Chapter 233 Sweetheart

Chapter 233: Chapter 233 Sweetheart

Alessio closed his eyes briefly.

He couldn’t bear the thought of her suffering while he sat in a comfortable office, surrounded by people who were supposed to be helping him find her.

She was his little sister.

He remembered her tiny hands holding his fingers, her childish laughter and the way she used to follow him around whenever he came home. The memories were painfully clear, even after all those years.

He had promised himself that he would find her.

No matter how long it took!! No matter what he had to do...Yet, once again, he had nothing.

"Get me a drink," he ordered without looking at anyone.

One of his men immediately left the room.

Alessio dropped the useless file onto the desk and dragged a hand through his hair. His head was throbbing and he felt exhausted.

A few minutes later, his man returned with a bottle of whiskey and a glass.

Alessio took the bottle from him.

"Leave."

The men exchanged a brief glance before obeying.

Soon, he was alone in the office.

He poured himself a generous drink and swallowed some of it, barely noticing the burn in his throat.

Then he reached for another folder.

Perhaps there was something he had missed. A name, a date, a connection that hadn’t seemed important at first. Anything that might give him another direction to follow.

He began going through the documents again, his expression growing darker with every page.

Nothing.

The same dead ends. The same unanswered questions.

He poured himself another drink.

His work phone vibrated on the desk but he ignored it for the moment. He had been using that phone all day, speaking to his men, receiving reports and making calls related to the investigation.

His personal phone, however, remained forgotten inside his jacket. And his personal phone rang too and he ignored that as well.

He hadn’t checked it once since leaving the mansion.

He didn’t know how many hours had passed since he had last looked at it. He didn’t know whether Rafael had called, whether Eva had sent him a message, or whether anyone at home was waiting for him.

And he certainly didn’t know that Daisy had already tried to contact him.

His attention was entirely consumed by the investigation.

He set the glass down harder than necessary.

"I’ll find you," he muttered, staring at an old photograph of his sister with a deeply affectionate expression.

"Just hold on a little longer, okay?"

His expression hardened again. He picked up his work phone and called his investigator.

"Go through everything again. Every name, every location, every person who was connected to her disappearance. I don’t care if you’ve already checked it ten times. Check it again."

"Yes, sir."

"And find me something useful this time."

He ended the call and leaned back in his chair, rubbing his tired eyes.

It was well past midnight when Alessio finally leaned back in his chair, feeling the effects of the whiskey he had been drinking.

His head felt heavy, and his patience had worn dangerously thin.

He reached for his jacket, intending to retrieve his cigarettes, when his fingers brushed against his personal phone.

He paused.

Oh.

His personal phone.

He had completely forgotten about it.

Alessio pulled it out of his pocket and pressed the screen.

The moment it lit up, his eyebrows rose. "...What the hell?"

Missed calls.

So many missed calls.

He stared at the screen, scrolling through the notifications with a growing frown.

Thirty-one missed calls from Rafael.

Several more from Mateo.

A few messages from both of them.

Where the hell are you?

Are you coming home tonight?

Broo!!! Answer your damn phone.

He exhaled through his nose.

Those two idiots had apparently decided to bombard him with calls.

He was about to lock the screen when something caught his attention.

His thumb stopped moving.

Daisy.

There were missed calls from Daisy.

For a moment, Alessio simply stared at her name. Then he quickly opened their conversation.

She had sent him messages, too.

Are you okay?

Please let me know when you’re free.

Alessio’s expression changed immediately.

His heart gave an unexpected, hard thump against his chest.

Daisy had called him?

She had actually taken the initiative to call him?

He read her messages again, as though checking that he hadn’t imagined them.

A strange, excited feeling spread through his chest.

She was worried about him.

Daisy had been thinking about him enough to reach for her phone and ask whether he was okay...And he had ignored her.

Alessio sat upright so abruptly that the chair scraped against the floor.

"Damn it!"

He immediately pressed her contact.

The call began ringing.

He held the phone to his ear, his fingers tightening around it as he waited.

Come on.

Pick up.

Please pick up.

He couldn’t believe he had been so careless. He had spent the entire day buried in his investigation, drinking, losing his temper and ignoring everything outside that office.

He hadn’t even considered checking his personal phone and Daisy had been trying to reach him.

His heart skipped another beat as he imagined her sitting at the mansion, looking at her phone and wondering why he wasn’t answering.

Had she been worried?

Had she thought something had happened to him?

The thought made him feel guilty.

He had told her he might be away for work but he hadn’t promised to keep her updated. She had no reason to wait for him.

Yet she had called anyway.

"Daisy," he muttered impatiently when the call continued ringing. "Come on, sweetheart. Answer the phone."

He blurted out the endearment he called in mind before he could think about it.

He froze for half a second.

Then he shook his head and focused on the call again.

He needed to speak to her. He needed to let her know he was fine.

And, although he wasn’t prepared to admit it even to himself, he wanted to hear silence in her presence.

He wanted to know why she had called.

He wanted to know whether she had been worried about him.

Meanwhile, the thirty-one missed calls from Rafael and the numerous calls from Mateo remained forgotten on his screen.

His brothers could wait.

Daisy couldn’t.

At least, that was what his increasingly muddled mind had decided.