Tempted By My Father's Best Friend
Running from her father's rejection, Isabella arrives in London determined to start over, only to walk straight into temptation and danger. Her obsessive ex is waiting at the airport. And the stranger from her one reckless, unforgettable night in New York is now her new billionaire boss.
*************
"Hello, Isabella." Mateo Rossi's voice is low, smooth, and dangerously familiar, sending heat curling through her before she can stop it.
She freezes. He leans back, eyes dark and unreadable, lingering on her just a little too long.
"I never knew Nathan had a daughter like you," he says softly. "All grown up." Relief floods her.
He doesn't recognize her. Not the girl from that night. Not the one who lost control in his arms. Or he does, and he is choosing to pretend. Because Mateo watches her like she belongs to him. He tests her, corners her, pushes her past every limit she thought she had. Doors close.
Tempers snap. Boundaries blur. And Isabella realizes something far more dangerous than her past catching up to her. London was never her escape. It is his world. And this time, Mateo Rossi has no intention of letting her walk away.
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Chapter 7
**MATEO'S POV**
Isabella.
That girl has no idea what she does to me.
Since that night in the Velvet Room, she’s lived rent-free in my head. Every curve, every gasp, every time she looked up at me like I was the only thing that existed. When I learned she was Nathan’s daughter, it felt like fate handed me the perfect excuse to pull her close. To keep her. To make sure no one else ever touched what was already mine.
I went to her apartment that day telling myself it was just concern—she looked wrecked at work, pale and unsteady. But the second I saw her in that towel, hair dripping, skin flushed… all restraint vanished. I told myself she was too drunk that first night to remember me. That’s why she never brought it up. That’s why I never pushed. I wanted her to come to me on her own. Wanted her to crave it the way I did.
Dang it. I shouldn’t have gone.
Shouldn’t have looked at her body.
Shouldn’t have touched her.
Her soft, wet heat under my tongue. Her lips parting on a moan. Those wide eyes locked on mine while she came apart.
I was asking too much and I knew it. Seem I always had Oliver's Twist after all.
I’ve barely slept since. Every night I watch the feeds—her office camera, the hallway ones, even the building entrance. I sit in this chair and stare like a goddamn addict. Today was worse. Seeing her talk to one of the junior analysts, laughing at something he said… it clawed at me. I don’t even know the guy’s name. Doesn’t matter. No one gets to make her smile like that except me.
Then she left her office. Walked down the hall for water. My dispenser on her floor had been empty for days—I’d meant to have it fixed. She stopped at the main one. Filled her cup. Drank. Filled it again.
That’s when he appeared behind her.
Ethan.
His hand landed on her ass like he had the right.
Rage hit me so fast my vision tunneled. That perfect curve belonged to me. Only me.
I watched her flinch. Watched her try to step away. Watched him crowd her against the wall, whispering something that made her face drain of color. She looked terrified. Small. Like she knew exactly what he was capable of.
I slammed my palm on the desk.
“I’ll fucking kill him.”
I grabbed my phone. Dialed her extension. It rang out. Dialed again.
Finally she answered, voice small. “Hello, Mr…?”
“Get to my office. Now.”
I kept the feed open while she hurried down the hall. Derrick watched her go, that smug tilt to his mouth. I zoomed in. Couldn’t read his expression clearly, but I didn’t need to. I knew men like him.
A knock. I barked for her to enter.
Aisha stepped in first. “Sir, you have the board meeting in an hour, and—”
“I know. I’ll handle it.” I waved her out.
She gave a quick bow and a professional smile, then paused at the door. Isabella was approaching. They exchanged a few quiet words—Aisha said something that made Isabella laugh. A real laugh. Soft. Bright. The sound hit me like sunlight after weeks of dark.
Then she was inside.
She stood in front of my desk, eyes glued to the floor. Hands trembling at her sides. That cheap dress clung where the water had soaked through. Shoes scuffed. Hair falling out of its tie. She looked fragile. Exhausted. Nothing like the woman who’d begged under me days ago.
It hurt to see her like this.
“What happened to your dress?” I asked, keeping my voice flat.
She hesitated. Eyes darted everywhere but my face.
“I… I went to get water. Almost tripped on the way back. It spilled.”
Bullshit.
“You almost tripped.”
She swallowed hard.
“I’m talking to you, Angioletto.”
The nickname slipped out sharper than I meant. She flinched.
“There was no water in my office dispenser,” she tried again. “I got thirsty. Tripped coming back.”
Still lying. Still refusing to meet my eyes. What was she hiding?
I leaned forward. “Look at me.”
She did—finally. Those big eyes glassy, scared. Like she thought I was about to fire her. I feel like she always assumed the worse.
“I’m sorry, Sir. It won’t happen again.”
She sat when I nodded toward the chair. Good girl. Always so quick to obey.
I studied her. The way she held herself together even when she was falling apart. The night in New York she hadn’t taken a single bill from the nightstand, even when hundreds were scattered like trash. She could’ve grabbed my watch. My black card. Anything. She didn’t. That kind of honesty is rare. It makes me want to wrap her up and never let the world touch her again.
“I have a headache,” I said.
She stood immediately. Uncertain.
“Aren’t you going to check?”
She nodded. Rushed around the desk. Stood between my knees. Her small hands settled on my head—gentle, careful. She drew me closer until my forehead rested against her stomach. Fingers threaded through my hair, massaging slow circles over my scalp.
Christ.
I closed my eyes. Let myself feel it. Her warmth. Her scent—clean soap and faint vanilla. My cock twitched. I ignored it. Focused on the soft pressure of her fingertips. On the way she didn’t pull away.
Her phone buzzed on the chair across the room.
She didn’t move.
“You going to get that?”
She smiled faintly. Stepped back. Picked it up. The screen lit her face for a second before she angled it away—but not fast enough.
Ethan.
The name burned into my brain.
She ended the call without answering. Walked back. Hesitated.
“I should get something for your headache, Sir.”
I rolled my eyes. Stood. Pointed near the mini fridge in the corner.
“Stay here the rest of the day. Drinks are in there. My head’s fine.”
She looked like she might argue—then thought better of it. Walked slowly back to the chair. Sat.
“Yes, Sir,” she whispered.
The saddest sound I’d ever heard from her.
I straightened my tie. Grabbed my tablet. I should attend my Meeting first. Then I deal with Ethan.
And after that… I deal with her.
No more hiding. No more pretending she doesn’t remember.
She’s mine.
She just doesn’t know it yet.
And the message? I knew she remembered me .
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9.6
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7.5
I didn't fall for him.
I crashed.
Liam Cage wasn't supposed to matter. He was just the arrogant stranger with a dangerous smile and eyes that undressed me in a single glance. Just a man passing through my life.
Until our parents got married.
Now he's everywhere, in the kitchen at midnight, leaning against doorframes like he owns the air I breathe. In the hallway, too close. Always too close. Every look between us feels like a secret. Every argument feels like foreplay. Every silence feels loaded.
We don't talk about it.
We don't have to.
Because the truth is there in the way my pulse stutters when he says my name. In the way he watches me like he's trying to decide whether to ruin me - or save me.
He's wrong.
For me.
For my family.
For my sanity.
But when he touches me, the world narrows down to skin and heat and the terrifying realization that some mistakes don't feel like mistakes at all.
They feel inevitable.
This story is about craving what you shouldn't, crossing lines you swore you wouldn't, and discovering that sometimes the most dangerous love is the one that feels the most real.
8.8
My little boy died on the operating table during a minor, routine surgery.
That exact same night, my billionaire husband bought out the Hudson River for a massive, million-dollar fireworks show.
It wasn't to mourn our child. It was to celebrate his first love's son being discharged from the hospital.
When I confronted him with our son's death certificate, he sneered and accused me of hiding the boy to get his attention.
He held his mistress in our home, watched her fake a panic attack, and threatened to bankrupt my family if I didn't get on my knees and apologize to her.
But the most horrifying truth came from a terrified hospital nurse.
My son's anesthesia was deliberately kept low during the procedure to keep his tissue viable to save the mistress's child.
He was awake and in agonizing pain while his own father planned a grand celebration for another man's son.
I couldn't understand how a father could be so completely heartless.
How could he sacrifice his own flesh and blood just to please a woman who constantly manipulated him?
Looking at the ashes on my son's favorite toy, my paralyzing grief evaporated, replaced by a cold, unyielding rage.
I arranged my little boy's funeral alone in the freezing rain, left my wedding ring on the counter, and walked straight into the private hotel suite of my husband's most ruthless business rival.
"Let's take him down," I said.
8.7
I finally stepped onto American soil after four years of exile, clutching my suitcase with white-knuckled desperation. My plan was simple: get to Manhattan, start my job, and stay as far away from the Newton family as possible.
But the moment I turned on my phone, Sterling Newton’s voice cut through the air like a blade. He had already sent a car; he didn't care about my plans, my apartment, or my freedom. He wanted me back in that suffocating mansion, and he expected me to obey.
When I arrived, the house felt like a mausoleum. My adoptive mother smothered me in a desperate, suffocating embrace, while my father and sister acted as if my departure had never happened. Then, the heavy front door thudded shut. Barron Newton had arrived.
He didn't greet me with warmth; he looked at me like a piece of furniture that had been moved out of place. He spent the entire dinner dismantling my resolve, using my deepest guilt as a weapon to force me to stay, making it clear that I was merely a prisoner in his gilded cage.
I felt like I was suffocating. How could he have so much power over my life? Why was he so determined to keep me trapped in this house, and what was he truly waiting for in the shadows of the night?
I retreated to my room, feeling the invisible chains tightening around my throat. Just as I thought I had found a way to fight back, a message from Fernando flashed on my screen, warning me that our original plan was in ruins. I realized then that I wasn't just fighting the Newtons—I was fighting a war on two fronts, and the countdown to my destruction had already begun.
7.7
I spent two years trying to please Xander Yates, thinking he was the man who would help me save my family’s struggling manufacturing business. As a former senior legal counsel, I thought I knew how to handle sharks, but I never expected the man I loved to be the one who would try to skin me alive.
Everything shattered at a high-end gala when I felt a chemical fire start in my marrow. Xander had spiked my drink, chasing me through the hotel corridors with a predatory smile, ready to take by force what I wouldn't give him willingly.
I barely escaped into an elevator, stealing a key card from a man in a sharp grey suit and collapsing in room 8086. That stranger turned out to be Crockett Blackburn, the "Ice King of Wall Street" and a man my family had spent years avoiding. He didn't save me out of the goodness of his heart; he saved me because he saw a "messy variable" he could turn into a weapon. By morning, Xander was blackmailing me with a video of me drugged, and Crockett was offering me a deal that felt like a deal with the devil. He would save my factory, but only if I gave him 51% controlling interest and became his personal legal counsel.
The humiliation was total. Xander called me a junkie and a slut, while Crockett looked at the bruises on my neck with the cold, clinical assessment of a man checking a damaged piece of equipment. When a secret bid was leaked, Crockett didn't hesitate to pin the blame on me, accusing me of working with my ex to drive up the price.
I was a pawn in a game between two monsters, one who wanted to destroy my body and another who wanted to own my soul and my family’s legacy. I had lost my apartment, my reputation, and my safety in less than twenty-four hours.
"I don't like it when people break my things," Crockett told me as he applied ointment to the marks Xander left on my throat.
I realized then that if I wanted to survive, I had to stop being the victim and start being the predator. I signed the contract, moved into Blackburn’s penthouse, and prepared for a scorched-earth war against the Yates family. I don't care if Crockett Blackburn is using me as a leash—as long as he lets me be the one to bite.