Showing results by author "Zoe Blake" in All Categories

It was an innocent mistake; she knocked on the wrong door. It was mine. If I were a better man, I would've just let her go. But I'm not. I'm a cruel bastard. I ruthlessly claimed her virtue for my own. It should've been enough but it wasn't. I needed more...I craved it. She became my obsession. Her sweetness and purity taunted my dark soul. The need to possess her nearly drove me mad. A Russian arms dealer had no business pursuing a naive librarian student. She didn't belong in my world. I would bring her only pain. But it was too late...she was mine and I was keeping her.

I took her innocence as payment. She was far too young and naïve to be betrothed to a monster like me. I would bring only pain and darkness into her sheltered world. That's why she ran. I should've just let her go. She never asked to marry into a powerful Russian mafia family. Unfortunately for her, I don't care. I own her, and after three years of searching, I've found her. My runaway bride was about to learn disobedience has consequences...punishing ones. Nothing was going to keep me from claiming her before the eyes of God and man. She's mine now, and I'm never letting her go.

Tearing off the gilded veneer of elite privilege exposes the sordid scandals, dark secrets, and taboo desires of New York's jaded high society in this dark romance series from best friends and USAT bestselling authors Zoe Blake and Alta Hensley, writing under their new pen name, Blake Hensley.

Darius Ivanov believes the American branch of the Ivanov crime family has grown soft. Too many weddings. Too many feelings. Men who forget that love is a liability. He's there to set them right. Darius Ivanov is the man no one dares cross. The most disciplined—and most dangerous—of the Ivanovs. He doesn't raise his voice. He doesn't leave a trace. And he never, ever loses control. Until her. To secure a multibillion-dollar arms deal, Darius crosses a line even the Ivanovs won't excuse—he kidnaps the daughter of a U.S. Senator and locks a diamond bomb collar around her neck.

Zoya NofiKova made one fatal mistake—she took an Ivanov. Now my cousin is missing, his pregnant wife left for dead in the wreckage of a brutal car crash. The guilt is a noose around my neck, tightening with every second he's gone. I was never fully Ivanov—half Russian, half Latin, never enough. But this time, I'll prove myself. I'll infiltrate Los Infidels. Find Pavel. And take the woman responsible.

Her innocence was going to get her killed. That was if I didn't get to her first. She's the protected little sister of the powerful Ivanov Russian mafia family–the very definition of forbidden. It’s always been my job, as their Head of Security, to watch over her but never to touch. That ends today. She disobeyed me and put herself in danger. It was time to take her in hand. I’m the only one who can save her and I will fight anyone who tries to stop me, including her brothers. Honor and loyalty be damned. She’s mine now.

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.

Enter the world of the Dark Obsession series where power, control, and manipulation reign supreme. Contains books 1-5. In this gripping collection, the boundaries of love and cruelty blur. This isn't a romance. It's a dark and twisted obsession.

We were not meant to be together…then a dark twist of fate stepped in, and we're the ones who will pay for it. As the eldest son and heir of the Cavalieri name, I will inherit a great deal more than a billion-dollar empire. I will receive a legacy of secrets, lies, and scandal. After enduring a childhood filled with malicious rumors about my father, I have fallen prey to his very same sin. I married a woman I didn't love out of a false sense of family honor. Now she has died under mysterious circumstances, and I am left to play the widowed groom.

She was supposed to be a problem—one I would deal with, forget, erase. Instead, she became my obsession. A hotel maid drowning in her father's debts, working among killers and Bratva bosses, believing silence would keep her safe. Then she saw something she shouldn't. She should have run. Should have screamed. Should have begged. Instead, she held my gaze, defiant and unbroken. Now, I can't let her go. The only way to keep her alive is to make her mine—a marriage that will satisfy Bratva law and place her firmly under my control. What I offer isn't protection. It's possession.

I didn't come to her apartment planning to tie her to her bed and ravage her. A Russian arms dealer has no need for an innocent schoolteacher. I would have done what I came to do and left, but when she opened those gorgeous red lips and threatened to scream I knew she would be screaming long before I was finished with her.

With a single gunshot, she brings the violent secrets of my buried past into the present. She may not have pulled the trigger, but she still has blood on her hands. And I know some very creative ways to make her pay for it. I am as ruthless as my Cavalieri ancestors, who forged our powerful family legacy. But no fortune is built without spilling blood. I've earned a reputation as a dangerous man to cross and made enemies along the way. So, to protect those I love, I handed over the mantle of patriarch to my brother and moved to northern Italy.

I came for my money. I took her instead. She's not the one who stole from me. She's a pawn caught up in her family's deadly game. It doesn't matter. Her innocence won't save her from me. I could just let her return the money, but as I stare down at the beautiful creature stretched out before me like a virgin sacrifice, I thank God for every sin that has blackened my cold heart. Because I'm going to make her beg, scream, and suffer for me. Then I'm going to make her mine.

When you are a son and one of the heirs to the legacy of the Cavalieri name, you need to be more vicious than your enemies. Sometimes, the lines get blurred. Years ago, they tried to use her as a pawn in a revenge scheme against me. Even though I cared about her, I let them treat her as if she were nothing. I was too arrogant and self-involved to protect her then. But I'm here now. Ready to risk my life tracking down every single one of them. They'll pay for what they've done as surely as I'll pay for my sins against her.

I never asked for an assistant, and if I had, I sure as hell wouldn't have chosen her. With her sharp tongue and lack of discipline, what she needs is a firm hand, not a job. The more she tests my limits, the more tempted I am to bend her over my knee. As a Russian Mafia boss, I can't afford distractions... or secrets. I suspect my innocent new assistant is hiding something, and I know just how to get to the truth.

When I give an order, I expect it to be obeyed. She's too smart for her own good, and it's going to get her killed. Against my better judgement, I put her under the protection of my powerful Russian mafia family. So imagine my anger when the little minx ran. For three long years I've been on her trail, always one step behind. Finding and claiming her had become an obsession. It was getting harder to rein in my driving need to possess her... to own her. But now the chase is over. I've found her. Soon she will be mine.

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.

She couldn't have known the danger she faced when she dared to steal from me. She was too young for a man my age, barely in her twenties. Far too pure and untouched. Unfortunately for her, that wasn't going to stop me. The moment I laid eyes on her, I claimed her. Determined to make her mine… by any means necessary. I owned Chicago's most elite gambling club, a front for my role as a Russian Mafia crime boss. She was a fragile little bird who had just flown straight into my open jaws. Naïve and sweet, she was a temptation I couldn't resist biting.

The true legacy of the Cavalieri family, my birthright, ties me to a woman I despise: the daughter of the mafia boss who nearly ended my family. Making her both my enemy... and my future wife. The hatred is mutual; she has no desire for me to be her groom. A prisoner to her family's ambitions, she's desperate for a way out. My duty is to guard her, to ensure she doesn't escape her gilded cage. But every moment spent with her, every spark of anger, adds fuel to the growing fire of desire between us. We're trapped in a volatile duel of passion and fury.

Only a monster would kidnap a woman from her brother's wedding, but that's what I've become. Now this innocent girl is my captive. Mine to use and punish in the most shameful of ways.