Brian by Maura Rose

BRIAN: Life in Dublin isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Sure, I have steady work tending bar in the family pub, but I’m tired of feeling stuck. The dreariness of day-to-day existence, the monotony… it’s getting to me.
So when my brother mentions a job opportunity with the Irish mob in the U.S., I’m more than happy to hop on a plane and start a new life—a life with promise, a life with opportunity. Especially after meeting her. Kathleen. Beautiful, sassy, whip-smart Kathleen. I can’t keep myself away from her, and I take every chance I get to meet with her… to breathe her in, to touch her, to taste her…
There’s just one problem: Kathleen doesn’t know I’m in the Irish mafia, and I don’t know how to tell her. What’s worse—I don’t know if she’ll want anything to do with me once she finds out.

KATHLEEN: I’m the heir to an Irish mafia family, but I want more than what this life has to offer. Especially since ‘this life’ involves living under my mother’s tyrannical thumb. I can hardly stand to be in the same room with her, and it seems like the feeling is mutual. I do whatever I can to get away, whenever I can—but it’s not enough.
Then I meet Brian—gorgeous, charming Brian, with his warm eyes and Irish brogue. He’s a diamond in the rough, a silver lining in my cloudy life, a passionate lover with a generous heart. I feel terrible lying to him about what my family business really is, but what else can I do?
I want to escape, to run away with Brian and never look back, but that’s easier said than done when you’re a mob boss’s daughter. In this life, breaking away from your family comes at great cost—a cost that’s stained in blood and death.