Mariella (Lake Como #1)

Sofia has spent her whole life devoted to quiet things: the scent of proofing bread, the hush of Sunday Mass, the flowers she arranges before dawn in her little shop on the Varenna waterfront. She has never wanted anything more than this small, gentle life.

Then she catches his eye.

He is Capobastone of the Castellania family, a name never spoken aloud and the entire lake moves around for. Sofia was never meant to be seen by men like him. But now that he has seen her, he cannot stop.

He calls her Mariella. No one else does. It is the first thing he takes from her, before her mornings and peace, before she understands that his devotion is not the kind she prays for.

Sofia has always believed that God tests the faithful.

She is beginning to wonder if this is her test, or her ruin.