LOGINShe froze for the briefest moment. Then her fingers found the front of my shirt, holding onto the fabric as though she were afraid I might disappear if she let go. Her soft gasp died in her throat as my mouth pressed into hers. The small hesitation in her body melted away, turned into a fire that
Or... For me. She smiled. It wasn't the bright, carefree smile she wore during her rare moments of happiness. This one was smaller, almost shy. As though she wasn't entirely certain how I would react to finding her here. I simply stood there with one hand still resting on the doorknob, staring at
One picture made my hand stop. Gianna couldn't have been older than ten. Her hair was tied neatly into a bun, every other child smiling proudly toward the camera. Gianna wasn't looking at the photographer. She was staring somewhere beyond the frame, her expression distant, almost watchful, as though
His gaze softened in a way I had only seen a handful of times. "Raphael, if anyone can convince her to speak, it's you." I looked away, the words never reached my mouth because another thought had already taken their place. Scars. My breathing slowed by instinct. Images surfaced one after anothe
Salvatore slowly shook his head, "I asked her that question more times than I can count." "And?" "She'd only ever give me one answer," e looked directly into my eyes, "'If he ever finds us... he'll never stop until he takes her.'" I waited, "That's all?" I asked. Salvatore swallowed hard, his vo
Raphael ━━ ⛓ ━━ "Raphael!" I heard Vincenzo call after me. I didn't answer. The hallway blurred around me. Guards stepped aside the moment they saw my face. I knew exactly where he was. Dad hadn't left the estate since Hazel's funeral. He spent most of his time in the library. The room had bec
Raphael ━━ ⛓ ━━ Gold-digging whores. I didn’t even have to look at them to know that’s exactly what they were. The smell of desperation always clung to women like them, no matter how much expensive perfume they sprayed on their wrists to hide it. Hazel Kinsley. She was the widow of some patheti
Gianna ━⊰ ❦ ⊱━ I tugged at the scrap of black lace riding up my hip. This outfit wasn’t clothes, it was a prayer. A tiny, see-through prayer. I caught my reflection in the cracked dressing room mirror and barely recognized the girl staring back. The silver wig was cold and synthetic against my
DISCLAIMER This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places, and events are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is purely coincidental and unintentional. This book, including all i
Raphael ━━ ⛓ ━━ Six monitors cast a cold blue glow across the room. Lines of code crawled across two screens. Financial records occupied another. Security feeds filled a fourth. The remaining monitors displayed data I had been collecting for the last three hours. My fingers moved across the key







