The Emperor

Dante Maroni is the heir to the Tenebrae Outfit and has spent his life being prepared for it. What he shows people is charm; what he keeps to himself is the willingness to be brutal when the situation requires it, and the fact that he has been in love with one woman for as long as he can remember. He goes undercover inside the syndicate that is responsible for a set of missing children and finds information that upends his understanding of his own family, which forces him to start a game with lethal rules. Amara is the daughter of the Maroni housekeeper; she was abducted and tortured at fifteen and has since built something like a normal life, unknowingly under protection, until her world comes apart again and she is pulled into the same game.

Amara has loved Dante for longer than she has admitted to herself, and the years of being unknowingly protected are what leave her unprepared for him.