Eric

Verona City was carved into two kingdoms of crime: the DeRossi mafia and the Vargassi syndicate. Their hatred was legendary—an old wound that never healed, a feud fed by blood and betrayal for generations. Luca DeRossi, the heir to the DeRossi empire, grew up learning that the Vargassis were the enemy. Isabella Vargassi, daughter of the Vargassi boss, was taught the same. Yet neither lesson mattered the night they met. It happened at a rare peace negotiation, a meeting doomed from the start. But across the table, Luca’s sharp gaze met Isabella’s fierce, fearless eyes. Something formed in that instant—something neither could kill. Secret meetings followed. Hidden smiles. Stolen hours in abandoned warehouses and rooftop gardens where no gunmen patrolled. Their love was forbidden, reckless, doomed… and irresistible. But one night, as the city slept beneath flickering streetlamps, Isabella made a choice. She pushed Luca away. “We can’t keep doing this,” she whispered. He thought it was fear. He thought she simply couldn’t handle the risk. And though it shattered him, he let her go. What he didn’t know—what Isabella couldn’t bring herself to say—was the truth growing quietly inside her. She was pregnant. Panic gnawed at her. If her father discovered the child was DeRossi blood, there would be war—worse than anything Verona had seen. And if the DeRossi family learned she carried their heir? Luca would be dragged into a conflict he couldn’t escape. So she protected them both the only way she could: by disappearing. Weeks later, the feud between their families reignited, fiercer than ever. Luca threw himself into the chaos, trying to bury the memory of the girl he still loved. But Isabella, hiding in a small apartment across the river, held her growing belly and whispered: “He’ll know one day… when it’s safe.”