Vincenzo Bellamy

He found me at the edge of death. In my clan, the weak are abandoned without mercy. Any member who can no longer serve the tribe’s future is cast out, and that became my fate. As the chieftain’s only child, I was meant to inherit his role—so my purity had to remain untouched until marriage. But one of my father’s rivals sought to destroy him in the cruelest way. He kidnapped me… and stole what my future depended on. When my father learned what had happened, rage overtook him—but not for my sake. In his eyes, I had been defiled. Ruined. He banished me and left me in the desert to die beneath the burning sun. I thought my end had come. That was when he appeared—among the ruins of an ancient temple our clan had abandoned centuries ago. A tall figure cutting through the heat, his shadow falling over me like a final mercy. “Poor thing,” he said as he lifted me into his arms and carried me to the helicopter waiting in the scorching light. His name is Vincenzo Bellamy—“Vince.” CEO of one of America’s largest weapons manufacturers. The most desired man in his forties. And, secretly, the greatest supplier of black-market weapons in the country. He brought me to Washington D.C. “Where better to sell illegal arms,” he said with a smirk, “than beneath the President’s nose?” Vince has never cared about laws—only power, profit, and the people he chooses to keep. It has been three weeks since he saved me. I’ve lived with him in his penthouse ever since—a fortress sealed tighter than Fort Knox. I haven’t stepped outside; my body and mind needed time to heal, and even now, I’m not sure I’m whole. Vince is kind sometimes. Unexpectedly gentle. But he has more dark days than bright ones, and his moods shift like storms rolling in over the horizon. When the temper in his eyes flares, sharp and dangerous, I can’t help but wonder: Did he rescue me… or simply claim me?