Numbers Don't Lie

I’m sorry, it was an accident. I swear it was an accident!” Silver stuttered out in fear. Rodriguez stared at the trembling girl before him, heart torn in two. He’d usually revel in a sight like this, but not today. Instead he simply swiped away her tears. The feeling of her silky skin underneath his rough palms, sent a jolt of electricity through his veins. *** Silver was a waitress at the Blue Phoenix Bar. One night she found a flash drive left behind by some customers. She kept it, in hopes that the men would come back for it. Unaware that she has inadvertently stumbled into a sprawling operation between the top echelons of the Russian Mafia. Rodriguez is known to be the most dangerous man in the world, The Russian Mafia Don. When he discovers that a vital flash drive is missing, he goes into a destructive rage and blames the waitress who took it. He soughts after her life but meeting her alone is enough to change his mind. He decides instead to kidnap her and take away her freedom, making her a slave in his empire. But as it turns out, his slave holds a strong attraction to both his heart and body.

Sa gitna ng isang malamig at maka pangyarihang mansion, pumasok si Ysabel Aragon isang babaeng hindi lang basta nanny, kundi si Vivienne Calista Montclair, na nagbago ng pagkakakilanlan upang makapasok sa mundo ng mga Whitmore. Ang tunay niyang pakay ay hindi trabaho, kundi isang lihim na misyon ang makalapit kay Aurelius Whitmore, ang kinatatakutang Don na posibleng may kinalaman sa pagkawala ng kanyang ina. Ang trahedyang iyon ang nagbago sa buong buhay niya, kaya sa likod ng bagong pangalan at bagong katauhan, matagal niyang pinagplanuhan ang bawat hakbang para makapasok sa buhay ng lalaking kinamumuhian niya. Sa mata ng lahat, isa lamang siyang simpleng nanny, pero sa likod nito ay isang babaeng puno ng galit, sakit, at matinding paghahanap ng katotohanan. Ngunit sa pagpasok niya sa mansion ng mga Whitmore, hindi niya inaasahang may batang si Isabella na unti-unting babago sa direksyon ng kanyang misyon. Sa halip na malamig at magulong kapaligiran, nakita niya ang isang inosenteng bata na dahan-dahang nagbubukas ng pinto ng tiwala at emosyon na matagal nang nakasara sa kanya. Habang mas lumalalim ang koneksyon ni Ysabel kay Isabella, mas nagiging komplikado rin ang kanyang misyon dahil unti-unti siyang nahihila sa misteryosong si Aurelius. Isang lalaking puno ng kapangyarihan, panganib, at madilim na nakaraan-na sa bawat titig ay unti-unting sumisira sa matitibay niyang depensa. Sa pagitan ng paghihiganti, lihim na pagkakakilanlan, at unti-unting pagkapit ng damdamin, nagiging mas magulo ang lahat. Hanggang saan niya kayang panindigan ang kanyang misyon kung ang puso niya mismo ang unti-unting kumakalaban dito? At sa mundong puno ng kasinungalingan at kapangyarihan... sino nga ba ang tunay na kalaban ang Don o ang sariling damdamin niya?

“What do you want from me, Don? I'm your wife.” My voice trembled as the reality of what Alessandro might do to me settled in like a forest fog. “Exactly what I should get knowing how talented your mother was.” He growled, not sounding at all like the man I loved, while he unzipped his dress pants. Sure, I wanted to get laid but not like this. ~~~ To Don Alessandro Moretti, Elena is nothing more than a tool of vengeance. The daughter of the woman who once shattered his father’s empire. But what Alessandro doesn’t know is this: The amnesiac woman he married is no lamb—she's the top assassin and hacker of a phantom organisation. And when her memories return… All hell will break loose.

LUCIA: I'm thrown into a world of chaos when I hear that my family is part of the Italian mafia. No, scratch that - my family is the Italian mafia - and as tradition states, I'll be getting married to the bratva head. My world is in shambles when I see how cold and ruthless my husband is. Despite how handsome and attractive he is, I give myself one assignment; stay as far away from him as possible. But as neither my body nor my heart gets the message, I have to think of a way to conceal my emotions from him. IVAN: My life's purpose has always been to take over from my father as the head of the bratva. That's practically what I was born for; to kill and destroy. But for that to happen, I must get married, which isn't a problem since an arranged marriage to the Italian mafia princess has long been formed for us. What becomes a problem is the strange feelings that begin to steer within me the moment I'm married to my wife. Now I have another purpose added to the list; kill, destroy and love.

ELARA Elara My father stole millions from the devil and ran, leaving me behind to pay the price. Nero Moretti is the ruthless King of New York’s underworld. He is cruel, cold, and utterly unforgiving. To him, I am just a debt to be collected. A pawn in his brutal game. I swore I’d never break. I swore I’d never give in to the monster who holds my leash. But the longer I stay in his gilded cage, the more I see the man beneath the monster. And the more I fear the dark, twisted heat awakening between us. In a world ruled by blood and secrets, can I survive him? Or will I lose myself to the man who owns me, body and soul? NERO She was supposed to be nothing more than leverage. Use her. Break her. Discard her. That was the plan for Petrov’s daughter. I expected fear. I expected tears. But Elara is different. And there is a fire in her eyes that refuses to die. A fire that tempts me to step closer. Keeping her close stirs a hunger I thought I buried long ago. An obsession I can’t afford. She was just collateral. A means to an end. But now, she’s the one thing I can’t bend to my will. And the only thing I will burn the world to keep.

“I’ll keep you safe, Anya. Even if I have to lock you away.” * * Her brother kept her away from the Bratva’s bloody world. But the night he was killed, Anya Vasiliev was thrown into it. Straight into the arms of his best friend, Roman Sokolov. Now the new Pakhan, Roman swears she’s safest with him. But his protection feels like a prison… and his obsession, like chains tightening around her throat. He says he’ll burn Moscow to the ground for her. But will she ever escape the man who swore she’ll belong to him? No matter the cost?

As my due date approached, a massive discrepancy surfaced in the Galante family's arms accounts. The leadership made a swift decision. They sent me, Sophia Vitale, the Don's wife, the woman everyone claimed had nothing better to do, to personally inspect the armory and verify the inventory. I believed it was a routine check. I never imagined my husband's godsister, Monica Leone, would use it as cover to blow up the entire armory. The explosion was deafening. Fire ripped through the sky. Concrete collapsed around me, crushing my body as a searing pain tore through my abdomen. I did not call my husband on his highest-priority private line. Instead, I sent a distress signal to my father. In my previous life, the moment the explosion occurred, I had used that same priority channel to call my husband. The child had survived. Monica had been obliterated in the blast. My husband had claimed he did not blame me. He had said Monica was an outsider and that an heir mattered more. He had spared no expense, hiring elite obstetric specialists to monitor me day and night. He had told me to stay calm and wait for delivery. Then, on the day I went into labor, he personally locked me and the baby inside an abandoned warehouse drenched in gasoline and burned us alive. "If you hadn't deliberately delayed, she wouldn't have died. Do you really think playing the innocent victim could fool me? Dream on," he said. "You like playing with fire so much? Fine. I'll let you experience her despair yourself." When I opened my eyes again, I was back at the armory, at the exact moment of the explosion.

Everyone said my good looks were what saved me from my family's downfall. It was how I managed to become a Donna. I was the only one who knew why he had to compromise to marry me. Xavier Whitmore, the tall and handsome Don, was unable to have physical relationships with a woman. When I shyly took off the gown on our wedding night, he sat in his chair and lit a cigarette before remarking in an icy voice, "I'm allergic to women. That said, you have my word that you will be the only woman in my life." He kept his promise. Though he never so much as touched me in the five years of our marriage, he provided me with a life of luxury and wealth. Although it was merely a title, being his only woman brought me happiness. Everything changed on the day my men and I were ambushed by a rival mafia family. We barely made it out alive. When I returned home, I found him locked in a tight embrace with his widowed sister-in-law, Alice Ortega. "Alice, I won't let you remarry. If you do, I'll make sure that man dies a thousand deaths." I scoffed. It wasn't so much that he couldn't handle being physical with a woman. It was simply that he could not be physical with anyone but her. In that case, she could have the pleasure of being the Donna.

I met him in a place no sane woman should ever be in Blackgate Prison. As a prison therapist, I was trained to see danger. Every part of me screamed to stay away, but I couldn’t. He was a legend behind bars, Nikolai Sokolov, ruthless, untouchable, the leader of one of Russia’s most feared Mafia syndicates. Darkness clung to him like a second skin. The dim light carved his face into something sharp and dangerous. He looked at me, cold and unreadable, and held me in place with his gaze. “Who are you?” His voice was rough, heavy with threats and scars I couldn’t see. I forced a smile, trying to keep my voice steady. And yet… a part of me felt at home in this danger, a shadow inside I had never admitted, one that hummed quietly at his presence. It was darkness like his, though he couldn’t know it. “I’m Dr. Korovin. I’m here to evaluate you.” The chains rattled as he shifted, a predator testing the limits of his cage. His lips curved, not into a smile, but into a warning. “My name is Nikolai,” he said slowly, deliberately, heavy with threat. “Remember it, Doctor.” I should have been scared. I should have run. But something inside me stirred, something dark, like him, and I didn’t yet understand it.

The second I opened my eyes, I knew. I was twenty-seven again. Back when I was the Leone heiress. The golden girl of Arezzo. Engaged to the Don of the Grimaldis—Marco Grimaldi. Handsome. Loaded. Time magazine's "No.1 Most Desirable Husband in the World." Even the royal family of Inglane had tried to marry a princess off to him. Everyone called me the luckiest woman alive. Yeah. Right. The first thing I did after coming back? I grabbed the marriage contract and walked straight to my father's affair daughter— the fiancée Marco had actually wanted all along. Bella Leone. I slid the contract across the table. "It's yours. You're marrying Marco." She just stared at me. Six years. That's how long I'd chased him. And now I was handing over the contract like it meant nothing. "Everyone thinks you're the better match anyway," I said. "So go ahead. Convince Dad to get the Grimaldis to switch the contract. You can have the Grimaldi Donna title." Not this time. I'm not becoming that suffocated, invisible Don's wife ever again.