"Please don't kill me." She pleaded in a slightly cracked voice. I pursed my lips, thinking hard about what to do with her. "Kill her, and let's get out of here." Lorenzo urged but I shook my head and lowered my gun. She was too beautiful to die just like that. ~•~ Ava Martinez's world is shattered when a mafia boss, Ruiz Giovanni, brutally murders her family and kidnaps her. Ava's feelings for Ruiz are complicated and her desire to escape is matched by her forbidden attraction to the man who destroyed her life. Will Ava find a way to escape or will she fall in love with the person who murdered her family?
Ruiz Giovanni
~•~
"Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned." My shrill voice echoed through the church. "It has been long since I had my last confession."
"What troubles you, my child?" The priest's voice echoed from the other side of the confession room.
"I have killed a total of fifteen persons in the last twenty-four hours," I said and closed my eyes tightly as the memories of the previous day replayed in my head.
Father Francis let out a loud gasp and I put my hand over my mouth to prevent myself from laughing. "Did you at least do it for a good cause, Ruiz?"
Of course, I wouldn't go around killing people if it wasn't necessary. They crossed my territory. They stole from me and I had to retaliate by wiping out half of their men.
"Yes, they stole from me." I raked a hand through my long black hair. "Forgive me, father." I slumped my head back on the wooden chair.
"Ruiz, my child, your sins are grave indeed." Father Francis said, his voice laced with concern. "But the lord is always ready to forgive his children, you're forgiven. Strive to do better because I fear for your soul."
I snorted, a wry smile spreading across my face. "My soul is long gone. But I will strive to do better." The lie tasted bitter on my lips but I needed to tell Father Francis what he wanted to hear.
I walked out of the confessional booth, holding back a grin as I made my way out of the church. One must've wondered why I always confessed my sins without any fear but I had Father Francis wrapped around my fingers.
He wouldn't dare say anything about me because he knew it would just put his life in danger. Aside from that, I trusted him.
My mother forced me and my siblings to go to church regularly while growing up. So technically, Father Francis watched me grow up.
I grew fond of him and he tried his best to stop me from joining gangs back when I was a teenager, but my mind was made up and all his pleas fell on deaf ears.
Even if I considered his pleas at one point in my life, there was no redemption for me anymore, because I wasn't going to stop until I found out who exactly killed my brother.
As I settled in my car, I turned up the stereo and was about to start the ignition of the car when my phone started ringing.
It was Lorenzo calling. Lorenzo was my best friend and my partner. "Speak, brother," I asked as I put him on speaker while my eyes were fixed on the road.
"I've gotten intel on the other gang who stole from us, I'll send you the details now." As soon as he ended the call, my phone pinged with a text.
I shook my head as I read his text. The location wasn't far from where I was. Lorenzo and some of our other men were going to meet me there.
Two gangs came together to steal from me. Initially, we had found only one of them. The people who made me visit Father Francis earlier.
"I guess I have to sin again." Anger coursed through my veins as I matched the brakes of the car and turned around, driving at full speed to the Martinez resident.
I respected Mr. Martinez and I never expected him and his members to steal my money and drugs. We were competitors, so we didn't see eye to eye, but I still respected him and would never steal from him.
Pulling up at the front gate, I opened the compartment of my car where I always kept my gun. I brought it out and made sure it was loaded before I stepped out of the car.
Lorenzo asked me to wait for his arrival before making any move but I didn't have much patience. I was fueled by anger, so I walked towards the gate and banged on it multiple times.
One guard opened the gate to see who it was and before he could say anything, I shot him on the head. His body fell to the ground and I walked past him.
As I entered inside, two other guards came firing shots at me, but I took them down with just two bullets. I had been to the Martinez residence a few times for business, so I knew my way around some parts of the house.
I made my way to the front door but before I could twist the door handle, I heard Lorenzo's voice behind me. "You couldn't wait?" He asked and I turned. His eyes darted across the lifeless bodies on the ground.
From his expression, I could tell he wasn't surprised.
The other men surrounded the compound while Lorenzo and I went into the house. The front door was easy to bypass. It was my line of work, so it didn't give me much trouble.
I could only hear voices coming from the TV in the living room. Lorenzo and I walked over to the living room and my surprise, I saw Martinez and his family seated with scared looks on their faces.
It was him, his wife, and two of his teenage kids.
"Ruiz, you don't have to do this. We can talk about it." Martinez pleaded when I pointed the gun at his wife who was also begging for her life.
I let out a dry chuckle. He knew what he did and there was nothing to talk about. He crossed a line and he was going to pay the consequences.
Without wasting time, I fired a shot at his wife and the blood spilled all over the cream-colored sofa. The rest of the family gasped in disbelief and I could see the fear in their eyes.
"Ruiz, plea.... "
I didn't let him complete his sentence before I fired a shot at him too, making his body fall to the ground. I turned over to the children. I didn't want them to have a life without their parents, so I fired two shots at them too.
"Let's go."
Lorenzo and I were about to walk back to the front door when we heard a brief sound coming from the staircase. "Did you hear that too?" Lorenzo asked and I nodded.
We both went upstairs and as we ascended the stairs, we heard footsteps running in the corridor. We looked at each other for a second before I increased my pace, running upstairs faster.
"Stop or I'll shoot you too!" I commanded, my gun trained on the fleeing figure. She froze and turned around slowly, it was dark but I could tell it was a female.
As I moved closer to her, I discovered she was Martinez's oldest daughter. I had seen her once or twice on several occasions. She didn't live in Spain and I had no idea she was in the country.
"Please don't kill me." She pleaded in a slightly cracked voice. I pursed my lips, thinking hard about what to do with her.
"Kill her, and let's get out of here." Lorenzo urged but I shook my head and lowered my gun. She was too beautiful to die just like that.
After five years of marriage, Billionaire Alexander Burke is convinced that his wife, Olivia Burke, doesn't love him. Olivia is also convinced her husband is still in love with his ex and their marriage is just for convenience. Alexander serves her divorce papers but soon regrets his impulsive decision. Desperate to win her back, he puts the divorce on hold. Olivia who has had enough of his encounters with his ex decides to finalize the divorce anyway. What will Alexander do when he realizes he has made the biggest mistake of his life? Will Olivia make him pay for his betrayal or fall for him all over again?
“I, Alpha Dimitri, reject you, Noah, as my mate.” His cruel words always replayed in my head. My stomach churned whenever I remembered that night. ~•~ When Alpha Dimitri rejects Noah Petrova as his mate, she faces an unfortunate fate and is stuck living with the man who broke her heart since his father took her into his home when her dad died during an attack. Along the line, she falls in love with his younger brother, Aiden, who has been in love with her ever since she moved into their house. Alpha Dimitri wasn’t happy about their relationship and tried his best to make their lives miserable. What happens when Aiden challenges his brother for the position of the alpha? Will he win? Or will Alpha Dimitri retain his power?
Being extremely skilled with hacking, Nessa sims faces an unfortunate fate when Vito Giancana, the don of the Italian mafia, notices her. He offers her a job when she realizes he is in the mafia, she rejects the offer, not wanting to involve herself in such an organization. However, Vito will not take no for an answer and forces her to live with him in to keep her identity a secret. In a forced proximity, they agree to keep their relationship strictly professional, but when they share a, would they be able to adhere to their agreement? Or would they put everything at risk to please themselves?
Allison fell in love with Ethan Iversen, the soon-to-be Alpha of the Moonlight Crown pack. She always wanted him to notice her. Meanwhile, Ethan was an arrogant Alpha who thought a weak Omega could not be his companion. Ethan's cousin, Ryan Iversen, who came back from abroad and was the actual heir of the pack, never tried to get the position nor did he show any interest in it. He was a popular playboy Alpha but when he came back to the pack, one thing captured his eyes and that was Allison.
Darya spent three years loving Micah, worshipping the ground he walked on. Until his neglect and his family's abuse finally woke her up to the ugly truth-he doesn't love her. Never did, never will. To her, he is a hero, her knight in shining armour. To him, she is an opportunist, a gold digger who schemed her way into his life. Darya accepts the harsh reality, gathers the shattered pieces of her dignity, divorces him, takes back her real name, reclaims her title as the country's youngest billionaire heiress. Their paths cross again at a party. Micah watches his ex-wife sing like an angel, tear up the dance floor, then thwart a lecher with a roundhouse kick. He realises, belatedly, that she's exactly the kind of woman he'd want to marry, if only he had taken the trouble to get to know her. Micah acts promptly to win her back, but discovers she's now surrounded by eligible bachelors: high-powered CEO, genius biochemist, award-winning singer, reformed playboy. Worse, she makes it pretty clear that she's done with him. Micah gears up for an uphill battle. He must prove to her he's still worthy of her love before she falls for someone else. And time is running out.
Corinne devoted three years of her life to her boyfriend, only for it to all go to waste. He saw her as nothing more than a country bumpkin and left her at the altar to be with his true love. After getting jilted, Corinne reclaimed her identity as the granddaughter of the town’s richest man, inherited a billion-dollar fortune, and ultimately rose to the top. But her success attracted the envy of others, and people constantly tried to bring her down. As she dealt with these troublemakers one by one, Mr. Hopkins, notorious for his ruthlessness, stood by and cheered her on. “Way to go, honey!”
To the public, she was the CEO's executive secretary. Behind closed doors, she was the wife he never officially acknowledged. Jenessa was elated when she learned that she was pregnant. But that joy was replaced with dread as her husband, Ryan, showered his affections on his first love. With a heavy heart, she chose to set him free and leave. When they met again, Ryan's attention was caught by Jenessa's protruding belly. "Whose child are you carrying?!" he demanded. But she only scoffed. "It's none of your business, my dear ex-husband!"
Accused of murder, Sylvia Todd's mother was deemed a traitor by the entire pack, condeming Sylvia to live the rest of her life alone in humiliation as a lowly slave. All she wanted to do was to prove her mother's innocence somehow, but fate never seemed to be on the side of the traitor's daughter. Still, Sylvia never lost hope. As the future lycan king of all werewolves, Rufus Duncan possessed great power and status, but he had an inexplicable reputation for being cruel, bloodthirsty, and ruthless. Unbeknownst to everyone, he had been cursed long ago to transform into a killer monster on every full moon. Even though fate did not always look upon the two, it brought Sylvia and Rufus together as each other's destined mates. Will justice be served for Sylvia's mother? What about Rufus' secret? Can Sylvia and Rufus defy all societal norms and stay together? Will these two unlucky souls have their happy ending?
"Sign the divorce papers and get out!" Leanna got married to pay a debt, but she was betrayed by her husband and shunned by her in-laws. Seeing that her efforts were in vain, she agreed to divorce and claimed her half of the properties. With her purse plump from the settlement, Leanna enjoyed her newfound freedom. The constant harassment from her ex's mistress never fazed her. She took back her identities as top hacker, champion racer, medical professor, and renowned jewelry designer. Then someone discovered her secret. Matthew smiled. "Will you have me as your next husband?"