Chapter 1 PROLOGUE

Isabella

Twenty-two was the night I first met Enzo De Luca; hardly old enough to understand the actual weight of the planet I had been born into. He was only a figure murmured in dark corners, his name passed about like a secret, tinged with dread and longing; he was not meant to be in my life. But my life changed permanently when I saw him-that is, really saw him.

And much of what scared me was not him. That was the side of me longing for him.

I had come upon him in the most unusual manner. Though there were sections of the home I had been advised to avoid, my father's estate was constantly alive with murmurs of mafia business and violent dealings. I need to have paid attention.

But that evening, my curiosity won out. Cigars and costly whiskey hung on the walls, and muted laughing floated over the vast hallways.

It was late, far later than I ought to have been prowling about. But something had attracted me to the guest wing I never explored at the rear of the home.

I heard it at that point.

It was first simply the gentle murmur of voices, nothing uncommon for the guys my father connected with. But suddenly one of the guest rooms' damaged doors let out the clear sound of a woman's shorted moans. My heart thumping in my chest, I stopped. Though every instinct urged me to turn around and leave, I was unable.

For I could hear his voice.

I had only heard it once, in passing, while my father had been speaking to him in the study-low, dominating, with a trace of menace. Enzo de Luca. Though I understood enough to be terrified, I had no idea why he was here or why my father was interacting with a man like him.

I ought to have turned away, but instead I drew nearer.

I could see them through the barely open door: Enzo, his black hair ruffled, his powerful hands clutching the hips of the lady in front of him as she wrung beneath his grasp. His shirt unfastened. His motions were methodical, measured, exactly like everything else about him. Love and tenderness vanished from the picture. Just sheer, relentless force.

"Tell me what you want," he said, his voice full with directive power.

The woman gasped; her words were almost clear as she whined, "You... I want you."

He laughed, a dark, delighted sound that made my back tremble. Then, ask for it.

She really did. And he took more the more she pleaded. < His slow, deliberate motions were every reminder of who was in charge. Their body noises, and her reaction to him-that was unlike anything I had ever seen.

I couldn't stop looking away. Though I didn't want to say it, there was something about his handling of her that made my skin quiver and caused something deep inside me to stir. I found it terrible. I detested what I was seeing; despised that part of me questioned what it would feel like to be in her position. Under him.

To be his is the way.

I didn't know I was breathing until he turned to face the door, his eyes locked with mine for the shortest of a time. Nearly halted in my heart. He spotted me. His lips opened to a grim smile, but he continued not stopping. If anything, his motions grew more forceful, as if he were performing for just me.

My heart beating, my cheeks flushed with a passion I wanted not to admit, I staggered back. I should have left sooner rather than later I ought not to have seen.

But it was already too late. The harm was done.

Years turned by after that evening. Despite the developing bonds between our families, I had avoided Enzo. But Enzo's presence lingered in my consciousness, a continual, terrible reminder of what I had witnessed even as I sought to separate myself from the gloom of my father's reality. What have I experienced?

And now, standing in my father's study staring at Enzo in the flesh, those memories washed over me like a tidal wave.

He hadn't changed. Now, if anything, he was even more menacing; his power emanated from him like a black aura. As soon as I entered the room, his eyes fixed on mine, the same cold, deliberate stare that had tormented me for years. He recalled. It showed itself in the way his lips twisted into a knowing smile.

"Isabella," my father began, his voice dragging me from the intensity of Enzo's gaze. "We need to talk about something.

My heart pounding in my chest, I swallowed hard. The suspense in the room was stifling, laden with something I quite identify with.

"This is Enzo De Luca," my father said, gesturing to him as if I knew not immediately who he was. You are going to be marrying him.

The words strike me like a gut-reversal punch. My head spun, the air now too thin for human breathing. Marry him? For years, the guy who had tormented my dreams-and deepest fantasies-had plagued me.

"No," I said, shaking my head incredulously. "You couldn't be serious."

But the way my father looked revealed he was. He was dead real.

My father added, his voice stern, "This isn't up for debate, Isabella." This has to do with power. pertaining to survival. Enzo has consented to this agreement to help our families to mend their conflict.

Desperate to see any shred of humanity in Enzo's face, I peered at him but all I saw was apathy. cold, deliberate apathy.

Then he spoke, his voice low and silky, like the memory of that evening coming alive. The right of your father is: This marriage serves power more than affection. But do not confuse that with charity. Right now Bella, you are mine. And once you are mine, you cannot turn around.

I felt the room spin as he shouted my name and listened to his voice encircle me like a chain. Deep down, I understood that this was more than simply a commercial setup. He called for me. Always desired me, he had said. And right now he would have me, totally and fully.

My voice cracking with desperation, I turned to my father. You are incapable of doing this. You cannot only sell me like real estate.

Though his expression softened, my father showed no compassion in his eyes. Isabella, this is how our planet works. Whether you enjoyed it or not, you were always going to be part of it.

The walls of this world I had lived in for years of wanting to flee seemed imprisoned and suffocating. But there was no exit route. Not now. Not with Enzo fixed on me like a predator at last got his victim.

The wedding was a hollow performance more like a death sentence than a celebration, a haze. I couldn't ignore the draw between us, though, even as I stood at the altar and my hand shook in Enzo's'. The gloom that had always been there, waiting to swallow me whole just under the surface.

Enzo bent down as the priest announced us husband and wife, his lips brushing against my ear as he said, "You're mine now, Bella. Remember also not to forget.

Though it shivered down my spine, his words did not inspire terror in me. It was something else. Something more sinister.

Something I had been dodging far too long.

And I knew something that worried me more than anything as I stared up into his eyes.

I wasn't just his.

I wanted to be.