Doina

In the mafia world, women don’t reign. I’m the exception of that rule. I didn’t choose this life. It chose me. I have a legacy to protect, a power to snatch, and no one will stop me. If an arranged marriage is what it’ll take to lead, then so be it. What I don’t count on is that my chosen husband happens to be a ghost from my past. Kyle Hunter. He was once my guard, my protector. Now, he’s after my kingdom. The road to the throne is paved with thorns, blood, and casualties. To win, I’ll risk it all. My heart included.

Bruised and abused, and victim to a loveless household, I shimmered with new life the moment he found me drowning my sorrows in a lake beneath the stars. A chance encounter. An unspoken connection. I was smitten. He was curious. But, as everyone knew, fate could be decidedly cruel. He called me Halley, like the comet. I called him Reed. And my best friend? Well… she called him Dad.

According to the FBI, I was considered a serial murderer after three kills. What do they call me after fifty-two? They call me the Silencer. One final bullet would have been all it took to stop me from taking another soul, and I would have been doing Meridian City a service by pulling that trigger. An angel crying for help stopped me, and that night, I took three lives for her. Then three turned into eight. Then eight turned into twenty. Twenty turned into twenty-one. Twenty-one turned into twenty-three.

Her dresses are too tight, her heels too tall. She laughs too loudly, eats without decorum, and mixes up most sayings in the book. Little do most know it’s just a sparkly disguise, there to hide one panic attack at a time. Nobody can crack Gianna’s facade...no one anyway, until he comes along. In the New York underworld, others know him as a hustler, a killer; his nature as cold as the heart of ice in his chest. Christian Allister has always followed the life plan he’d envisioned in his youth, beneath the harsh lights of a frigid, damp cell.

One minute you’re a struggling graphic designer in L.A. who's finally coming to terms with being single forever, and the next, you're flying to New York in a private jet to get engaged to your ex-boyfriend’s older brother. At least...that’s what everyone thinks. Forced to clean up his playboy image in order to protect his company, Beckham Sinclair, the city’s most eligible billionaire bachelor, wants me to be his fake fiancée and personal assistant. Now I'm spending every spare second with a man I thought I’d never see again.

When a copycat murderer prowls among the trees of Ponderosa Springs, our loyalty is tested. It had been foolish of us to believe our revenge would go unpunished. That the town wouldn't retaliate after what we did. With our lives hanging in the balance, Thatcher and I have no choice but to coexist. In the twilight of musty cabins and haunted library towers, my somber secrets are exposed, and his cravings are revealed. So the question is . . . What is love without obsession?

I never thought I'd step foot in Royal Manor again. But four years later, here I am...back to finish my senior year at Royal Hearts Academy. And forced to face Jace Covington. My first friend. First crush. First kiss. The one I left behind. Only - he isn't the same boy I gave my heart to. This new Jace is as cruel as he is gorgeous. And he's determined to make my life a living hell. Along with the rest of his glorified family and crew of tyrants. They expect me to worship the ground they walk on like everyone else, but I'd rather eat dirt.