The Devil's Contract

"Five million euros bought my debt. It didn't buy me."

To save her reckless younger brother from sleeping at the bottom of a canal, Serafina Valenti signs a blind agreement, only to find herself standing on the auction block of an underground Venetian palazzo, facing fifty masked monsters in bespoke suits. She refuses to grovel. She refuses to wear their silk. She prepares to die fighting. Then the double doors blow open, and the underworld falls to its knees. Enter Dante Belladonna. Crowned in blood and custom wool, the ruthless master of Lombardy doesn't negotiate. With a single, devastating bid of five million euros, he obliterates the auction, burns her brother's promissory note to ash, and drags Sera to his fortress on Lake Como. He doesn’t want her body. He claims he only bought her father's liabilities, and the brilliant financial mind capable of unlocking the ghost shipping fleet stolen by his bitterest enemy. He gives her a 365-day contract and three non-negotiable rules: Rule One: Do not betray him. Rule Two: Do not leave the estate without his guards. Rule Three: Never lie to him. Sera intends to break every single one. But locked behind wrought-iron gates with a man who kills without flinching, the war of wills turns lethal. When bullets shatter the ballroom glass and ambushes turn the dark waters of the lake red, Sera discovers the terrifying truth hidden behind his iron gaze: The Devil didn't buy her to rule her. He bought her because she is the only thing on earth he cannot afford to lose.