He's my brother-in-law's brother. The one Serrano man everyone agrees I should stay away from. Which is exactly the problem — I never learned how to leave well enough alone.
A year after my best friend married into the coldest family in New York, I've made my peace with the Serranos. Mostly. Except for Rafael — quiet, watchful, guarded in a way that makes me want to know exactly what he's hiding underneath it. We've spent a year circling each other at family dinners, saying nothing, meaning everything.
Then a gunshot puts us in a locked room together for an hour, and neither of us can pretend anymore.
What follows is supposed to be simple: a few stolen weeks before we tell our families, before his father's plans for someone more "suitable" catch up to us, before my own family decides I'm the safe Calloway who never gets chosen first. Simple doesn't last. The secrecy costs us more than either of us accounts for — and when the pressure finally lands, Rafael does the one thing he swore he wouldn't: he decides what's best for both of us without asking me.
I don't need protecting. I need a man who trusts me enough not to.
FORBIDDEN VOW is a full-length, dark mafia romance and Book Two in the Serrano Creed series — forbidden romance, stolen-time tension, and a hero who has to learn the difference between loving someone and controlling the outcome for them. Standalone HEA; light series continuity with Book One.
Used availability for Cora J Riley's Forbidden Vow