.”

“So someone built it for him,” Mateo stated.

“Yes. And whoever it is, they have intimate knowledge of the Moretti syndicate’s money laundering protocols,” Adelaide said, turning to face him. “The ghost company uses the exact same randomized algorithm your accountants use to clean cash from the casinos.”

Mateo’s jaw tightened. The implication was heavy and dangerous.