Escaping the Pawn, Ensnaring the Don
"My father sold me to a sixty-year-old monster to clear his gambling debts. So, I made a desperate gamble of my own."
Seventeen-year-old Isabella Rossi has two choices: become the broken plaything of a sadistic mafia Capo, or do the unthinkable. She chooses the latter. Sneaking into a high-end speakeasy, she slips an aphrodisiac into the whiskey of the deadliest man in New York—Damien Falcone, the ruthless Underboss of the Falcone family.
Her plan was simple: steal his seed, secure his protection, and run.
But you don’t drug a predator and expect to walk away.
When Damien wakes up, he doesn’t kill her. Instead, he claims her.
"You intercepted a delivery meant for my enemy. Turns out, it was you. Now, you are my Collateral."
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Chapter 5
Isabella POV
The bitter, metallic taste of the tonic still coated my tongue when the heavy front door of the safe house clicked open. Damien stepped into the living area, the air around him instantly dropping in temperature. He stopped dead. His nostrils flared, catching the lingering, suffocating scent of Eleonora Falcone’s heavy floral perfume.
Then, his predatory amber eyes locked onto the empty glass vial resting on the polished mahogany table.
The silence that followed was lethal. His jaw clenched, a muscle ticking dangerously beneath his skin. He wasn't furious about the prevention of a child—he was enraged by the blatant disrespect. This safe house was his domain. I was his possession. His mother had bypassed his authority, implying he couldn't control what was his.
"Who was here?" Damien growled, his voice a low, vibrating threat that shook the floorboards.
I knew his explosive temper. If I didn't extinguish this fire now, it would consume me. Swallowing my terror, I closed the distance between us. I raised a trembling hand and placed it flat against the hard, tense muscle of his chest.
"Your mother's handmaiden," I whispered, forcing myself to hold his lethal gaze. I leaned in closer, letting my breath ghost over his jaw. "But I only obey the master of this house. You."
I pressed my lips to his in a desperate, calculated kiss. For a split second, he was rigid as stone. Then, with a dark, guttural sound, his large hands gripped my hips, lifting me effortlessly. He took me right there against the edge of the mahogany table, his movements harsh and demanding, a brutal reminder of exactly who owned me.
Later that night, the air in his study was thick with the scent of expensive cigars and aged whiskey. I was tasked with organizing the scattered files on the side table, but my eyes kept drifting to the heavy leather-bound ledger open on his massive desk. Columns of numbers. Money. Blood. If I could understand those numbers, I could understand the source of his power. I thought of my mother's lost business acumen, and a sharp pang of longing hit my chest.
"Fascinated by the math, *gattina*?"
Damien's voice broke my focus. Before I could step back, he caught my wrist and pulled me down onto his lap. His large hand rested heavily, possessively, on my waist. He gestured toward the corner of the room where my newly acquired Fifth Avenue boxes and jewel cases sat, then tapped the tip of his fountain pen against the open ledger.
"A choice," he murmured, his amber eyes narrowing as he searched my face for a trap. "All the finery a woman could ever desire, or the pen, and a lesson on what these numbers truly mean."
He was testing me. He needed to know if I was just a greedy girl dazzled by wealth, or a woman with dangerous ambitions. Ambition in his world would get me killed.
Remembering my secret plan, I didn't hesitate. I forced a soft, vacuous smile and reached up to trace the cold, brilliant ruby necklace at my throat. "The dresses," I said smoothly, leaning my head against his shoulder. "And the jewels."
His tense muscles relaxed slightly. A dark flicker of amusement returned to his eyes. He saw exactly what I wanted him to see: a shallow, materialistic pet, easily controlled by luxury. He didn't see the boat ticket back to Sicily I was already calculating in my head. He didn't know these jewels were my only hope of rescuing my friend Maria.
A heavy knock on the heavy oak door shattered the quiet.
"Boss," Leo 'The Bear' Gallo's gruff voice called out. "Luca Viti is here. He was sent to formally discuss the details of his upcoming arranged marriage."
The name hit me like a physical blow. *Luca.*
The color drained from my face. Luca was the kind boy from Little Italy, the one who used to share his bread with me when we were children. He represented a life of normalcy and decency I could never have again. Panic seized my throat. If Damien sensed any connection between us, if he saw Luca look at me with pity, Luca would be a dead man.
I scrambled to get off Damien's lap. "I... I should go to my room," I choked out, my heart hammering violently against my ribs.
Damien didn't let go. Instead, his arm tightened around my waist like a steel band, locking me flush against his chest. He felt my violent trembling. His amber eyes darkened, shifting from calculated control to pure, predatory jealousy. He leaned in, his breath hot and dangerous against my ear.
"You're not going anywhere."
He looked up at the doorway, a chilling, humorless smile curving his lips. "Send Viti in, Leo," Damien commanded, his grip on me bruising. "He's here to discuss his wedding. My girl will stay right here and offer her congratulations."
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7.2
Title- A Name Without A Past
Author- Abraham Tejiri Onojighofia
Genre: Psychological Suspense Romance / Crime Thriller
Tagline: Memory lies. Danger doesn't..
Larry awakens in an abandoned hospital with no name, no past, and no memories-except one. A woman's face. Her voice. Her presence. The single image floating in the hollow wreckage of his mind is so sharp, so undeniable, that he knows she matters. He doesn't know who he is, but he knows he must find her.
Moments after he escapes the hospital, someone tries to kill him.
Driven by instinct and the one memory he trusts, Larry follows the fragment of recognition until it leads him to Ella Morgan, a composed and fiercely intelligent homicide detective. But instead of relief, he's met with confusion. Ella has never seen him before. According to her, he is a stranger.
But danger arrives before either of them can walk away.
A sudden attack convinces Ella that Larry is not lying-someone wants him dead. And the attempt on his life mirrors the recent string of unsolved murders she is investigating. Against policy and against her better judgment, Ella takes him under temporary protection. Immediately, unsettling cracks begin to appear in her certainty.
Larry recognizes places connected to the case.
He reacts to threats with a trained instinct he can't explain.
And his fragmented flashbacks seem tied to secrets Ella wasn't supposed to uncover.
As they race to piece together his missing identity, a darker truth begins to emerge. Larry's amnesia is no accident. Evidence points to a covert operation, a covered-up crime, and powerful enemies determined to bury the truth permanently. His erased memory may hold the key to a conspiracy that reaches into the police force, the city's elite-and Ella's own past.
With each step closer to the truth, the connection between them deepens. Larry feels drawn to her with an unshakable certainty that defies logic, while Ella fights the pull of a man who may be the missing link to her most dangerous case yet.
But as Larry's memories begin to return, so does a chilling realization:
Ella wasn't just a face in his mind. She was the last person he tried to protect before everything went dark.
Now, the enemies hunting Larry have turned their sights on her.
In a deadly race against a faceless adversary, Larry and Ella must unravel the past he's forgotten before it destroys them both. Because the silence Larry woke up with isn't empty-it's hiding a witness, a secret, and a truth someone is willing to kill to keep buried.
And the closer the truth gets, the more dangerous remembering becomes.
7.1
He doesn't believe in love.
He believes in ownership.
Lucien Vale built his empire the same way he destroys his enemies-quietly, strategically, without mercy. To the world, he's the youngest billionaire in Europe. To those who cross him, he's something far darker.
They call him The Devil in a Suit.
When struggling art conservator Amara Rossi unknowingly restores a painting tied to one of Lucien's most dangerous secrets, she becomes collateral in a war she never saw coming. To protect her-and control the damage-Lucien does what he does best.
He claims her.
What begins as a contract meant to silence her turns into an obsession neither of them expected. Amara refuses to be owned. Lucien has never been denied.
But behind Lucien's cold precision is a man forged by betrayal, raised in violence, and taught that love is a weakness exploited by enemies. And behind Amara's defiance is a woman who has spent her life surviving powerful men.
Their chemistry is volatile. Their power dynamic intoxicating.
Their connection? Terrifyingly real.
Because the devil doesn't fall in love.
He possesses.
And when Lucien realizes he would burn empires for her, the question isn't whether he can keep Amara-
It's whether she can survive being claimed by him.
7.8
She once called him her husband.
Now, she calls him a devil.
After catching her husband in his ex's house one too many times, she walked away,pregnant, broken, and done.
Four years later, fate laughs when she runs into him again, more powerful, colder, and dangerously obsessed.
He wants her back, but not for love. For revenge. For reasons buried beneath his arrogance and her silence.
But as she fights the pull between hate and desire, she learns something terrifying
The devil she runs into might not be the same man she divorced.
He's darker, hungrier... and this time, he's not letting her go.
7.9
Ten minutes. That was how close I was to handing my fiancé the keys to a three-hundred-million-dollar empire built on my code.
But when I walked into the office, his mistress was sitting in my chair, spinning the pen I bought him for our anniversary.
Caleb didn't even look up. He told me the investors wanted stability, not a pregnant woman. He called our unborn child a "liability" and ordered security to escort me out of the building I paid for.
I went home to pack, only to find a burner phone hidden in the closet. The texts were brutal. He called me an "incubator." He said once the deal was signed, he’d take the baby and dump the "nerd."
When he caught me with the phone, he didn't apologize. He dragged me by my hair and threw me into the soundproof panic room to keep me quiet until the deal closed.
"Caleb, please! I'm bleeding!"
I pounded on the steel door until my hands were raw. But he just locked it and went to eat pizza with his mistress.
Alone in the dark, on the freezing concrete, I felt the life inside me slip away. He hadn't just stolen my company; he had killed my child.
He thought I was broken. He thought I was just "the help." But he forgot one thing: I built the security system he was trying to sell.
Three days later, I rolled my wheelchair into his victory press conference, flanked by his biggest rival.
"Do you trust your new code, Caleb?"
"Because I wrote the backdoor. And I just opened it."
8.1
On my wedding day, the wedding planner looked at me with pity in her eyes.
She told me the groom had called with a last-minute request. He wanted the name on the floral arch changed from "Elena" to "Sofia."
Five years of loyalty to Dante Romero, and I found out he was planning a "secret" ceremony with his mistress an hour before ours.
He claimed she was dying of cancer. He said it was her final wish to be a bride, and that as a good mafia wife, I should understand. He swore it was just charity.
But I had seen the texts where he called me "furniture."
I had watched him step over my body when I fell down the stairs at a club, just so he could leave with her.
And this morning, I watched Sofia walk into the hotel lobby wearing *my* custom French lace wedding dress, smirking as she clung to his arm.
Dante thinks I'm crying in the bridal suite.
He thinks I will sit in the front row of his "fake" wedding and wait for my turn like a dutiful puppet.
He is wrong.
I wiped my tears and picked up my phone. I didn't cancel the wedding date. I just changed the location to the ballroom next door.
And I changed the groom.
As Dante says his vows to his mistress, I am walking down the aisle to meet the only man the Romero family fears.
The Reaper.
9.5
On her second wedding anniversary, Andrea Reed discovers the ultimate betrayal.
Her husband wants a divorce. Her stepsister is his mistress.And the family empire she protected is nothing more than a prize they've been plotting to steal. Before she can fight back, Andrea is pushed off a cliff-pregnant, broken, and filled with regret.
But death isn't the end. She wakes up five years in the past. Her father is alive. Her inheritance is still in her hands. And the man who killed her is smiling like he's in love.
This time, Andrea won't be naive. She plays the perfect fiancée while secretly collecting evidence, turns traps into public humiliation. She lets her enemies destroy themselves from within.
And when a powerful, dangerously enigmatic billionaire-Samuel Kingswell-crosses her path again, Andrea realizes something even more terrifying than betrayal: In her first life, she chose the wrong man.
In this life, she will choose power and revenge, make them beg before they fall. Because this time, the woman they tried to kill is no longer a victim.
She is the hunter.