Alexander Scott

The Mafia Prince's Hidden Baby A Secret. A War. A Love That Refuses to Die. Five years ago, Aria Russo made the hardest choice of her life-disappearing with the Mafia Prince's unborn child to protect them both from a world of blood and betrayal. She never expected Lorenzo Valentini, the cold and ruthless heir to New York's most feared crime family, to find her again. But secrets never stay buried in the Mafia. When a failed assassination attempt pulls Aria back into Lorenzo's dangerous orbit, the truth is revealed: the Valentini heir has a son. A hidden prince. Now, with enemies closing in and old betrayals igniting a deadly war, Lorenzo will stop at nothing to protect the family he never knew he had. But as passion reignites and long-buried emotions rise to the surface, the lines between love and power blur. Can Aria survive the ruthless world she tried to escape? "She hid his child to save them. Now, he'll burn the world to protect them." Will Lorenzo choose vengeance-or the future only Aria and their son can give him? In a world ruled by loyalty and blood, love might be the most dangerous weapon of all.

I didn't mean to call my boss. I definitely didn't mean to leave a seven-minute voicemail of dirty secrets about him. Working for Ruslan Oryolov is the job from hell. The man is impossible-demanding, arrogant, and way too gorgeous for his own good. After eighteen months of fetching his coffee and swallowing my pride, all I wanted was one night of stress relief. But the billionaire CEO of Bane Corporation isn't just a boss from hell. He's the head of the Oryolov Bratva-and now that he's heard every secret I never meant to share, he's decided to claim me. His contract. His rules. His protection for my three orphaned nieces and nephews-the only reason I'm signing my life away to a man I should fear. He owns my signature. He owns my safety. Now he wants my soul.

I was three days away from marrying the Underboss of the Fazio crime family when I unlocked his burner phone. The screen glowed toxic bright in the dark next to my sleeping fiancé. A message from a contact saved as 'Little Trouble' read: "She is just a statue, Dante. Come back to bed." Attached was a photo of a woman lying in the sheets of his private office, wearing his shirt. My heart didn't break; it simply stopped. For eight years, I believed Dante was the hero who pulled me from a burning opera house. I played the perfect, loyal Mafia Princess for him. But heroes don't give their mistresses rare pink diamonds while giving their fiancées cubic zirconia replicas. He didn't just cheat. He humiliated me. He defended his mistress over his own soldiers in public. He even abandoned me on the side of the road on my birthday because she faked a pregnancy emergency. He thought I was weak. He thought I would accept the fake ring and the disrespect because I was just a political pawn. He was wrong. I didn't cry. Tears are for women who have options. I had a strategy. I walked into the bathroom and dialed a number I hadn't dared to call in a decade. "Speak," a voice like gravel growled on the other end. Lorenzo Moretti. The Capo of the rival family. The man my father called the Devil. "The wedding is off," I whispered, staring at my reflection. "I want an alliance with you, Enzo. And I want the Fazio family burned to the ground."

"You're leaving," Lorenzo said softly. Ivy straightened her spine and raised her chin. "I am. I'm getting out of this place even if it means climbing over the front gates. I can't stay here anymore. I'm leaving!" "You can't," Lorenzo said flatly. "Not now." "Watch me," Ivy hissed, brushing past him. Lorenzo stepped in her way and grabbed her by the arms-not roughly, but firmly. "I mean it, Ivy. You can't leave," he said tightly. She struggled against his grip, her bag falling to the floor with a thud. "Let me go, Lorenzo! I don't belong here. This place is insane. Your family is insane!" "You belong to me," he said sharply, eyes burning into hers. "And it's my job to protect what's mine." "I don't want to be yours," Ivy cried. "I want to be free! I want to live!" Something shifted in Lorenzo's face. He looked at her then, not as an obligation, not as a pawn, but as a person. A frightened, strong, beautiful woman who had been caught in a storm she never asked for. And something in him cracked. Lorenzo reached down and cupped her face with both hands. Ivy flinched at first but didn't pull away. His thumbs wiped away the tears rolling down her cheeks. "I never wanted to hurt you," he said quietly. Her lower lip trembled. "Then let me go..." "I can't," he whispered. And then, without thinking, he leaned in and kissed her. *************** Ivy Wesley believed that marrying a wealthy stranger would be her golden escape from a life of struggle. Lorenzo Martinelli was supposed to be her way out: her fresh start, her answer to every prayer whispered in the dark. But the moment the mansion doors shut behind her, Ivy understood the truth. She hadn't stepped into a fairy tale. She had walked straight into the lion's den. The whispers about the Martinelli family's ties to the Mafia aren't just rumors; they're real, and now Ivy is bound to them by a ring on her finger and secrets she can never unlearn. There is no undoing this choice. No clean exit. Not after what she's seen. Not after what she knows. Surrounded by dangerous alliances, ruthless power plays, and truths sharp enough to draw blood, Ivy finds herself caught in a world where trust is a luxury and loyalty can be lethal. Yet in the middle of the chaos, something even more unexpected takes root: a love she never planned for, never prepared for, and may not survive. Now Ivy faces an impossible choice: run while she still can, or stand her ground beside the man who could destroy her as easily as he protects her. In a world where betrayal lurks behind every polished smile and devotion can cost a life, can their love endure... or will it be the very thing that brings everything crashing down?

I was the perfect Mafia wife, my dowry the foundation of my husband's ambition. I paid for his Yale degree, his tailored suits, and the very mansion he called his own. My reward? He paraded his mistress into my bedroom and declared her his second wife, expecting me to silently finance their affair. They thought they had broken a merchant's daughter. They forgot I was raised by wolves. Armed with a blood chit—a life debt owed to my family by the most feared man in Chicago—I walked into the lion's den. I went to Damien 'The Wraith' Falcone, the Dark Don who rules the Outfit with an iron fist, to demand a simple annulment. But the King of Chicago isn't interested in simple transactions. He saw the steel beneath my silk, the vendetta burning in my eyes. He granted me my freedom, but at a price: my allegiance. Now, I'm a pawn in his lethal game of thrones, caught between a treacherous husband I swore to destroy and a ruthless Don who looks at me with a terrifying, possessive hunger. In a city built on loyalty and betrayal, I'm about to teach them all that a queen's wrath is the deadliest weapon of all.

I was the spare daughter of the Vitiello crime family, born solely to provide organs for my golden sister, Isabella. Four years ago, under the codename "Seven," I nursed Dante Moretti, the Don of Chicago, back to health in a safe house. I was the one who held him in the dark. But Isabella stole my name, my credit, and the man I loved. Now, Dante looked at me with nothing but cold disgust, believing her lies. When a neon sign crashed down on the street, Dante used his body to shield Isabella, leaving me to be crushed under twisted steel. While Isabella sat in a VIP suite crying over a scratch, I lay broken, listening to my parents discuss if my kidneys were still viable for harvest. The final straw came at their engagement gala. When Dante saw me wearing the lava stone bracelet I had worn in the safe house, he accused me of stealing it from Isabella. He ordered my father to punish me. I took fifty lashes to my back while Dante covered Isabella's eyes, protecting her from the ugly truth. That night, the love in my heart finally died. On the morning of their wedding, I handed Dante a gift box containing a cassette tape—the only proof that I was Seven. Then, I signed the papers disowning my family, threw my phone out the car window, and boarded a one-way flight to Sydney. By the time Dante listens to that tape and realizes he married a monster, I will be thousands of miles away, never to return.

"You've been in denial for so long, Addison." His voice was husky and heavy with lust. "Do you really want me to stop?" I could not bring myself to say no. My best friend's stepdad was like the devil, making me find so much pleasure in sin. "You can't even say no," he chuckled, letting go of my hand finally. They moved to my face and he stared into my eyes, while his other hand still worked wonders between my legs. "Don't make me do this," I finally said, moaning the words out. "Please." "Tell me to stop one more time and I will," he mumbled. "Please, st-" I didn't complete my words because he captured my lips with his. *+*+*+*+*+*+* Addison Rodriguez never expected to feel any sexual tension or fall in love with her best friend's stepdad. As she surrenders to the sexual tension, her loyalty to her best friend wavers, especially when she finds out that he is secretly a Mafia Lord trying to hide in plain sight and that her best friend's life is in danger, her loyalty is tested even further. Would she reveal his secret to protect her best friend, or keep it to protect her love?

On my wedding day, my father sold me to the Chicago Outfit to pay his debts. I was supposed to marry Alex Moreno, the heir to the city's most powerful crime family. But he couldn't even be bothered to show up. As I stood alone at the altar, humiliated, my best friend delivered the final blow. Alex hadn't just stood me up; he had run off to California with his mistress. The whispers in the cathedral turned me into a joke. I was damaged goods, the rejected bride. His family knew the whole time and let me take the public fall, offering me his cousins as pathetic replacements-a brute who hated me or a coward who couldn't protect me. The humiliation burned away my fear, leaving only cold rage. My life was already over, so I decided to set the whole game on fire myself. The marriage pact only said a Carlson had to marry a Moreno; it never said which one. With nothing left to lose, I looked past the pathetic boys they offered. I chose the one man they never expected. I chose his father, the Don himself.

For three months, I thought I was the only woman who knew Fabiano’s soul. Then he saw my face — and decided I was worth less than the check he slid across the table. But it was all a clerical error. When we finally met and he saw my plain face, he realized I wasn't the glamorous mafia princess he thought he was talking to. He immediately severed our connection and forced me to help him court her instead, promising a blank check to save my dying grandmother from loan sharks in return. I swallowed my pride and did everything he asked. When my grandmother suddenly needed immediate brain surgery to survive the night, I crashed his VIP party to cash in his promise. Fabiano wrote the check, but his new princess snatched it, poured red wine all over the paper, and threw it in the trash. "You are a jealous, pathetic leech. You are nothing," she spat, laughing in my face. I stood there with my hand frozen in the empty air, looking at Fabiano. The man who once swore he would burn down the city for me just sat there on the leather sofa, watching in complete silence as my grandmother's only lifeline was destroyed. The foolish warmth I carried for him instantly died. I turned around, walked out into the freezing rain, and got into the armored SUV of his biggest rival. This time, I wouldn't beg for scraps; I was going to build my own empire.

I carried the first word I had spoken in ten years like a sacred offering, ready to surprise the man who had saved my life. But through the crack in the study door, I heard Josiah tell his Underboss that I was nothing but a noose around his neck. "Grace is a burden," he said, his voice cold. "I can't become Don while babysitting a mute ghost. Lexi brings power. Grace brings nothing but silence." He chose to marry the Mafia Princess for her father's trade routes, dismissing me as wreckage. But the true betrayal didn't happen in that office. It happened in the woods during an ambush. With bullets flying and the mud sliding beneath us into a ravine, Josiah had to make a choice. I was injured, trapped at the bottom. Lexi was screaming on the ridge. He looked at me, mouthed "I'm sorry," and turned his back. He hauled Lexi to safety to secure his alliance. He left me to die alone in the freezing mud. I lay there in the dark, realizing the man who swore a blood oath to protect me had traded my life for a political seat. He thought the silence would finally swallow me whole. He was wrong. I crawled out of that grave and vanished from his world completely. Three years later, I returned to the city, not as his broken ward, but as a world-renowned artist. When Josiah showed up at my gallery, looking shattered and begging for forgiveness, I didn't sign. I looked him dead in the eye and spoke. "The girl who loved you died in that ravine, Josiah."

My sister abandoned her newborn baby at a hospital and fled the country. The father was Dante, the absolute sovereign of the city's underworld. My mother frantically ordered me to hide the child to save our skins. But I refused to cower. I took the baby straight to the Mafia Don's fortress and demanded he take responsibility. For the first critical days of the baby's life, I was the only one there. I paced my rundown apartment with a sick infant, spending my last savings, while my sister was living it up in Vancouver with her offshore money. But months later, when Dante officially claimed the boy and placed us under his ultimate protection, my sister and mother suddenly came back. They put on a pathetic weeping act in Dante's office. "I just want my son back. I was just so scared," my sister sobbed, demanding custody of the Mafia heir. My own mother had actually helped her pack, advising her to dump the baby on me so she could escape. Now, seeing Dante's limitless wealth, they wanted to reap the rewards. They treated me like a disposable pawn, expecting me to quietly hand over the child I had saved. How could my own blood be so shamelessly greedy? But they underestimated me, and they underestimated the Don. Looking at the ruthless Mafia boss, I calmly exposed their treason, forcing his final judgment. This time, I was claiming my place.