He’s dark. Dirty. Dangerous. A brother in my dad’s MC. Everything Mom told me to avoid. Everything I shouldn’t want. But his dark, his dirty, and his dangerous are like catnip to me. He stirs fear into the hearts of men, but I hear his rage. I feel it like it’s my own. He’s a killer. Shameless. Some might even call him a psycho. I just call him soul mate. We were born to raise hell together.

When my father tries to force me to marry one of his cronies, I run away to my half-brother's home. He's the black sheep of the family, a biker, not an Irish mobster. At the Satan's Sinners' MC compound, I find more than I bargained for. Not my brother, ironically, but a man who gives a whole other meaning to "white knight." He's dark and mysterious, a seeker of answers and a finder of truths. Even better? He offers me an out, a shotgun wedding in Vegas.

Star's my penguin. She doesn't know it. She took off. Sure. I'm mad at her. Sure. But that's her charm. She's ornery. Difficult. Impossible to love, but I see her BS. And I call her on it. I'll chase her from the North Pole to Antarctica. This Fecker isn't about to lose his soul mate.

Conor's my lifeline. He doesn't know it. I need him to find me. I need him to chase me. I need him to love me. If I haven't already destroyed what we might have had, he's crazy enough to take me on. My Fecker. Mine.

A chance meeting brings Jen MacNeill into my life - the woman born to reign at my side. A new don reigns over Manhattan. But though I won the war, peace isn’t easily brokered. Over a decade of avenging my father’s death, I made many enemies. To each and every one, Jen’s a target. But I’ll paint New York City red before I let them harm her. I just never imagined I’d be in the line of fire first.

She was an assignment: a selfish brat who'd run away from home and who’d found refuge in an MC, a spoiled pain in my ass that I had to bring back to Daddy. Only—Isabelle is nothing like the picture my initial research painted. Yes, she's a brat. Yes, she's insecure. And yes, she's a Disciple…sort of. But she's so much more than that. So broken, yet so hopeful. So lost, yet so eager to be found.

Secrets—you know my family is founded on them. Lies—my marriage hinges on one. I kept the past buried like a coward. Now, I feel the constraints of my choices like they’re a chokehold. I know that it’s time to tell my wife the truth. It’s time to deal with the consequences of my actions. Aoife deserves to be my judge, jury, and executioner. If she burns down the house with me in it, well, that’s on me and my filthy secrets….

In my world, women are property. Made to be owned. Born for one reason - to be tied to a powerful man, to bear the next generation. That reason is why I don’t want to be married. But women aren’t the only ones with zero say in their lives.... And my bride? Bratva scum.

The second our eyes meet, I feel it. The ticking clock. It's only a matter of time before we come together. Before the heat that arcs between us turns into a conflagration. But he's a mobster. An O’Donnelly. His notoriety is legendary. I'm a journalist. I expose men like him, which is how I built my reputation.

Fifteen years ago, she fell into my world. Fifteen years ago, I fell for her. She’s the love of my life. No going back. Loving someone means sacrificing your own happiness to protect them. Loving someone means making them hate you to keep them safe, to get them away from the toxicity that is your world. I destroyed us before we even had a chance to begin…. Can a near death experience bring both my kid and the woman who owns my heart back to me? This is Declan O'Donnelly's story.