Bound By Contract To The Ruthless Don

I threw a latte on the most dangerous man in New York and lived to tell about it.

Dante Vitiello. The Capo dei Capi. A man rumored to cut out tongues for interrupting his dinner.

Instead of a bullet to the brain, he handed me a black card and a terrifying ultimatum.

"I need a fiancée," he told me, his eyes dead cold.

To save my failing journalism career and my life, I signed a contract with the devil.

I had to wear his massive diamond ring, smile for the cameras, and pretend to be the love of his life to stop a political mafia marriage.

The rules were clear: Absolute obedience. Total exclusivity. And absolutely no feelings.

But the performance started to feel dangerous.

When a rival Don insulted me at a gala, Dante didn't just play the part—he threatened to butcher him in front of three hundred people.

When I saw the jagged scars on his chest in the dead of night, I didn't see a monster; I saw a lonely protector.

My investigation was supposed to expose him, but I was the one getting stripped bare.

Then his cousin Rocco stormed in, calling me a disposable whore and a temporary pawn.

I stood my ground, defending not just myself, but Dante too.

Dante looked at me then, not as an asset, but as a woman he wanted to devour.

He stepped closer, his voice a low rumble that vibrated through my bones.

"I think we are going to have a problem with the clause about 'no feelings'."

Chapter 1

I watched the brown stain spread across the stranger's chest and knew, with terrifying clarity, that the three men reaching for their waistbands were about to end my life before my coffee cup even hit the floor.

The chatter in the lounge died instantly.

It was the kind of suffocating silence that usually precedes a bomb blast.

I stood frozen, my hand still extended, the empty cup slipping from my numb fingers to shatter on the marble.

Dark liquid dripped from the lapel of a suit that likely cost more than my entire college education.

I looked up.

I wished I hadn't.

The man wearing the suit didn't flinch. He didn't look down at the stain.

He looked at me.

His eyes were shards of onyx, devoid of anything human. They were the eyes of a predator who had just found a rabbit stupid enough to walk into its den.

I knew that face.

Everyone in New York knew that face, even if they pretended not to see it.

Dante Vitiello.

The Capo dei Capi. The head of the Vitiello crime family.

He was the man who supposedly cut out a rival's tongue last Christmas for interrupting his dinner. And I had just thrown a latte on him.

I opened my mouth to apologize, but my throat felt like it was filled with sand.

One of the bodyguards, a mountain of muscle with a scar running down his