The Devil’s Scar by Zoey Parker

I can’t say no when he tells me to bend over.

Going home with him was my first mistake.
But the bad boy set my insides on fire.
Now, he’s back at my door – but for a different reason.
This time, he’s here to kill me.

MADELINE

It wasn’t supposed to be like this.
I came to the city with big dreams and the belief that people were good at heart.
But I’ve been here long enough to learn the truth:

Deep down, we’re all just animals.

He seemed different at first.
A gentleman, almost, in a weird enough way.
But I was too drunk and too foolish to see the beast that hid waiting inside him.
And by the time he let it out, it was too late to run away.

I did the only thing I could do:
I submitted.

I’m not proud of this, but I fell to the floor and did everything he told me to do.
And here’s the sickest part of all…

I loved it.

At least, I did back then.
But now, the chickens have come home to roost.
And when I wake up with a sick feeling in my stomach, I know exactly what it is.

I’m pregnant with Nikolai’s baby.

NIKOLAI

I laughed when she answered the door.
Her jaw dropped almost as fast as her skirt did on the night we met.
I’ll admit, I was surprised, too.
I never expected to see her again.

But if I’ve learned anything in my time as a mafia hitman, it’s that there’s only one way to get someone out of your life for good:
Put them in the dirt.

That’s what I’d come here to do.
Her brother had wronged my employer.
And now it fell to me to bring mob justice to his doorstep.

Along with anyone else in the room.

It was fate that I’d hurt her sooner or later.
That’s just the way of the outlaw.
She thought she’d escaped unscathed.
But destiny brought us together so I could teach her a dark lesson:

The devil never forgets.