When Nikolai Romanov came looking for my brother, I emptied my savings hoping I could pay off his debt. But I didn't have even close to enough, so the bastard decided to take me instead. I didn't expect a Russian mafia boss like him to be gentle with me...and he wasn't. Not when he spanked me for daring to wear panties under the dress he chose for me, and certainly not when he stripped me out of that same dress and made me scream in his bed.

Had she crashed into any other man's car, she could have walked away—but she hit mine. Upon seeing the bruises on her wrist, I struggled to contain my rage. Despite her objections, I refused to allow her to leave. Whoever hurt this innocent beauty would pay dearly. As a Russian Mafia crime boss who owns Chicago's most elite gambling club, I have very creative and painful methods of exacting revenge.

D'Artagnan Conti was born into poverty, raised to be a soldier in my father's savage regime. I grew up in luxury, longing to escape my family's cruel machinations, and the young man with sapphire eyes and the voice of an angel became not just my forbidden crush but my everything. Then he was taken from me, killed in a brutal attack by our enemies. Or so I was led to believe....

For weeks, I've been watching her. Stalking her. Now, it's time to start playing with my beautiful little pawn. From the moment I first saw her from afar, I knew she would become my prized possession. I will gaslight her into thinking she is my obedient ward, trapped in the Victorian era. She is my unwilling captive, forced to play my sadistic game for her own survival.  She will have no choice but to bow to my rules and discipline. In time, her memories of a modern life will fade.  If not, she will pay a painful price.

Being attracted to her isn't wrong…but acting on it would be. As the patriarch of the powerful and wealthy Cavalieri family, my choices come with consequences for everyone around me. The roots of my ancestral, billionaire-dollar winery stretch deep into the rich Italian soil, as does our legacy of ruthlessness and scandal. It isn't the fact she is half my age that makes her off-limits. Nothing is off-limits for me. A wounded bird caught in a trap not of her own making, she poses no risk to me. My obsessive desire to possess her is the real problem—for both of us.