I was sold to the Devil of Severn City to save my father’s empire. Instead, I’ll use him to burn it to the ground.
For ten years, Vesper Dravos has played the perfect, fragile syndicate princess. She has smiled for her father’s capos, poured their wine, and swallowed the bile of knowing her father was the architect of her mother’s murder. Now, Vikor Dravos has made his final, fatal miscalculation. To avoid a two-front war, he has forced Vesper into an arranged marriage with Malakai Mercer, the ruthless, blood-soaked head of a rival syndicate.
Malakai expects to receive a terrified, obedient pawn to secure his borders. What he gets is a queen holding a match.
Malakai is brutal, untamed, and entirely unbothered by the collateral damage of his reign. But when he discovers the lethal, venomous creature hiding beneath Vesper’s porcelain mask, the political treaty becomes something else entirely. It becomes a dark, consuming obsession.
They are two apex predators bound by blood, trauma, and a shared thirst for vengeance. As they tear the Severn City underworld apart piece by piece, the lines between hatred, survival, and intoxicating passion violently blur. But when the ash finally settles, will their new empire survive the monsters they’ve become… or will they beautifully ruin each other?
