He began walking over to me. This is it. I'm dead. I saw his shoes come into my view as I was looking down, hair covering my face. "Look at me." He growled out. I started to cry, too afraid to look. He grasped my chin and lifted my face to meet his. I mentally gasped. It's the guy from last night. His eyes held surprise too, before anger erupted in them. I cowered back in fear of what he might do. "Who did this to your face?" He growled. I started to cry again and shake. "Him." I whispered and gave a small nod toward the guy who hit me.

•"Looking into his eyes was like looking into the ocean, beautiful and bright yet full of danger...I felt like I was swimming with sharks. Exciting yet terrifying, the warmth of his breath upon my cold tired skin sent shocks of electricity down my spine. His tender kiss under the blanket of midnight stars made me forget, but in the same breath, remember the forbidden love that is us."•

Drugs, guns, sex, and of course, Italian mafia. The family business held secrets that she never knew about and never really cared about. Until she met him. She can't help but fear him, and he can't help but care for her. "Say you're mine, inamorata. Say you're my sweetheart, my inamorata." Inamorata: a woman with whom you are in love or have an intimate relationship.

He takes his other hand putting my hair behind my ear. Why is he doing this? He slowly brings his lips to my ear. I can feel his lips barely touching the top of my ear making me suck in a sharp breath. "I like knowing you're scared of me" He whispers. His breath hits my ear and fans out to my neck. I shiver at his words. He stays that way for a moment before sliding his hand down my forearm and slowly pulling his head away. Our bodies still touching, he looks down at me with a smirk on his lips before he lets me go and walks away without another word. ~~~~ He is not the same person anymore. He has secrets. With him in her life, it is just a bittersweet tragedy.

It is a well-established fact amongst those who lurk the criminal underworld that love is nothing more than a weakness. It is a weakness that those who want to destroy you will take advantage of in order to bring you down to your knees in the dirt at their feet, with the barrels of their guns pressed against the skin of your temple, ready to end your life with one meaningless flick of their finger. However, Vittorio Lucente, the Don of the most influential and notorious crime family the underworld has ever known, quickly learns that love is an emotion beyond his vast control, and that the moment he starts to fall for the broken beauty behind the bar, it is impossible for him to just stop. Rose feels as though she is a shell of who she could be, having had to live a life where violence and pain was thrust upon her the moment she was born, but that doesn't stop her from falling deeper and deeper into a world where brutality is almost as normal as needing oxygen to live. Rose has her thorns, and yet Vittorio is still all too willing to take a firm grip on her and risk his very own blood being drawn, just so long as he can keep her safe away from those wanting to hurt her. They both have their enemies and they not only threaten to tear the two of them apart, but they also threaten to completely shatter both of their worlds. - A/N - I started this book in 2015, and I'm continuing it in 2020. This is also likely to be the first out of a two book series. Warning: There will be violence and mention of abuse, sexual abuse, drugs, alcohol and sex. Author's Note: This is my first original story and these are my own characters.