TRIGGER WARNING! 

This story contains graphic depictions of gun violence and murder, mafia-related threats and organized crime elements, sexual content, kidnapping, alcohol use, betrayal and emotional manipulation. Reader discretion is advised.

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“Is there no other way?” I asked, totally subdued by the fact that this nightmare marriage was the only solution.

“No, there isn’t,” he said coldly. “I can’t afford to lose my son and have you turned into a sex slave by the Romanovs.”

“Your son?” I scoffed, the memory of him taking my virginity and vanishing without a trace slicing my heart. “You seem to have forgotten that you never intended on taking things further with me. God, you’re no different from the Romanovs!”

He assessed me coolly with those dark eyes and then said with a note of finality, “He’s my son, Niamh, and you’ll have to become my wife.”

My father was killed. My uncle sold me to the Russian mafia syndicate. And now, the man I hid my son from for five years—Massimo Valentino—is forcing me to be his wife. My survival and the safety of Matteo depend on this hated forced marriage.

But the situation is worse than I thought: I am the key to a hidden vault that the Texas underworld is willing to kill for. With the war raging outside and a major betrayal brewing inside the Italian mafia syndicate, my safety depends entirely on Massimo.

I have to forgive and trust the man who ruined me, or lose everything.


This is the first installment in The Valentino Princes Series.

I detoured to Matteo's room first to bring him along, but the bed was empty and his toys were neatly tucked away. He was already downstairs. 


I turned and headed straight for the dining hall. 


Every step I took on the cold marble seemed to echo through the hollow of my chest, making my ribs ache with a tension I couldn't shake off. 


I kept wondering if Massimo would finally emerge from that study, if he'd actually show his face for dinner after six hours of haunting silence, and the thought made my stomach twist into a thousand knots. 


I walked in just in time to see Shauna settling Matteo into his high chair. 


My son looked like he'd been dragged out of a very deep sleep; his hair was a messy nest of curls and his eyelids were drooping low, his little head nodding as if he wanted nothing more than to curl back into his blankets. 


Chapter 73 - But…