He expected a mafia princess but sheโs so much more.
Dangerโs Heir, a sexy romantic suspense novel set in the mafia world from New York Times bestselling author Mari Carr and award-winning author Lila Dubois is out now!
She fell in love, got marriedโฆand it was all a lie.
They expected a mafia princess, but when Rodrigo meets the woman his father is forcing him to marry, he realizes Giada is much more than she seems. Smart and dangerous, sheโs the kind of woman he could loveโฆtoo bad everything heโs about to tell her is a lie.
Casson knows Rodrigo is in too deep. Rodrigoโs undercover mission as the heir to a powerful Camorra don should have ended long ago, but now heโs engaged to the daughter of another dangerous man, and itโs Cassonโs job to pull him out.
Thereโs just one problem. Giada.
Sheโs nothing either man expected, and everything they want. The last thing they expect is for Giada to invite both of them to her bed.
As the wedding day looms closer, and enemies close in, the line between what’s real and what’s a lie becomes blurred, and Rodrigo and Casson have to decide if love is enough. And if they should tell her the truth.
Unfortunately, thereโs someone else waiting in the wings to make sure they never say โI do.โ
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Keep reading for a look inside Dangerโs Heir!
Chapter One
Rome wouldnโt burn again if he could help it.
Antonio Starabba slid into his desk chair with a sigh. He would have stifled the sigh if thereโd been anyone else in the room besides his husband and wife. Karl was working, papers spread out on the low table in the center of the small seating area. Leila was occupied with something less casual. She was disassembling and reassembling a sniper rifle with alarming quickness.
Antonio wasnโt one for guns, but his wife was sexy in a very dangerous way while holding a large gun. No one but himself and Karl ever got to see her with it, since on those occasions that she reactivated her expertise as a sniper, her targets never saw her.
โYou donโt have to stay,โ Antonio said in Italian. His spouses were now fluent in the language of Antonioโs home territory.
โDo you want us to leave?โ Karl didnโt look up.
โNever.โ
โThen weโll stay for quiet moral support.โ
โIโm not going to be quiet.โ Leila smiled. โIโll keep practicing. One of them might recognize the sound.โ
โIs it a good idea to threaten the fleet admiral?โ Now Karl did look up.
โIโm not threatening him.โ There was a sinister clack as she popped a piece into place. โThis is for those morons in Castile.โ
Antonio grunted his agreement with that statement even as he turned on his computer. It would take a few minutes for the secure video chat to come online.
โHowโs Milo?โ Karl asked.
Asking about Milo Moretti wasnโt the subject jump it might have seemed. Miloโs wife was the flashpoint for their current crisis, through no fault of her own. Several months ago, Dr. Talya Maes had been kidnapped by the mafia. Sheโd been held prisoner alongside human trafficking victims, but sheโd been taken to help the Camorra with a very different sort of crime. Theyโd wanted Talya to create a bio-weapon. A drug that would turn people into caution-less super soldiers.
The entire Talya situation had been a mess from beginning to end. First because despite the fact that Talya was a member of the Mastersโ Admiralty, Europe’s oldest still-functioning secret society, no one had noticed sheโd gone missing. The society was divided geographically into nine territories, whose borders were based on maps and empires far older than modern Europe. It just so happened that Talya had lived along one of the borders, which cut through modern-day Belgium, and each territory thought she was a member of the other.
Antonio had publicly expressed disapproval with the admirals of France and Germany for failing Talya, but secretly he felt sorry for them. Being the head of a territory wasnโt easy, or fun. Antonio had never wanted to be a territory leader. Never wanted to be admiral of Rome, which encompassed Italy, all the coastline of the Adriatic sea, and the major islands in the Mediterranean. However, that was exactly what heโd become after his father, the previous admiral had been severely wounded in a bombing. Antonio had been named acting admiral while his father recovered, and eventually his father had stepped down. Antonio had expected his father to resume the admiralship, but his fatherโs long recovery, coupled with his pride at seeing Antonio holding the position of admiral, had pushed him to retire.
The position of admiral of Rome should have gone to his sister, Sophia. Instead she was now living in England, both the territory and the modern-day country, and married to two good men, including Englandโs admiral. She would have made a brilliant admiral if fate, and the previous fleet admiral, hadnโt intervened. But her leadership and skills hadnโt been wasted. When the current fleet admiral, Eric Ericsson, whom Antonio was about to meet with, had taken an unplanned, unsanctioned vacation, Sophia was the one heโd left in charge. Sophia, whoโd been taught to lead, negotiate, and manipulate since she could talk, was also the lead on building a relationship with the Americans, but that was a separate issue.
Talya Maesโ months of imprisonment by the Camorra ended when a Spanish member was also kidnapped, and one of Antonioโs security officers, Milo Moretti, helped orchestrate her rescue. Milo had seen Talya during that op and vowed to return to free her even before anyone knew that she was a member of the Mastersโ Admiralty.
And if the rescue had been the end of Talya, Milo, and Henriโs story, Antonio wouldnโt be having this meeting.
His computer dinged, signaling that the meeting was connecting.
โHold on, let me get back to the part that makes the scary noise,โ Leila muttered, quickly disassembling the long rifle.
โYouโre terrifying sometimes.โ Karl murmured, still engrossed in his work.
โThank you.โ
โYouโre welcome, geliefde.โ
Antonio smiled at his spouses, but quickly blanked his expression as his camera turned on.
Three video windows appeared, including his own. In the first, two men sat side by side in a dim concrete room. From the intel Antonio had on Castile-โthe territory that contained modern-day Spain and Portugalโ-Antonio assumed they were calling from the bunker-like ops headquarters in the basement of one of the territory-owned buildings.
Admiral Santiago De Leon was older and, while fairly new in his position, he was a powerful admiral. The man beside him, Vicente Coval, was also powerful, but in a dark, deadly way that befit a security minister. Each territory was ruled by three people, with the admiral as the main power. However, an admiral could be overruled by his vice admiral and security minister. The trinity checks and balances system was meant to stop any one admiral from abusing their power, though as Hungary could attest to, that didnโt always work.
The leadership was a trinity, as were the relationships among members. The defining characteristic of the Mastersโ Admiralty was arranged marriages between three people. Antonio had grown up in the society and, to him, the idea of a relationship with just two people feltโฆunbalanced and odd.
The third window held the fourth attendee of this meeting. The fleet admiral was the leader of the society. Not part of any territory, the fleet admiralโs power was checked not by a trinity leadership model, but by the nine territory admirals.
Antonio examined Eric and acknowledged to himself that if the time ever came that they needed to move against the fleet admiral, heโd have Leila shoot him from a distance.
For a moment there was heavy silence, then Eric spoke.
โI was going to sing.โ
Antonio sighed to himself, Leila smothered a snort, and Karl looked up, his glasses making him look ridiculously sexy.
โSing, Fleet Admiral?โ Santiago asked with a quick smile.
โHave you seen The Sound of Music? Remember that โproblem like Mariaโ song?โ Theyโd been speaking French, but he switched to English. โI was going to make it โproblem like Rodrigoโ but I couldnโt get the verses to fit. Hard to rhyme stuff with mafia.โ
โThe Camorra,โ Antonio said. โNot just the mafia.โ
Eric leaned back in his chair, seeming to consider. โNo, I donโt think that makes the rhyming easier. English is a ridiculous language.โ
That they could all agree on, since both Castellano and Italian were clearly superior. Antonio wasnโt sure about Ericโs native Danish, but Leila said it was a beautiful language.
โRodrigo is not a problem,โ Vicente said, cutting through the light moment.
โYes, he is,โ Antonio countered. โHeโs clearly defected. Understandable, but not an excuse.โ
During the prep to save Talya, it was discovered that Rodrigo was the secret son of a Camorra don. That same don was holding Talya Maes, so Rodrigo had been sent in to the mafiaโit could hardly be called undercover since it was his real identityโto rescue her. Talya was safe, finally, but Rodrigo had refused to back out.
Antonio felt sympathy for the man, but it didnโt change the facts. โHeโs given up hisโโ
โHeโs given up nothing. He is still one of us. Still loyal,โ Vicente insisted.
Antonio understood the other manโs stout defense. As security minister of Castile, Vicente was the leader of that territoryโs security officers. While law and order within the society was overseen by the knights, headed by the vice admiral, the quiet, dangerous work was the purview of the security officers. Antonio had been a security officer before being forced into the position of admiral. And Rodrigo, the subject of todayโs meeting, wasโฆhad beenโฆa security officer for Castile.
โHe kidnappedโฆre-kidnappedโฆDr. Maes,โ Antonio said. โHis job was to rescue her, which he did, and he should have stopped there.โ
โShe came to no harm,โ Vicente countered. โIf youโd spoken to Talya, as I have, you would know that Rodrigo didnโt hurt her.โ
โI have spoken to Dr. Maes, as she is now a member of my territory, and married to one of my security officers.โ
Milo was more than just a security officer. Milo was Antonioโs friend, but he wouldnโt disclose anything so personal in this venue.
โIf you object to the burning of your territory, that was your man, not Rodrigo.โ
After Rodrigo kidnapped Dr. Maes, Milo and Henri Fortin had chased him across France and Italy. As they pursued, they waged a small war. Billionaire Henri had attacked the Camorra on paper, buying up companies and taking control of ports they used. Milo had been more directโheโd set fire to every Camorra property he could find. Privately, Antonio had asked Milo what the fuck heโd been thinking, as all that property damage was risky and drew attention. Milo had replied that Antonio should be grateful heโd chosen fire and not C4.
โDid you fiddle?โ Eric asked.
Antonioโs eye twitched. That joke was getting old, even if he himself had been thinking something along those lines. โIโm no Nero, and this isnโt about the fires. Itโs about Rodrigo. Heโs his fatherโs son.โ
โNo,โ Vicente insisted. โHe never hurt Talya. And his plan worked. The Camorra think her drug isnโt viable. The kidnapping is regrettable, but there was no lasting harm from it.โ
Leila and Karl both stiffened. It was slight, but Antonio caught it. Theyโd both been taken by a serial killer. Kidnapped and tortured, they no longer had nightmares, but what had happened would always be a part of them.
โIf you believe that, then I pity your wife,โ Antonio snarled. Gabriella, the Spanish heiress whose kidnapping had exposed Talyaโs captivity, was Vicenteโs spouse.
Vicenteโs expression, already cold, froze.
โAntonio,โ Eric warned.
โIf heโs ignoring how his wife sufferedโโ
โDo not speak about my wife.โ
โโthen she deserves better.โ
โAdmiral Starabba,โ Eric barked. โStop.โ
Strangely, Vicente seemed to have calmed with Antonioโs final words. โShe does deserve better,โ he said. โBoth of my spouses do.โ
โNo more talking about anyoneโs wives,โ Eric declared.
Leila snapped two pieces of the rifle together, the noise loud and sharp.
Vicenteโs eyes narrowed. He clearly recognized that sound.
On screen, Eric put his elbows on his desk and his head in his hands. โHej, Leila.โ
โHej flรฅdeadmiral,โ she called out.
โI thought this meeting was private.โ Santiago raised a brow.
โTheyโre here because Leila is the one who saw the article,โ Antonio said.
There was silence before Eric lifted his head from his hands. โOkay, Iโll bite. What article?โ
Antonio grabbed his mouse. โI told you that Rodrigo is lost to us. He belongs to the Camorra.โ
โNo,โ Vicente insisted. โThereโs a reason heโs still undercover. He is a good operative, and we need to trust him.โ
Abruptly tired, Antonio shared his screen, showing everyone else the newspaper article Leila had seen. Antonio half expected that maybe Vicente already knew about it. It would make sense for him to have alerts set up to notify him of any mention of Rodrigo. But then again, he probably had alerts set up to notify him when police reports or crime information with Rodrigoโs name appeared.
He probably didnโt have an alert set up for the society pages.
โWhat am I looking at?โ Eric said.
Antonio opened a second document, which had the small announcement translated into both French and English.
โOh shit.โ Eric sat back. โRodrigo is getting married?โ
โRodrigo is getting married,โ Antonio confirmed. โTo a mafia princess.โ
Danger’s Heir by Mari Carr
Tanya My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Dangerโs Heir is Mastersโ Admiralty #9 This is the first book that I have read of either of these authors. I know that each of the books in this series can be read as a standalone. I really feel that I missed out on so much of the story by not having read any of the other books.
The Prologue was confusing with all the introductions of characters. Again this might have been made up by having read the other books. I am glad that I kept reading this book. Because I ended up really liking this book.
This is Giada Russo, Rodrigo Capello and Casson Boteroโs story. I want to go back and read more from this series, and I think I will start at book one. For now, once I got over my confusion, I enjoyed this book. 4 stars
About Mari Carr
Virginia native Mari Carr is a New York Times and USA TODAY bestseller of contemporary romance novels. With over one million copies of her books sold, Mari was the winner of the Romance Writers of Americaโs Passionate Plume award for her novella, Erotic Research. She has over a hundred published works, including her popular Wild Irish and Compass books, along with the Trinity Masters series she writes with Lila Dubois.
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Meet Lila Dubois
Lila Dubois is a multi-published, bestselling author of erotic, paranormal and fantasy romance. Her books have been nominated for many awards including RT Book Reviews Erotic Novella for Undone Rebel and the Golden Flogger. Having spent extensive time in France, Egypt, Turkey, Ireland and England Lila speaks five languages, none of them (including English) fluently. Lila lives in California with her own Irish Farm Boy and loves receiving email from readers.
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