Novels by Darlella

THE WEDDING OF DAMNED SOULSThe photograph on Gio’s phone was the last thing I wanted to see.Daniel Pearce was kneeling on a concrete floor, his hands tied behind his back. Blood ran from a cut above his eyebrow.Behind him stood a man I had spent my entire life believing was dead.Vittorio Locatelli.My supposed biological father.And he was holding a gun against Daniel’s head.“Midnight,” I whispered.Gio took back his phone.“We’re not going to that wedding.”“He’ll kill Daniel.”“Then we find him before midnight.”I stared at Gio.“Am I your sister?”He hesitated.“According to the records, yes. But I don’t trust anything we’ve discovered so far.”“And if they’re wrong?”His expression tightened.“Then we have another problem.”I looked away. My father was being held hostage, my mother was missing, and I still didn’t know whether the man standing beside me was someone I could love or someone I was related to.“Let’s find them,” I said.By nine in the morning, Gio’s estate had bec

THE NAME BURIED WITH THE DEAD“Ask him why he named you Amelie.”The message remained on Gio’s phone.I couldn’t stop staring at it.My name had always felt like the one thing nobody could take from me. Now even that seemed to belong to someone else.“Play the video again,” I whispered.Gio did.My mother’s frightened face appeared on the screen. Daniel sat behind her, tied to a metal chair.Then her voice returned.“Vittorio Locatelli isn’t the man who stole you. Your biological father has been dead for twenty-four years.”The recording ended.“Tell me she’s lying,” I said.Gio looked at me.“I can’t.”“Then take me to the place where I was born.”He studied my face before nodding.“We leave in twenty minutes.”St. Catherine’s Maternity Clinic stood behind a row of old oak trees in Chicago. Its white walls were peeling, the windows boarded, and the rusted sign above the entrance barely readable.I stepped out of the car.“This is where I was born?”“According to the records,” Gio rep

THE PRICE OF HIS RETURNThe message remained on Gio’s phone.THE WEDDING IS BACK ON. THREE DAYS. NO EXCEPTIONS.Beneath it was a photograph of Daniel Pearce being forced into a black vehicle. His hands were tied, and blood marked his forehead.I zoomed in on the photograph.“Wait. That watch.”Gio looked at me. “What about it?”“I’ve seen it before. At my father’s birthday dinner six months ago.”The man wearing it had congratulated me that evening and told me my mother would have been proud of me.Gio immediately called his security chief.“Rafael, I want every photograph and guest record from Daniel Pearce’s birthday dinner. Every name. Every face. Find the man wearing a silver watch with a red line around its edge.”He ended the call.“Your father may have been watched for months.”“By Vittorio?”“Possibly.”I folded my arms. “You really need to find another answer.”“When people keep lying, certainty becomes expensive.”I looked at Daniel’s photograph.“Why does Vittorio want this

THE GIRL WHO STOLE A LOCATELLI’S HEART“She’s standing in your bedroom, Gio.”Isabella Locatelli’s voice trembled through the phone.“Your sister is alive.”Gio went completely still.I watched his face, waiting for him to deny it. Instead, his expression changed into something I had never seen before.Pain.“Mother, what are you saying?”“Twenty-four years, Gio. Your father told me my daughter died during childbirth. He showed me a death certificate. But I found the original hospital records tonight. She was born alive.”My fingers tightened around the doorframe.“She had dark hair,” Isabella continued, crying now. “And a small crescent-shaped birthmark beneath her left shoulder.”My hand flew to my shoulder.The mark was there.The same one my mother used to kiss whenever I complained about it as a child.Gio noticed.His eyes moved from my shoulder to my face.“Mother…” His voice cracked. “Are you saying Amelie is—”“She’s my daughter.”The room seemed to tilt.“No,” I whispered.G

A BRIDE FOR THE DEVIL“If my brother has your mother, then this wedding isn’t an alliance.”Gio stared at the photograph.“It’s a ransom.”I wanted to believe him wrong. I wanted an explanation that didn’t involve dead men, missing children and families built on twenty-four years of lies.But my mother was alive, and she was standing beside a man everyone believed was dead.“Call him back.”“Amelie—”“Call your brother!”“He used an untraceable number.”I laughed bitterly.“Your family has money, weapons and enough influence to frighten half of New York, but apparently finding one missing man is impossible.”His jaw tightened.“We’re leaving.”Back at the Locatelli estate, Gio led me into his father’s study.Something was missing.The photograph of his father and my mother had disappeared, along with the black folder we’d discovered earlier.Beneath the bookshelf, I noticed a gold locket.Inside was a photograph of me as a little girl.On its reverse were six words.TO MY DAUGHTER, WH

THE HEIR WHO NEVER DIEDFor several seconds, I forgot how to breathe.Gio stood beside me, his phone pressed against his ear, while the corridor filled with the smell of gunpowder and blood.His brother was alive.The boy who had supposedly died in a fire. The child whose funeral had taken place without a body. The man who had apparently been waiting eight years to meet me.“What was his name?” I whispered.Gio lowered his phone.“Luca.”“Did you love him?”His eyes shifted towards the dead man.“He was my brother.”“That wasn’t my question.”Silence.“Yes, Amelie. I loved him.”Something in his voice made my chest tighten. For the first time, I understood that beneath the ruthless reputation of Gio Locatelli was a man who had spent years grieving someone who might never have died.“Where is he?”Gio’s phone rang again.“They found a body outside the city. The identification papers say it’s Luca.”“Then let’s go.”“Amelie, you’re staying here.”I folded my arms.“You really need to le