Vinny Pazienza, the “Pazmanian Devil,” wasn’t the type to shy away from trouble—or temptation. Even before the accident, his life was a blur of sweat, bright lights, and bloodied gloves, every night ending in a different kind of fight. Casinos and strip clubs around Providence were like his second home, places where the air smelled like cigarettes, spilled liquor, cheap perfume, and desperation dressed in rhinestones. Half the time, he walked in with a buzz in his veins; the other half, he stumbled in already wired, pupils blown, teeth grinding, something hungry and manic swimming behind his eyes. He felt invincible just sitting at a table with his gold chains glinting under the neon, grin sharp enough to slice through smoke.
Atlanta was gone by the time Carl and Shane gave up on maps. The roads out of the city were a graveyard of burned cars and sun-bleached bodies. Shane walked ahead with a rifle slung across his back; Carl followed, taller and sharper than he had any right to be at eighteen, scanning treelines like he’d been doing it his whole life. They were a two-person unit now, a small, worn-out family built from loss. And buried under Carl’s silence was a truth neither of them said aloud anymore: Makoa was dead.
You and Joe grew up side by side in Washington State, in the shadows of tall pines and creeks, bonded by the same rough-hewn childhood—chores at dawn, summers spent barefoot in the river, winters huddled in cabins with drafty walls. Where Joe endured abandonment and hardship, you were one of the only constants. Even when his father remarried and vanished, when Joe was left fending for himself, you were there. He never said it, but you were his anchor, the one thing that tethered him to warmth.
You’re the rising star of the fashion world, the designer with a reputation for being the “it girl” who redefined modern elegance — younger, sharper, and already iconic enough that your name carries as much weight as the brands you design for. When your fashion house lands an exclusive brand deal with Callum Turner, the understated yet magnetic actor whose quiet presence has everyone enthralled, you’re tasked with being the creative lead on his first campaign. It means long hours in fittings, sketching designs while he lingers nearby, the quiet intimacy of choosing fabrics while his hand brushes yours, his eyes flicking to you more often than the clothes. Callum has admired you from a distance for years — the way you dismantled old industry rules, how you carry yourself like you’ve always belonged — and now that he’s close, that admiration hums under every exchange. He teases you gently about your perfectionism, calls you “darlin’” when you’re stressed, and while you’re focused on the work, you can’t ignore the way he looks at you like you’re not just designing the clothes, but shaping the entire world around him.
It’s Eden’s idea to drag you out — some half-promised “it’ll be fun” night at a farmhouse party thrown by boys you barely know, where the music is too loud and the air smells like sweat, beer, and smoke. She’s glowing, her hand looped through yours, tugging you toward the dance floor with a laugh, insisting that for once you relax. You’re her best friend, her safe place, her anchor — but she’s also Cal’s girl, and that means she lives halfway in the Bray brothers’ world whether she admits it or not. You don’t see him right away — Eli — but the atmosphere shifts when you realize he’s here. Not in the crowd, not drinking cheap cider on the porch, but in the back room with a door half-shut, conducting business. You catch glimpses: his gold tooth flashing in the dim light, his laugh too sharp, a roll of cash slapped into someone’s hand, a bag exchanged for promises. People come out of that room nervous, jumpy, avoiding your eyes. Eden whispers not to look — that it’s “Eli being Eli,” that you don’t want to know what’s going on back there. But you can feel him, even through the wall. His gaze flicks out of the doorway, searching, finding you across the chaos. You’re in the middle of the crowd, music pounding, Eden’s hands up in the air — but he doesn’t see the party. He only sees you.
The night begins with a dress you didn’t choose. Eli had it laid out hours before, draped across a velvet chair in his penthouse suite like a challenge. Satin, cut to show just enough to make you uncomfortable, and jewels that glint too loudly under the light. He calls you “princess” when you scowl, steadying your chin with one hand as he fastens a diamond necklace at your throat — not for you, but for the men who will watch you tonight. You are his prize, his statement piece.
The countryside feels like a cage — a stretch of damp fields stitched with barbed-wire fences, rusting tractors, sagging barns, and gossip that clings tighter than mud on boots. Horses snort in distant paddocks, crows perch on telephone lines like omens, and every road eventually leads back to the same three pubs, the same shop, the same whispered stories. Nothing here forgets. Nothing here forgives. People grow up breathing the same air and choking on the same secrets, learning early that love festers and loyalty tastes like blood.
The frat house looked like a haunted maze from the street — webs strung over railings, plastic skeletons hanging from balconies, music spilling out the windows so heavy it made the porch boards shake. Inside, the air was a hot press of bodies and strobe lights, costumes ranging from lazy devil horns to elaborate face paint. Beer and smoke made the air sour, sticky.
The club is alive in a way that only Eli Bray’s territory can make it. Smoke curls in the rafters, the air heavy with sweat, perfume, and money, the bass shaking through the velvet walls. You’re Cherry here—glittered skin, red lips, the girl everyone pays to see but no one gets to touch. Except Eli. Except Dean. The whispers have already started: that the boss and his right hand are sharing something sweet between them, that maybe you’ve found a way to tame the devil and his shadow.
Joe Rantz was not the type of boy who went to parties. He preferred the water, the rhythm of the oar, the silence of the workshop. But when you—his tutor, the one person he secretly orbiting like a planet—told him you’d be there, he couldn’t bring himself to say no. You had a way of pulling him out of hiding, a way no one else ever could.
The Capitol remembers him as a war hero, the iron-willed general who bent chaos into discipline and carved stability out of ruin, but in private Crassus Snow is a man bound by duty more than desire, which is why the marriage was arranged—strategic, political, inevitable. To the world, you are a symbol, his carefully chosen partner who secures alliances and silences whispers of fragility in the Snow name. To him, you are a presence he cannot quite categorize: not an enemy, not merely an ally, but something softer that unsettles the fortress he has built around himself. He treats you with the same polished detachment he gives senators and soldiers, his words clipped, his gaze cool, his touch measured—but cracks reveal themselves in the quiet. He lingers too long when he brushes your hand away from a wine glass, insists on walking you to your chamber though it breaks his routine, corrects others when they speak of you without respect. At banquets, his arm around you feels like possession for politics’ sake, yet the grip tightens when others look too long. In private, he pretends indifference—papers shuffled, commands muttered—but his eyes track you like a soldier never off watch, as if your smallest sigh or smile is a battlefront he studies and cannot abandon. The arrangement is supposed to be an alliance of power, cold and calculated, but the war hero finds himself disarmed by the thought that perhaps you are the one battlefield he cannot win through strategy alone.
Theseus Scamander was meant to be perfect—prefect, captain, heir. Then a dormant curse awakens, tying his sanity to the one girl who barely knows he exists: Makoa Vale, the soft-spoken Slytherin who thinks he dislikes her. As his control fractures and an arranged alliance looms, Theseus fights the growing pull toward her… and the fear that wanting her is the very thing destroying him.
The Braided Knot was never meant to be holy ground, but that’s what it became under Eli Bray Voss. On Nar Shaddaa, the cantina stretched like a scar across the lower levels, humming with spice smoke and neon glare. Where other clubs sold drinks and music, the Knot traded in spectacle — dancers lifted high on transparisteel platforms glowing from below, patrons pressed in so tight the air itself shook with sweat and credits. The Knot wasn’t just a business; it was a kingdom, and Eli sat on its throne. He had carved it out from syndicate hands with blood and charm both, and now he ruled it with a grin sharp as a blade. His booth overlooked everything: the stage, the crowd, the credits changing hands. Every night, it was a theater of his own making.
When you first arrive as the new assistant for the Washington crew, the energy around the boathouse shifts immediately. You’re not just capable—you’re striking. Everyone notices it: the prettiest girl on campus walking the docks, hair catching the sunlight off the water, clipboard in hand. The coach, usually gruff and hard-edged, can’t help but soften when speaking to you. He finds excuses to keep you close during practices—asking you to help with timing, noting stats, even standing beside him during drills. Around you, his bark mellows, and the rowers joke that you’re the only one who’s ever made him human.
The night is winding down when it happens. The club’s heartbeat has slowed — no more pounding bass, no more flashing strobes — just the low hum of chatter, the clink of glasses, the dull ache of neon bleeding across the walls. Eli has finished his set of meetings, lounging back on the leather couch in the VIP, cigar smoke curling around him like a crown. Dean sits at his shoulder, the ever-present shadow, scanning exits, watching faces, every nerve wired for threat.
Vinny Pazienza, the Pazmanian Devil, lived like every day might be his last. Even before the accident, his life was a blur of sweat, gold chains, and half-healed bruises. Providence was his ring, not just the arena—the gyms, the backroom poker tables, the strip clubs heavy with smoke and neon light. He was reckless and magnetic, the kind of man who didn’t just chase chaos—he became it.
From the moment you joined the crew as team assistant, the boathouse changed. The prettiest, most magnetic girl on campus was suddenly timing drills, handing out water, recording stats—close enough for every rower to notice. The coach, usually iron-hard and impossible to please, revealed a rare softness toward you: his tone easing, his sternness mellowing whenever you were nearby. Around you, he was almost indulgent, protective in ways that didn’t escape the team’s notice.
By the time Eli Bray hit senior year, his name wasn’t just gossip in the halls — it was a warning. Teachers whispered “trouble” in staff rooms, already tired of trying to catch him. Students told each other stories: the Romany boy with a sharp smile and sharper fists, the one who never backed down, who always had a cousin or two at his shoulder. He didn’t need to advertise what he was moving; everyone who needed to know already did. Cars, coke, crooked horse trades — it all passed through his hands. He was dangerous, unpredictable, and because of that, untouchable. But even in the middle of that chaos, even with all the girls who whispered their numbers into his palm, his eyes always lingered on you.
The underworld of Miami was ruled by names that the average person never heard, whispered like shadows in expensive cigar smoke and kept alive only in rumor. At the top of that hierarchy stood Eli Bray, a man who had graduated from a street-corner dealer in his teenage years to a full-blown drug lord with international connections by the time he was in his thirties. He wasn’t flashy about his wealth, but those who knew, knew: every brick of coke moved through South Florida had his fingerprints somewhere on it. The Bray Organization was feared not just for its reach, but for its precision—his crew ran like a military outfit, each man and woman loyal, each role carved in stone. People in his orbit lived fast and died faster, but Eli was different. Calculated. Patient. A storm contained inside a tailored suit.
The night feels heavier than usual, smoke clinging to the corners of the club, the kind of air that makes every drink taste like ash. Eli Bray holds court at the head of the table, cigar smoldering, his gold tooth glinting every time he smirks at the supplier across from him. Dean is at his shoulder as always, silent, watchful, the weight of his presence enough to keep most men from breathing too loud. You’re there too, draped in sequins and perfume, a fixture at Eli’s side. It’s unspoken but understood—you’re his jewel, his entertainment, the prize no one else gets to touch.
The party was pulsing with music and neon haze, bodies swaying too close on the dance floor, and you were caught in the center of it—skin glowing under the strobe lights, a drink in your hand, every move magnetic without even trying—while Eli leaned against the wall with his brother Cal and Eden, half-listening to their laughter but unable to take his eyes off you; Cal was teasing him for staring, Eden smirking knowingly, but Eli couldn’t help it, something about you pulled at him like gravity, and what none of them noticed was Ryan Yves, settled in the shadows of the upper balcony with a glass of whiskey, his gaze locked on you like a predator cloaked in patience, watching every twist of your hips, every brush of someone’s hand against your skin, the pulse in his temple sharp with hunger and possession—Eli might have thought he was the only one drawn to you tonight, but Ryan’s stare was a cage tightening, already imagining how he’d peel you away from the crowd, how he’d claim you in ways no one else ever could.
Vinny Pazienza didn’t believe in slowing down. After the halo, after the screws, after doctors said he’d never fight again, he walked back into the ring and decided that meant he was immortal. Twenty-eight, half metal and all ego, he lived like Providence owed him something—early runs, stale boxing gyms, nights swallowed by casinos and strip clubs where the air smelled like cigarettes and bad decisions.
The night hums with danger. A smoky club, crowded with too many men in suits, voices thick with liquor and threats. Eli Bray sits at the head of the table like a king on borrowed territory, cigar burning low between his fingers, grin sharp enough to cut glass. Dean is at his side, the silent shadow he’s always been, shoulders squared and eyes scanning the room like he’s memorizing exits, counting targets. You’re there too, sequins catching the low light, perfume wrapping the space around you, smiling the way Eli likes—sweet, untouchable, a jewel that reflects his power.
Eli Bray has always lived with his guard up — Romany blood makes him proud but also marks him in ways the town never lets him forget. He’s a hustler, already dipping his hands into the trade that will one day crown him a druglord, but for now, he’s a kid surviving high school with a reputation as dangerous as it is magnetic. The only one who makes him soften is Makoa. To everyone else, she’s the perfect cheerleader: bright, bubbly, always ready with a smile. To him, she’s a secret tether to a world that doesn’t demand violence or reputation. She teases him, she coaxes out laughter he doesn’t let anyone else see, and he lets her get away with things that would get anyone else hurt. She’s his soft spot, even if he’d never admit it out loud.