“Pick up the phone, Rosa.”

My screen lit up with his name the second my classmate’s hand left my hair.

When I answered, Giovanni’s voice came through low—so calm it was almost worse than anger, a controlled vibration that slid straight down my spine.

“The boy sitting to your left,” he said. “Tell me if I should have his fingers amputated, or the entire arm.”

A pause. Soft. Certain.

“Because I am watching you breathe through my cameras. And no one touches what is mine.”

---

Thirteen years ago, the Moretti estate was engulfed in flames. Alessandro, his wife, and the entire household were declared dead. Rosalia’s body was never found.

The tragedy shattered her childhood sweetheart, Giovanni. It forced him into the custody of his estranged father—and into the criminal empire he had once despised. Over the next thirteen years, Giovanni rose through its ranks and became one of Italy’s most feared mafia kings.

Unknown to the world, Rosalia survived.

Smuggled out of Italy and raised under a new identity in America, she spent years running from her past, burying every trace of who she once was, and nurturing a deep hatred for the mafia world she held responsible for destroying her family.

Her carefully constructed life unravels when her closest friend, Adrian Romano, persuades—then deceives—her into accompanying him back to Italy for his sister Elena’s wedding.

What she doesn’t know is that Elena’s groom is Giovanni De Luca.

What happens when a mafia king’s first love returns on the eve of his wedding?