The Phantom Heiress: The Underboss's Obsession
I was 'Nine', the deadliest assassin of The Syndicate. But yesterday, my boss faked my death in an explosion and sent me to New York.
I was ordered to infiltrate the Russo family as their long-lost biological daughter.
But my biological parents didn't want me. They loved the fake daughter they had raised in my place.
My mother called me a feral stray and tried to shove me into a mildewed servant's quarter, while the fake daughter lived in a grand suite.
When the fake daughter cried upon seeing me, my father pointed a finger at my face, yelling at me for disrespecting his precious replacement.
"You are nothing but a crude, uncultured mistake trying to ruin her life!"
They treated me like garbage, trying to assert dominance over a girl they thought was a helpless stray.
But when I cornered my mother and whispered my question, her reaction changed everything.
"If I hadn't been stolen all those years ago, would you have even needed a replacement?"
She didn't cry for the child she lost. Instead, all the color drained from her face, and her eyes widened in sheer, unadulterated terror.
She knew. Even if she hadn't orchestrated it herself, my mother knew exactly why I was kidnapped eighteen years ago.
They thought they could bully a pathetic orphan. They didn't realize they had just invited a monster into their home.
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Chapter 6
Damien POV
The air in the Syndicate’s Chapel on the Island smelled of melting beeswax, damp stone, and the lingering, metallic tang of death. It was an ancient place, built into the side of a cliff, where the waves of the Mediterranean crashed against the rocks below in a relentless, mourning rhythm.
I stood near the back, my bespoke charcoal suit a stark contrast to the tactical gear and silver masks of the Island’s assassins. I wasn't supposed to be here. The New York Mafia didn't mingle with the Syndicate’s "ghosts" unless blood or money was changing hands. But I needed to see it with my own eyes. I needed to see the end of the only person who had ever made me feel like I was the one being hunted.
On the altar rested a black, closed casket. Above it hung a grey, grainy photograph of a girl with eyes like a winter storm. 'Nine'.
Even in a static image, her defiance was palpable. She was the only assassin to ever survive my blade. Two years ago, in a rain-slicked alley in Rome, we had danced on the edge of a knife for twenty minutes. It had been a brutal, bloody stalemate that ended with both of us bleeding out in the gutter, staring at each other with a strange, twisted respect before our respective teams pulled us apart. I had hunted her shadow across three continents ever since, obsessed with the idea of a rematch.
Now, she was dead. A "mechanical failure" on a speedboat. What a pathetic, pedestrian end for an apex predator.
'Two', a massive brute of a man with a neck thicker than my thigh, stood by the casket. His fists were clenched so tightly his knuckles were white, his breath coming in ragged, unhinged hitches. He looked ready to murder the priest, the Butler, and anyone else who dared to speak of Nine in the past tense.
I walked down the center aisle, my leather soles echoing on the stone. The Syndicate soldiers tensed, their hands dropping to their holsters in a synchronized wave of hostility, but no one drew. They knew the Falcone name. They knew the cost of killing a guest. I stopped beside 'Two'.
"Watch your back, Falcone," 'Two' snarled, his voice a low, gravelly rumble that vibrated in the small chapel. "This isn't your territory. You have no business at her wake."
I didn't look at him. My eyes were fixed on the girl in the photo. A strange, twisted void opened in my chest—a sensation I hadn't felt in years. The game was over, and I hadn't been the one to claim the prize. I felt cheated.
"I came to pay my respects to a worthy opponent," I murmured dismissively, my voice carrying a quiet authority that made 'Two' stiffen. "Something you wouldn't understand. You were always just a hammer, 'Two'. She was the scalpel."
I reached out, my fingers tracing the cold edge of the wooden frame holding her picture. "What a waste of a beautiful monster. To be taken by a faulty engine instead of a blade... it’s an insult to her legacy."
I turned my back on the room full of killers and walked out into the freezing sea air. The sun was setting over the Mediterranean, casting long, bloody shadows across the docks. The chapter was supposed to be closed. The obsession was supposed to die with her.
But as I boarded my private jet for the flight back to New York, a nagging sensation clawed at the back of my mind. Silas was a man who didn't believe in accidents. He believed in utility. And a dead 'Nine' had no utility.
"Leo," I said to my Capo as the engines roared to life.
"Yes, Boss?"
"When we land, I want a full sweep of every new arrival in the Five Families over the last forty-eight hours. I don't care if it's a cousin from Sicily or a long-lost aunt from Vegas. If someone moved into the city, I want their biometric data."
"You think she's alive?" Leo asked, his brow furrowing.
"I think the Syndicate is a house of mirrors," I replied, staring out at the darkening horizon. "And I think I’m not done dancing with that girl just yet."
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9.2
For a thousand years, the city of Crescent Falls has survived beneath the shadow of an ancient savior. Each century, a man is chosen as an offering to Sariyah-the being said to have once driven demons from the world. When Bastion, the man Ember loves, is taken after daring to refuse her, Ember's grief turns into defiance, and she vows to bring him home no matter the cost.
Her search forces her into an uneasy alliance with Orion St. James, a dangerously charming immortal with a violent past and secrets tied to Sariyah herself. Bound together by a magic neither of them wants nor understands, Ember and Orion are drawn into a hidden war beneath the city-one involving cultists, monsters, and an ancient order known as the Watchers.
As Crescent Falls begins to fracture, Ember experiences unsettling visions that hint her bloodline is far more entangled with Sariyah than anyone ever suspected. Strange new powers awaken within her, blurring the line between protector and destroyer, while enemies gather and old loyalties are tested.
With the city on the brink of collapse and unseen forces moving in the shadows, Ember must decide how far she is willing to go to save Bastion-and whether becoming something darker is the only way to stop an evil that has ruled unchallenged for centuries.
Because some thrones are not inherited.
They are taken.
9.0
He drew her before he ever met her.
She dreams of him every night... without knowing who he is.
Nora is a brilliant editor in a prestigious journalism company - confident, successful... and completely unaware of her past. But night after night, she dreams of a mysterious warrior prince in a realm that feels far too real. When Edward, the enigmatic new CEO of her branch, walks into her life, her world starts to unravel. He's the son of the company's owner, and though they've never met, he's been drawing her face for years.
As their connection deepens, strange events begin to blur the line between reality and fantasy. What neither of them knows is that their souls are bound - not just in this life, but in another.
In a parallel world, Leela is a fearless warrior and spy, sworn to protect her people. Jing, the prince of a war-torn kingdom, trusts her with his life... but must never love her. Their bond is dangerous. Forbidden. And yet, undeniable.
Two women. Two men.
Two worlds on the brink of war... and love that defies fate.
When destiny calls across dimensions, will they choose duty - or the one their soul remembers?
7.6
Warning: This book contains a large number of very hot adult scenes!
"Look at the state of you, my little she-wolf," his voice was low and full of menace, like sandpaper scraping across my nerves. "You got this wet just from that?"
Then he pressed a hard kiss to my knuckles.
Fuck!
His rough tongue slid across my slender finger bones, tasting the salty sweat and fear on my skin.
A violent tremor shot through my whole body.
A moan I couldn't suppress slipped from between my lips. "Ah. Sebastian."
I felt my thighs rubbing together on their own, that damn traitorous movement making my pussy clench so tight I nearly came.
Yes, that's it, you desperate little bitch.
I cursed myself in my mind.
He flipped my hand over, his thumb pressing hard-almost punishingly-into the sensitive skin on the inside of my wrist.
My pulse pounded there beneath his palm like it was going mad.
"This is beating so hard," he whispered, his breath hot against my skin, "is it beating for me, Seraphina? Tell me."
Then he took one of my fingers into his damn hot, wet mouth.
Oh God.
His rough tongue swirled, rubbed, scraped along the skin of my finger, warm saliva soaking every inch.
And his eyes never left me-fixing on me like a beast locking onto prey.
He sucked softly at first, then suddenly with force.
That rhythm.
Fuck, he was fucking my finger with his mouth.
"Are you using this to fuck my mouth, Seraphina?"
He let my finger go with a filthy pop, seeing straight through my thoughts.
"Imagine this is my cock. Does it feel good, you filthy little she-wolf?"
My back arched uncontrollably, like the lowest kind of whore silently inviting him.
A broken, shameful whimper escaped my throat.
"Good. so good."
My scent thickened, wild floral heat and lust filling the air, swallowing the last of my reason.
I could feel the terrifying restraint in his body cracking apart.
He wanted to hear me moan his name as I came.
He wanted to bury himself inside my soaked, empty heat until I could feel nothing except his violent thrusts.
He moved to my middle finger, giving it the same obscene, thorough attention.
His tongue circled wickedly at the base, then pushed deep, sucking hard as if tasting the sweetest honey.
Fuck!
My hips jerked upward without control.
My other hand dug into the carpet, knuckles white, vision dissolving in the storm of desire swallowing me whole.
"I need you. to fill my pussy, Sebastian."
--
I grew up as a human in a wolf pack, but ironically, I ended up becoming the mate of the pack's Alpha. I thought I would fit perfectly into the wolves' world-until the day I caught my Alpha mate tangled with another she-wolf in the back seat of a car.
With trembling hands, I tricked him into signing the divorce papers-silently swearing revenge. But they didn't stop. His mother sent thugs to destroy me. His mistress tried to erase me. Even my coworkers wanted to use me.
That night, I nearly lost my life.
Until Alpha Sebastian found me-cold, ruthless, unmatched. He said he didn't need a mate.
But he protected me like a mate. Touched me like a mate. Looked at me like a mate, as if I already belonged to him.
I tried to resist his approach. I didn't want to make the same mistake twice. Wolves would never accept a human mate.
But whenever he came near me, whenever those scorching hands reached for me, I always hungered for him-wanted more-yet I was done with promises.
Until I discovered that my past was not simple at all-and Sebastian had his own reasons for approaching me-
7.4
In a city where data is power and truth is a weapon, some secrets are worth killing for.
Mara Quinn is a ghost in the system, an underground journalist known only as Cipher, feared by corporations and hunted by those with everything to lose. When she breaches a classified network inside Axiom Industries, she uncovers something no one was meant to see: ORACLE, a predictive AI capable of shaping human behavior on a global scale.
She expects retaliation. She doesn't expect Kael Draven.
Cold, brilliant, and untouchable, Kael is the architect behind Axiom's empire, and a man who doesn't make threats he can't execute. Instead of silencing Mara, he offers her a choice: work under his watch, or disappear from existence entirely. Trapped inside his glass fortress known as The Spire, Mara is pulled deeper into a world of surveillance, manipulation, and power plays that stretch far beyond anything she imagined.
But ORACLE isn't just a tool, it's already been used. Governments have fallen. Empires have shifted. And someone else is pulling the strings.
As a rival syndicate closes in and a hidden war erupts across the city, Mara and Kael are forced into an uneasy alliance, one built on intellect, suspicion, and a dangerous, undeniable pull neither of them can ignore.
Because in a world where every move is predicted...
the only thing more dangerous than control is feeling.
And the system is already watching.
7.5
Raven Noir, stolen and sold at birth, a lethal assassin scarred by a decade-old rape, infiltrates billionaire Damien Blackwood's elite nightclub empire as stripper, her cover to get close enough to torture and kill the man who unknowingly fathered her daughter. Damien, captivated by her icy control and commanding presence, pulls her deeper with lucrative nights and charged intimacy. But when he encounters her identical twin, the buried memories flood back. Mistaking the twin for his victim, guilt drives him to propose marriage. Devastated, Raven faces an impossible choice: expose the truth, seize her revenge, or let obsession destroy them all in a dark, slow-burn thriller of betrayal and forbidden desire.
8.3
Half a month into our cold war, I, Claire Parker, found an abortion procedure slip tucked inside Daniel Carter's suit pocket.
The patient's name belonged to the fragile little childhood sweetheart he had always protected so fiercely-Sophie Bennett.
I folded the paper calmly and slipped it back where I had found it.
Daniel noticed the movement immediately. His eyes flicked toward me through the rearview mirror, resignation coloring his voice.
"What are you overthinking now? Sophie was just keeping a friend company at the hospital. She accidentally left it there."
I turned toward the window and said nothing.
This was Sophie declaring war on me, yet the man who could crush competitors without mercy in the business world believed her completely.
The silence inside the car grew suffocating until Daniel finally stopped outside an upscale jewelry boutique.
He reached over and ruffled my hair with easy familiarity, his tone indulgent and affectionate.
"Come on. Pick out a ring. Your birthday's next month anyway, so we might as well register our marriage too."
I bit down hard on my lip as tears fell soundlessly onto the back of my hand.
What he still didn't know was that I wouldn't live long enough to see next month.