Lucia Moretti expected her marriage to die in the shadows. She expected the mercy of silence. The grace of a closed door. Instead, Kade Virelli executed their union in a public spectacle. He didn’t hand her the divorce papers – he flung them at her feet in the courthouse lobby, letting the legal ink splatter across the marble like a slap to the face. He did it in front of them all: the Hellhounds, their rival syndicates, and the vultures with cameras who feasted on her public unraveling. “Sign it.” Kade’s voice was a flatline. No heat. No pulse. “The marriage is dead.” He wasn’t wearing anger. He wasn’t wearing regret. He looked at her like a man staring at a stain he’d finally scrubbed clean. So she knelt. She signed while the pen stuttered in her shaking grip. She signed while flashbulbs seared her retinas. She signed while a secret bloomed inside her – a tiny, frantic heartbeat that belonged to the monster standing over her. Within forty-eight hours, Kade Virelli erased her. Her bank accounts didn’t just freeze – they bled dry. Her job didn’t just vanish – it went up in smoke after a single phone call. Her apartment wasn’t just sealed – it was reclaimed by the man who owned every inch of the city’s concrete. In Virelli City, help wasn’t an option. It was a death sentence. Because everyone knew the gospel of the streets: You don’t cross the Devil. You don’t even look him in the eye. Kade wasn’t just an ex-husband. He was President of the Hellhounds MC. The city’s apex predator – a man who could dismantle a soul without ever staining his hands. And he’d dismantled hers until nothing was left but bone. But then the wolves began to circle. When rival bikers started tracing her scent… When cartel shadows slunk after her into the night… When her name became a whisper on the lips of men who traded in flesh… The Devil returned. Not to apologize. Not to rescue. But to reclaim. He followed her like a haunting. Watched her until the air grew thick with his presence. Protected her with a violence that turned her blood to ice. He didn’t want her back. He wanted her owned. “She’s not yours to touch.” Kade’s snarl was cut short by the crack of breaking bone – he snapped a man’s arm like a dry twig. The ink on the papers was dry. The law said they were strangers. But Kade Virelli never let anything go. Lucia didn’t realize the divorce wasn’t an exit – it was a trap. He hadn’t abandoned her to the wolves; he’d used her as bait to see who would dare touch what was his. He hadn’t discarded her. He’d marked her. And in a city ruled by predators, being marked by the Devil meant only one thing: She would never breathe a breath of freedom again.

Elara Hart’s Christmas is ruined in one night—her ex cheats, her promotion collapses, and her family demands she bring home a fiancé she doesn’t have.In desperation, she hires a stranger.Not just any stranger—Jace Wolfe.A biker with tattoos on his throat, danger in his smile,and a body built to ruin a woman’s self-control.He agrees to play her fiancé…but from the moment his fingers brush her jaw,Elara knows Jace doesn’t do “fake.”He leans close when she talks.He whispers instructions against her ear.He touches her like he’s testing boundaries—and like he already knows she’ll let him.“If I’m going to pretend I own you,” he says,“you’d better act like it.”Their arrangement becomes a game of tension and proximity—his hand on her lower back,his thumb brushing her lips,his breath warm on her throat when no one is watching.Publicly, he’s her perfect holiday fiancé.Privately, he’s the man who pushes her against the door and smirks when she blushes.Snowy nights blur into dangerous desire,and Elara begins craving the touches that were never part of the contract.Jace was supposed to be temporary.A performance.A lie.So why does he look at her like he plans to unwrap every secret she’s hiding?And why does her body answer him before her heart can deny anything?This holiday, Elara’s biggest risk isn’t the man she hired—it’s the fire he wakes inside her…the one she’s no longer sure she wants to control.