A Ruthless kind of love
Elena Marlowe is a quiet and gentle woman who never looked for trouble. But everything changes the night she meets Damien De Luca, a powerful Mafia boss known for being cold, arrogant, and ruthless.
From the beginning, Damien wants her-and he always gets what he wants. At first, Elena is afraid of him, but as time passes, she sees another side of the man everyone fears. With her, Damien becomes softer, more human. And for the first time, he learns what it means to love.
Their love is strong, but danger follows them everywhere. Friends turn into traitors, and even family members plot against them. Surrounded by lies and betrayal, Elena and Damien must fight for each other and for the life they dream of.
This is a story of love and danger, of passion and betrayal-where even in the darkest world, love can change everything.
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Chapter 3
She was exiting the gallery when it started raining, but only just. By the time she hit the curb, it was raining in hard, cold sheets. Her thin jacket was clinging to her legs, heels scraping on wet asphalt.
She swore under her breath, attempting to hail a taxi, but every yellow stripe flew by without even the slightest hint of their gaze. The city had taken in all its passengers and stranded her alone, the ink on her notebook already beginning to smudge from careless drips.
It is when the car stopped.
Black, sleek car, tinted windows, engine humming like a wild animal in a cage waiting to be set free. The door had swung open on the inside.
Her breath was trapped.
Damien.
He leaned back against one arm over the leather, wet black hair from rain, the shirt collar still unbuttoned as if he didn't have rules to obey. The streetlamp on the corner cut a diagonal line across his jaw, harsh and merciless.
"Get in," he said.
Elena hesitated, heart hammering against her ribs. "No."
One brow arched slowly. "You'll catch pneumonia out here."
"I'll manage."
His eyes rode her, lingered a moment too long on the crease of her damp blouse, how it clung to her form. Heat swept through her in spite of the chill.
"Elena." His voice dropped, authoritative, almost menacing in its deference. "Get in the car."
His saying it was doing something that it shouldn't. It was the first time he'd ever said it, and it had escaped. possessive.
She swallowed hard against the pull. She had to turn back and go. She should-
Her body did not oblige. Legs getting in front of brain's permission, she got in.
The door slammed shut behind her with a bang, her destiny sealed.
Heat was immediate, the scent of leather and something darker enveloping her. She wriggled, her notebook pressed to her lap as if that would rescue her.
Damien didn't speak at first. He studied her with unnerving patience, his eyes trailing over every inch of her face. She could feel her pulse in her throat, in her wrists, in places she didn't want to admit.
Finally, he said, "You're trembling."
"It's cold," she panted.
"No," he said gently. "That's not it."
Her lips parted in denial, but she could not say it. For he was right.
The silence once more was pulled taut with tension.
And then, with a sudden movement, he put out his hand and brushed back a clenching damp lock of hair from her forehead. His fingers touched hers, a fraction of a second longer than they should.
Elena recoiled, not out of horror, but because the jolt that ran through her with contact against him caused her to blink.
"Don't," she breathed, her voice trembling.
"Don't what?" he growled, his gaze never wavering from hers, a flash of amusement playing at the corner of his mouth as if he already knew.
"Don't touch me."
"Liar."
A single word cut through her defenses, icy and ruthless. He leaned in, close enough she could sense the warmth of his body surround her, his breath mix with hers.
"You don't wince at my touch," Damien whispered. "You wince at the depth to which you crave it."
Her gasps came in and out too quickly, air scorching her lungs.
He was right. And knowing it terrified her more than anything.
"I don't even know you," she breathed.
"You know enough." His voice was final, as if that was all there was to it.
The driver's seat was empty-she hadn't even noticed until then. They were alone. Just the two of them, with rain slamming against the roof like a beat.
Damien's fingers stroked the curve of her jaw again, fingertips along the line of her chin, pushing her face up to meet his. His eyes blazed across hers, hot, as though daring her to let him go.
Every instinct screamed at her to shift. To get this over with. To fight.
But Elena's body again betrayed her, relaxing into touch a little.
That was all he needed.
His lips brushed hers-a breath, a ghostly touch that wove her out of existence. He wasn't kissing her with abandon, not yet. He teased her, faltered, retreated just close enough that she chased what she said she didn't desire.
Her fists were curled in her notebook, knuckles pressed tight with tension, the only thing that kept her anchored to the world as it existed.
"Why are you doing this?" She growled, her voice strained.
"Because I am powerless," Damien admitted, the first crack of vulnerability softening his otherwise cold tone. "And because you don't want me to."
Her heart thudded against her ribs.
The kiss deepened-slow, commanding, dangerous. His lips claimed hers, his hand sliding to the back of her neck, his fingers closing. She cherished the tartness of wine biting on his lips, the power in the way he dominated the second.
And God forgive her soul, she kissed him in return.
The flame increased to something hotter, hotter, devouring fear and reason. For blundering seconds, there were just the two of them-his taste, his scent, his hunger against each shivering defense she'd built.
When he finally let her go, she was panting, stunned.
Damien looked at her, eyes black with things unspoken. And then, gently, with some menace, he whispered:
"This is only the beginning."
The engine of the car roared to life. Elena was instantly awake, realizing she had not even inquired where he was going.
She was sure of only one thing-that she was now in Damien's world.
And she could never go back.
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8.2
The prophecy didn't save me, it claimed me.
Death was not her ending...... it was her rebirth.
Awakened into a world of gods, bloodlines, and ancient curses, she learns that her second life is bound to a prophecy written long before she existed. Marked by divine blood and hunted by fate, she becomes the one Olympus never wanted to rise again.
As secrets unfold and forbidden bonds form, she must decide whether to obey the destiny forced upon her or defy the gods who control her future. But prophecies always demand a price, and some rebirths are meant to destroy the world that created them.
Because being reborn under a cursed prophecy means there is no escape, only fate.
7.4
My husband, a powerful tech mogul, stole my sister' s posthumous research award. He gave it to his young protégé. The same woman who killed my sister.
He didn't just steal her legacy. He threatened to destroy my lab and my life's work-the cure for the very cancer that took our family-if I didn't publicly endorse his mistress.
When I confronted him, he let her destroy my irreplaceable samples. Then, he had my hands, the hands of a neuroscientist, systematically broken to ensure I could never work again.
He imprisoned me, forcing me to sign away my entire career and publicly apologize for crimes I didn't commit.
He called it "discipline," a lesson I needed to learn. How could the man who swore to protect me become my personal tormentor?
But as I lay in a hospital bed, broken and alone, a text message lit up my screen: "Need help? I owe your family a debt." He thought he had erased me. He had only forged me into a weapon.
9.7
Existing in a depressed life without a glimpse of hope, Alice lived with her uncle, who mistreated her badly.
She finally found her mate whom she had sought for and wished to have.
Her mate rejected her after she caught him cheating.
She ran away but found out that she was pregnant. She moved on with her life and planned to raise her kids alone.
On a momentous day, a sinister plot by jealous forces threatens; her children; they were kidnapped by unknown people.
Alice was unable to find her kids after all efforts. In a while she discovered that it was her powerful rival, the Villain that orchestrated the kidnap.
She got back to her mate, Andrew, to help her find her kids.
What was his reaction to his secret babies Alice has hidden from him, can Andrew and Alice put their differences aside to rescue them?
9.6
"I don't want you. I hate you."
Those words from her only son slice deeper than any blade.
Sarah returns from the hospital expecting love, only to find her place at the family table stolen.
Her husband, James, stands arm in arm with Tiana - his late brother's widow, while her son clings to the other woman's waist, rejecting his own mother.
The betrayal does not end there.
After a confrontation with Tiana, she woke up in an abandoned building, her hands tied, and mouth taped.
Beside her was Tiana too. Tied. James stood, his confused gaze darting from Tiana to Sarah.
And then came the baritone voice from one of the kidnappers: "One life. One choice. You can only save one. Choose!"
Sarah turned, seeing how Tiana was communicating with the kidnappers with her eyes.
She struggled to let James see the truth; that this was all a setup. But she couldn't. Her mouth was tapped.
But then, like a match striking steel, James' voice came brittle and final. "Tiana."
He chose his ex over his own wife. Over the mother of his child.
Sarah was abandoned in the warehouse. Immediately they left, the warehouse exploded, covered in flames.
And Sarah's screams and cries inside, filled the night.
Did Sarah survive the fire outbreak?
If she did, can they stand her revenge when she finally returns?
8.0
For six years, I played the perfect, submissive wife to Wall Street titan Francis Castro. I suffocated my own ambitions to fit into his conservative world.
But while I waited alone at a Michelin restaurant, a news alert popped up. My husband had just dropped millions on an aquamarine diamond necklace for his "muse," Chanelle.
The real nightmare began when I rushed home to find our five-year-old son in severe anaphylactic shock. I frantically called Francis from the ambulance, but he manually rejected my calls. He couldn't leave the bidding war for Chanelle's PR launch.
When he finally arrived at the ER, Chanelle was right beside him, wearing that blinding multi-million-dollar necklace. He didn't ask about our dying son.
"Why weren't you watching him?" he demanded, his voice hard and accusing.
And when my son woke up, hazy from the drugs, he rejected my touch and reached for Chanelle instead. Francis just stood there, praising Chanelle for knowing exactly how to calm him down.
I stared at the three of them looking like a perfect, happy family. Six years of swallowing my pride, only to realize my husband would let our son choke to death just to buy another woman's smile.
The last thread of my heart snapped. I handed him the divorce papers, demanding zero alimony. Then, I drove to a hidden Brooklyn loft, cut off my hair, and unlocked my safe.
It was time to resurrect my true identity—the legendary fashion designer, Ember.J. I am going to burn her empire to the ground.
8.9
I lay on a mildewed mattress in a run-down motel, my body trembling from withdrawal. Once the most feared "Gossip Queen" in Hollywood, I was now a forty-three-year-old ghost staring at a cracked mirror, waiting for the end.
The door clicked open, and Brittany Potts stepped in, looking immaculate in a beige trench coat that cost more than my life. She didn't come to help; she tossed a waiver of marital assets onto my bed and handed me a cup of coffee laced with something that smelled like bitter almonds.
She laughed, telling me my husband, Bennet, was already in the Bahamas celebrating my death. I froze when I saw the sapphire pendant around her neck—my mother’s necklace, which had vanished the day she died. As the poison began to burn through my chest, Brittany leaned in and whispered her final secret: she was the one who cut the brake lines on the car that killed my father when we were teenagers.
My entire life had been a lie. The pills, the scandal, the bankruptcy—it was all a masterpiece of betrayal orchestrated by the two people I trusted most. I died on that filthy floor, suffocating on my own rage and the taste of chemicals, praying for a single chance to make them pay.
But when I opened my eyes, the pain was gone. I was sitting in my old bedroom, the morning sun shining on a calendar that read September 15, 2024. My mother’s voice, warm and alive, called me for breakfast from downstairs. I was eighteen again, back in my senior year at Crestview Academy, and the monsters who destroyed me were still pretending to be my friends. This time, I’m the one who holds the shears.