THE KISS OF VENGEANCE
In a world where power is king and betrayal a currency, Francesca Marino is a woman with a mission. Haunted by the brutal death of her parents, she has spent years honing her skills, waiting for the day she can exact her revenge on those responsible for their murders.
Her path leads her straight to Vincenzo Lombardi, a man with bloodstained hands and buried secrets. Drawn into his world in the guise of deceit, Francesca expects a ruthless opponent. What she finds instead is a man who is both captivating and intoxicating. When their worlds collide, passion flares and the thin line between hatred and love is blurred.
With truths long buried exposed, Francesca finds herself compelled to face it all—her retribution, her family, and the man whose destruction she had promised upon.
With the past breathing down their necks and the future hanging by a thread, will Francesca and Vincenzo weather the storms, or will love be the ultimate casualty of a war written in blood?
Power is seductive, betrayal inevitable but love? The deadliest of all the weapons.
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Chapter: Chapter Twenty One.Chapter 21Vincenzo's Pov.Why do you remind me of the mafia, Francesca?That was his first sentence. No greeting. No offer to sit, only that one question. It cut through me, low, and menacing. It was not the kind of question you replied to thoughtlessly. The kind that suggested he had seen, considered, calculated things and was suspecting something. I didn't flinch. Because flinching meant weakness, and I couldn't afford to be weak in the presence of Vincenzo Lombardi."Because," I said, going further into the study, my tone even, "it's the only family structure where loyalty is more specific than love. And I am loyal."He didn't flinch. He sat with eyes locked on me, as silent as silent water, but I knew not to mistake stillness for peace. Vincenzo was never peaceful. He just had a depth of stillness. And then he did something that took me aback. He sat back in his chair and smiled. It barely reached his eyes, and it was laced with more curiosity than amusement. "Interesting answer
Last Updated: 2025-07-03
Chapter: Chapter Twenty.Chapter 20Francesca's PovI came back to my room with the weight of the day encircling my shoulders like a vice. Each muscle ached, yet weakness had never been potent enough to dull my instincts. They lived now, taut and irritated. Something was obviously not right.It wasn't stress. It was that shivery feeling that warned you when something was going to go wrong. My fingers tightened at my sides as I closed the door, glancing around my room out of habit. Everything seemed fine, but it wasn't just about the room. It was about the silence. Too still.I crossed the floor to my window and shoved it open, letting the cold evening air cut across my skin like a blade. The grounds outside were in familiar shapes. But something was not right, there. At the crest of the western garden wall, almost hidden in the vines, a new camera flashed once with a very gentle red light. I hadn't seen it yesterday. I would have remembered. I always remembered surveillance setups. This one wasn't a new inst
Last Updated: 2025-06-11
Chapter: Chapter Nineteen.Chapter 19Francesca's PovThe stench of smoke lingered in the air even though the firing had stopped. The chaos had receded into a tense quiet—the kind that always came after blood had been spilled. The kind that stayed with your skin and lingered like ash.Vincenzo turned to me, teeth gritted, eyes scanning the charred remnants of the courtyard as though he still waited for something else to leap out of the shadows."Let's head to the main house," he said. His voice was lower than usual, but there was no mistaking the command in it. A quiet authority that didn’t waver, even after the night we’d just survived.I nodded, silently falling in step behind him and Alessandro. My head was reeling, but my body was tense. My boots clicked over broken glass and blood-stained gravel. The air stuck me, heavy with death. I glanced past the burnt remains of the ancient garden wall and without thinking, I looked toward Arnaldo's body.He was still there. He had been one of us. Trusted and respecte
Last Updated: 2025-06-08
Chapter: Chapter Eighteen.Chapter 18Francesca's PovThe courtyard still smelled of smoke and gunpowder. My hands were trembling despite my telling them they weren't. I crouched behind the greenhouse wall with Vincenzo, who for once wasn't bellowing orders. He was looking at me.I avoided his gaze. My heart was racing in my ears, and it wasn't due to the firefight a moment earlier.Then I heard it. A whisper, low and chill."Don't move."My blood went cold. A gun barrel was pressed to the back of Vincenzo's head, and my hand moved instinctively to my waist. But I held back. Any wrong movement would kill him.Vincenzo shifted his head to the side, just enough to be able to see who was behind him. I saw the recognition in his eyes first. Not fear, not surprise… recognition." You?" he whispered. Disbelief layered his voice, mixed with something else—betrayal.I stepped out from behind him slowly, my body stiffening when I saw the man who stood with the gun.My stomach dropped. Arnaldo.I froze, meeting Vincenzo'
Last Updated: 2025-06-08
Chapter: Chapter Seventeen.Chapter Seventeen.Vincenzo's PovThe bed was too cold. Or maybe too big. I didn't know anymore. The house was quiet, the kind of silence that is only accomplished before dawn, when even shadows are afraid to move. I just lay there with my eyes open, staring at the molding on the ceiling, still.I couldn't sleep and it was because of her. Because of a woman. Tonight, she had this look in her eyes when I spoke to her.When I said, "If you're here to kill me, do it already. Before I start thinking of trusting you," she froze. Not the startled kind of stillness. It was a deeper one, tight panic underneath.Her face had changed so fast. First it was confusion, then something else shadowed her eyes, something raw. Not anger. That would've been easier to deal with.No, she'd looked very innocent and very frightened. The realization that I had done that to her hit like a dull blow to the gut. It shouldn't have mattered. I wasn't the type to care what my words did to a person but today, I did
Last Updated: 2025-06-05
Chapter: Chapter Sixteen.Chapter Sixteen.The sun light streamed through my high windows like a censure, unwanted and golden. I hadn't slept. Not precisely. My brain had stayed caught in the same web all night long—Vincenzo's insinuating menace, Isadora's almost imperceptible caution, and the treacherous, subtle way my breath had hitched to behold him sleeping in the library.I wasn't meant to care about him. Not confusion, not sympathy, not curiosity. But something had shifted. The edges of hatred were dulling, softened by proximity, by the mask he wore sometimes—the one that nearly seemed human.I shrugged my shoulders, shoving the thought away.I had a job.I buckled the knife under my leg. Just in case. Vito had taught me better than to go into a house like this unarmed. And today, I was going to find out if Isadora's warning was paranoia— or a very real noose tightening around our necks.By the time I entered the hall, the house vibrated with silent motion. Servants moving like ghosts. Guards in black st
Last Updated: 2025-06-02
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