Betrothed To The Mafia Lord novel Chapter 23

Sofia’s POV

“It’s alright, I guess.” I replied to her before turning back to Ryan who had an unreadable expression on his face. He always had this same expression on his face so there was no way someone would be able to figure out what he was thinking or how he was feeling by just glancing at his face.

“Um, how about tomorrow? It would be really nice if the both of you could have dinner here, so when you leave here at almost midnight, you wouldn’t have to get dinner again.” I proposed to him and watched as he leaned against the kitchen’s door before replying.

“I am afraid that won’t be possible, ma’am. Mr Ricci wouldn’t be cool with it.”

“Why not? There’s no harm there, is there?”

I demanded, flabbergasted by the amount of unspoken rules that were in the mafia.

“I don’t know, ma’am. It’s kind of a disrespectful act from us to you if we eat together.” Ryan explained and I gaped at him unbelievably for a few seconds.

“Are you kidding me?” I demanded before turning around to glance at Matilda to confirm if she had heard what I had heard. She didn’t seem unfazed one bit, she only shrugged like it was a normal thing everyone was suddenly supposed to know.

“That’s the truth, ma’am.” He echoed once again and I puffed out a deep breath. Which made me start to reminisce back to my life growing up how the guards had never sat with us to eat at the table.

But I had never been fond of any of them so it has never really occurred to me why they never ever sat with us.

But this was totally different.

“I’ll speak to Luca about it, don’t worry about it.” I finally ended up saying as my teeth worked my lower lip around and my fingers fiddled with themselves inside the warmth of the jacket.

I didn’t know how I was actually going to speak to Luca about it, since he had after all only been returning home from work late in the night when I’d have been fast asleep.

I was going to find a way though.

Ryan finally left for where he said he was going to and I exchanged a few words with Matilda until the food was ready.

“Where’s Sarah?” I asked her once she started dishing the food and setting up the table.

“Oh, she’d be down soon. In a few minutes, probably. She went to take a nap.” Matilda explained and I nodded my head slowly in understanding as a quiet ‘oh’ escaped my parted lips.

“You know she isn’t all that strong anymore, like the way she used to be… long before you came here.” Matilda continued and I watched her glide effortlessly across the kitchen, into the dining room and back to the kitchen once again.

“How long have you worked here?” I asked her as I stood up from my seat, tired of watching her working and making me feel idle as ever.

She smiled knowingly at me and picked the bottles of water before I could reach for them and made her way past me, straight into the dining room. I pouted at her when she came back into the room and she grinned while shaking her head.

“You’re injured, and shouldn’t stress yourself one bit. Just stay here, the table would be completely set up in a few minutes and we’d all have dinner together.

I sighed and sank back into my seat, grateful that she had insisted I don’t do a thing. I was starting to feel weaker than I expected I’d ever get just from a sprained arm.

Who knew a sprained arm could weaken someone’s whole system?

“So when did you start working here?” I asked again, needing something to talk about so I don’t sink into my lonely thoughts swirling around in my mind.

“I started working here five years ago.” She replied and I waited patiently before she continued. “When I started working here, Sarah guided me so much because it was all new to me back then. She was also really healthy back then, compared to now.”

I wanted to ask about Sarah’s health and if what was wrong with her was really severe, and if she was going to be alright but I swallowed the worry and words that was on the tip of my tongue. I had a feeling that despite how loud Matilda was and how she loved talking, she wasn’t going to want to talk to me about whatever it was that was wrong with Sarah.

I was going to have to end up asking her myself.

I made my way to the dining room with Matilda leaving the way once she done settling the table and sank into one of the seats. Matilda excused herself to go get Sarah and I nodded my head and waited on them. It took longer than I expected for them to emerge back to the dining room and I stared pointedly at Sarah as secretive as I could without being too obvious while trying to see if there was a way I could figure out what was wrong with her health by just staring at her.

Unfortunately for me, it only looked like she still looked a little bit sleepy as sank into the seat opposite mine. She smiled at me once she noticed my face and shielded her mouth with the back of her hand as she coughed into it before putting her hand away and staring back at me.

“Is something the matter, Sarah.” I inquired, feeling genuinely concerned as I took in her facial expression and tried to figure out if there was anything off about how she looked at the moment.

But she looked pretty much the same… except for the sleep still lingering in her somewhat dim eyes.