Cruel Master, the dark and explosive conclusion to the Sinister Arrangement Duet from USA Today bestselling authors Lucy Smoke & A.J. Macey, is available now!
It never mattered how far I ran … he was always going to catch me. Because I belong to him—body, mind, and soul.
My innocence is gone.
My father is dead.
And I’m no longer the girl who was forced to marry a hitman.
I’m stronger.
For the last five years I’ve been running from both my sister’s vengeful anger, and from my husband’s intense obsession.
When Gaven finally captures me—I have no other choice but to use him the same way he always planned to use me. The closer I am, the more information I have, the safer we both are. So, I’ll take his punishment for leaving. I’ll take his pain and his pleasure.
My wedding night might have ended in pain and betrayal, but I won’t let my life end the same.
He’s a killer and I’m a target. In the end, someone has to die, but who is it going to be this time?
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Keep reading for a look inside Cruel Master!
PROLOGUE: GAVEN
18 years old…
Snow sounded like fire embers when it was falling. Few people realized that. No, they wouldn’t ever realize that unless they shut the fuck up long enough and just listened to the sound of it. I supposed that, were I in different circumstances, I wouldn’t know something so trivial either. Still, it didn’t make the idiots of this world easier to deal with.
While everyone else was shopping for Christmas presents on this frost-covered December night, I was here—several miles outside of the city with little more than a thrifted, hole-infested, winter coat that might have been quite nice several decades ago to keep the chill at bay. As if to punctuate my own inferiority to the rest of the world, my stomach rumbled with hunger.
“Fuck.” I rolled onto my back and closed my eyes, shutting out the dark covering of trees over my head. I shivered as the layer of snow beneath me soaked into my back.
I’d been out here for hours—dropped off long ago by the man I was currently working for. Or rather, I’d been dropped off by one of his henchmen. There was no way, after all, that a man as powerful as Jason Perelli was going to be seen with a wannabe hitman when I hadn’t even proven myself. For all he knew, I’d get caught after my first kill. To him, I was little more than a greedy cleaner wanting a better life, and he needed plausible deniability.
My stomach rumbled again and I settled a hand over my lower abdomen.
When was the last time I’d actually had something to eat and it hadn’t left me craving more?
Unlike most of the guys I worked around—I didn’t work out to stay in shape. I didn’t have to. Instead, I hauled boxes down by the bay during the day, and during the night, I was shipped around to various places in the city as a glorified janitor to clean up messy kills for the crime families in the area.
I wondered how many people in the city tonight went to bed with the comforting unknowing of all the evil and wicked things that lingered in this shit world. How many of them hadn’t seen the brain matter of a half-naked woman sprawled across an expensive ivory marbled floor or had to get on their hands and knees and scrub out blood from the grit of the tile in some millionaire’s bathroom?
Most of them, I figured silently. Lucky fucking bastards.
Then again, if it hadn’t been for my one foster brother some years back, I likely never would’ve known myself. Too bad for Antonio though. He’d died only a few months into what would also be my last foster home—gunned down outside of the theater because the stupid fucker had run his mouth about the great new job he’d gotten working for the Perelli man.
His loss though had been my gain and when Jason Perelli’s men had come around the next time, I’d lined up for the empty position. The money, however, was never enough. It never went far—clothes, food, rent. New York was a massive pile of leeches, sucking the life out of any man or woman that was miserable enough to get stuck here without a way out.
I opened my eyes at that thought and rolled back over, my thinly gloved finger finding the trigger as I settled back into my earlier position. This would be my out, I swore. Blood. Murder. Havoc. War. It didn’t matter what I had to do. Someday, I would be one of those rich fuckers who called little shits like me to come and clean their messes. I didn’t care how many lives I had to take to feel some of that warmth. A fire on cold, dark nights like this.
In the end, this world was all about survival of the fittest and I was going to be one of them.
For more information about Lucy Smoke and her books, visit her website:
https://www.lucysmoke.com/
For more information about A.J. Macey and her books, visit her website:
https://www.authorajmacey.com/
My Review
5 Stars
Cruel Master by Lucy Smoke & A,J. Macey is
book Two in the Sinister Arrangement Series. This continues the story of
Gavin Belmonte and Angelina Evangeline ‘Angel’. This is not a
standalone book so you will need to have read the previous book 'Wicked
Angel' before starting this one. Gavin has finally found his run away
bride. Angel has changed from the scared 18 year old girl to a more
confident women. I really enjoyed this duet.
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