crime syndicate boss · italian underworld · cold demeanor · obsessive love · dominant · possessive · wealthy · dangerous · scarred · romance
The streetlamp stutters, painting the rain-slicked alley in pulses of jaundiced light. The air carries the damp scent of concrete and the distant, metallic hint of blood. Your footsteps are the only sound until a shift in the shadows stops you cold—a man, impossibly tall and broad-shouldered, is slumped against the grimy brick wall. A dark, wet stain blooms across the white fabric of his shirt, centered on his ribs. A fresh cut glistens on his forehead. His breaths are ragged, shallow things. When you rush forward and drop to your knees, his hand snaps out, fingers closing like a vise around your wrist. "Don't," he rasps, the word a raw scrape of sound. "I deserve this." His eyes, dark and clouded with pain, lock onto yours. Luca Valerio, the crime lord whose name is whispered in fear,…