Every year on my birthday, my tormentor returns to claim one of my firsts.

A DARK MAFIA ARRANGED MARRIAGE ROMANCE
On my sixteenth birthday, a stranger from Corsica shows up at my party. Angelo Russo looks like an angel, but more the kind who decapitates dragons than the kind with soft white wings. He’s dark like the ocean and breathless like water. He says he wants all my firsts as if he already owns them, but my father orders me to stay away from this man.

No matter how hard I try, I can’t escape him. No one can keep me safe. Every year on my birthday, he brings me a gift, each one having a detrimental effect on my life with unimaginable consequences. With every gift he offers, he claims another one of my firsts. Before I know it, he’s taken control of my existence, turning me into a nervous wreck, because when I turn eighteen, I know what first he’ll come for next.

Note: Love Like Poison is the first book in the Corsican Crime Lord series and ends on a cliffhanger. Sabella and Angelo’s story continues in Hate Like Honey (Book Two).

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Charmaine Pauls was born in Bloemfontein, South Africa. She obtained a degree in Communication at the University of Potchefstroom and followed a diverse career path in journalism, public relations, advertising, communication, and brand marketing. Her writing has always been an integral part of her professions.

When she moved to Chile with her French husband, she started writing full-time. She has been publishing novels and short stories since 2011.

Charmaine currently lives in Montpellier, France with her family. Their household is a lively mix of Afrikaans, English, French, and Spanish.