Book picks similar to
Dark Souls by May Gordon


mafia
insta-love
virgin-heroine
celibate-hero

Idle Bloom


Jewel E. Ann - 2014
    Everyday she takes the Red Line to her job at The Green Pot in Boston while her friends enter the coveted, black iron gates to higher learning. The ramifications from a tragic accident have put her life on hold while time marches on for everyone around her. After graduating from Harvard Law, Boston native, Oliver Konrad, moves to Portland to start his career and his life. Three years later, after a horrific discovery, he returns home to trade in his three-piece suit for leather work boots and his suburban home for a condo in Cambridge. All he brought back to the East Coast was an aversion to pillows and secrets he keeps hidden behind a mysterious locked door. Oliver’s days are predictable and his nights are lonely until he meets Vivian on the subway. Her long raven hair, green eyes, and mile-long legs are achingly sexy, but the way she "innocently" fingers and licks her Boston Kreme doughnut can only be described in two words—complete torture.When their paths cross at every turn, laughter is abundant, friendship is easy, and love is unintentional. However, their future seems improbable.

Machiavellian


Bella Di Corte - 2020
     I hungered to be seen. There were three things I knew about Capo Macchiavello: He was gorgeous. He was reclusive. He was considered one of New York’s most savage animals. And he wanted me as his wife. A simple arrangement – you do for me, I do for you. Nothing owed, no expectations. Except for one: never leave. Life was never that simple, though. By the age of twenty-one, I was parentless, jobless, and homeless, and I had come to learn the hard way that nothing was ever free. Even kindness comes with strings. Capo might’ve been the only man to ever see me, but I had made a vow to myself: I would never owe anyone anything. Most of all, the man I called boss. I killed to stay hidden. Mariposa Flores thought she owed nothing to no one, but she owed everything…to me, the ghost the world had once called The Machiavellian Prince of New York.

Buttons & Lace


Penelope Sky - 2016
     A big one. The payment can't be settled with money or favors. He only wants one thing. Me. Every action gets a reward. A button. Once I fill his jar with three hundred and sixty-five buttons, he'll let me go. He'll let me walk away. But I have to earn every single one. By submitting to the darkest, cruelest, and most beautiful man I've ever known. ** TRIGGER WARNING ** There are some dark and disturbing scenes of abuse and punishment.

Claimed


Jenika Snow - 2018
    In its place is a society where the rich rule and the female population is auctioned off to the highest bidder. CLAIRE Xavier saved me, purchasing me off the auction block and making me feel human again. Although I knew he wanted me, could see it in the way he watched me, he never touched me. But I wanted him to. I wanted to feel what it would be like to have his big body over mine, his strong hands running over my bare flesh. I shouldn’t want a man like him: rich, dangerous … one of the elite. But I did. Maybe it was time to break free from my shell and give myself something I deserved … him. XAVIER I had money and power, and I used those to my advantage, to purchase women from the auction under the guise that they were for me. But they weren’t. I purchased them to set them free. I’d been doing it for years without romantic attachment to any of them … until Claire came into my life. And once I saw her, I knew she’d be the one I couldn’t let go. She’d be my downfall, but I was more than ready to fall to my knees and worship the ground she walked on. Warning: Set in the same world as Mine To Keep, but a total standalone, this story is a safe read with a happily ever after. It might be short, but it promises to make you blush and reach for a fan. There is no OW/OM drama, just one alpha hero who knows what he wants … the heroine.

Forever Her Cowboy


Lucy Darling - 2020
    Who knows, maybe I am, but not when it comes to my Noelle, my little sister’s best friend. I’ve been patient. I’ve followed the rules. I’ve waited for her. But now I’ve come to claim what’s mine.My family has plenty of deep roots, put down for generations. Now, I’m ready to lay down some of my own. I may be the clean-cut cowboy to everyone else, but that’s the last thing I want to be when it comes to my Noelle. She needs to know how I burn for her, how I’ve thought of so many delicious ways to make her say my name.Soon enough she’ll see the part of me that I’ve saved for her and only her. Soon enough she’ll realize that she’s my life, my love, my everything. I’ll stop at nothing to make her mine.Author Note: This is a stand-alone sweet romance with no cheating and an HEA.

Princess


Jenna Rose - 2020
    She’s a good girl, and stays out of trouble, but one night on her way home from work, she witnesses a murder. Suddenly, she’s swept away into a dark, treacherous world where the only man who can save her, is also the man who’s vowed to “take care of her.” Prince is the boss of New York City. He runs the streets and has spent his life building an impenetrable wall around him, a wall that starts to crumble when he meets her. She’s everything he never knew he wanted, but she’s also a witness that could bring his empire crashing down around him. Prince promises his men he’ll do what needs to be done, but will he be able to? Or will the innocent girl be able change his life forever? After all, a prince needs his princess.

Sweet Cruelty


Zoe Blake - 2020
    Mine. If I were a better man, I would've just let her go. But I'm not. I'm a cruel bastard. I ruthlessly claimed her virtue for my own.It should have been enough. But it wasn't. I needed more. Craved it. She became my obsession. Her sweetness and purity taunted my dark soul. The need to possess her nearly drove me mad. A Russian arms dealer had no business pursuing a naive librarian student. She didn't belong in my world. I would bring her only pain. But it was too late…She was mine and I was keeping her.

Until Tomorrow Comes


Adelaide Forrest - 2021
    I left with an obsession.With one look, Isa captivated me. She consumed me, drawing me into her world without ever knowing the dangers of mine. I intend to make her mine, no matter what lies I need to tell to manipulate her into falling in love with El Diablo. It should be simple enough, but secrets lurk in the depths of her multicolored eyes, and I’ll do anything to understand what broke her before I had the chance.Because she’s mine to break.IsaRafael Ibarra tore through my life like a raging inferno.Consuming every part of me he touches, he promises to show me passion and the real Ibiza. Though our tryst can never be anything but temporary, I never want to leave the man who makes me wish things were different. But there’s a nightmare hiding within his multicolored gaze, a phantom rattling at the cages who wants to devour me, to take me and claim me as his. He’s temptation, pushing me toward sin with his wicked touch. But the sins of the flesh are different from the sins of the mind, and as much as I hate his secrets.I will never tell him my own.Until Tomorrow Comes is the first book in the Beauty in Lies trilogy and ends on a cliffhanger. This is a DARK mafia romance and contains graphic violence, mature content, and elements that may be triggering. Please read at your own discretion.

Keeping Lily


Izzy Sweet - 2016
    One night and everything in my life changed. Two words and my world turned dark. “Take her”.Owing the most ruthless crime lord in Garden City five million dollars, my husband chose to trade me and my children away to save himself. I was on the cusp of freedom, so close to divorcing that scumbag I was married to. Now I’m enslaved to a man who is obsessed with me. A man so wicked and beautiful, they call him Lucifer. So alluring, he makes the angels weep with envy. He’s so powerful, I can’t stop myself from bending to his will. He’s determined to master me, and he won’t rest until I give him all. He wants my light, and he wants my dark. He wants my body, and he wants my heart. But most of all, he wants the one thing I can’t give him. The one thing I can’t bear to part with…

Defying Her Mafioso


Terri Anne Browning - 2016
    My brother’s best friend and second in command. And the only man I would give up everything for. I fell hard for the Mafioso at the tender age of eleven. This beast of a man who I knew made people disappear—and probably enjoyed every second of it—was also the sixteen-year-old boy who had picked me up after I’d fallen flat on my face during my dance recital and told me I was the best ballerina he’d ever seen. He’s watched over me, protected me like I was the most precious thing in the world to him. And then he sent me away. Scarlett Vitucci was many things:The daughter of the biggest Cosa Nostra boss from New York to Chicago. The sister of the man I would gladly take a bullet for. And the only woman I would ever love. Sending her away was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but I didn’t deserve her or her love. For three years I stayed away, ignoring the gnawing ache that her absence left in my chest. Now, she was back and fighting what I felt for her was impossible. Letting her go had been a huge mistake. One I would never repeat.

Mountain Man


Sherilee Gray - 2017
    He doesn’t like strangers, and he doesn’t like leaving his sanctuary. Now I’m trapped here with him until the snow melts.  I see him looking at me. He tries to hide behind a gruff exterior, but I see the longing and the heat burning in his eyes. I know he wants me, and I can’t resist him. I want to feel those big, rough hands all over my body. But once he’s unleashed his raw, barely tried desire on me, will I be able to leave my mountain man behind, or will he make me his? Warning: The Smith Brothers are not just identical twins, they’re big, burly, bearded, insanely hot mountain men. They’re also sweet, and very, very dirty. Did I mention dirty?

Little Black Book


Tabatha Vargo - 2014
    I could have any woman I want, but I choose you. NO RELATIONSHIP, JUST SEX. Here’s my offer… I’ll put your name in my LITTLE BLACK BOOK, and when I want you, I’ll call you. When I call, you’re going to come, in more ways than one. It will be mutually pleasurable for both of us. There are only two rules: DON'T EVER DENY ME. DON'T FALL IN LOVE. If you do either, I’ll remove you from my book and payment stops. Do we have an understanding?

Hate Story


Nicole Williams - 2016
    Both of them have experienced the sting and sham of love and have no intentions of falling victim to it twice. Love is expensive—hate is free.Three years. A million dollars. A solution to both of their problems. They planned it all, from the story of their first meeting to the date of their divorce. Nothing could go wrong.But what they didn’t consider was chemistry, and Nina and Max have no shortage of it. After too many near-kisses, Nina convinces herself that hating Max is better than loving him, and the more she gets to know this soon-to-be-husband of hers, the more she discovers just how very much she truly, madly, and deeply . . . hates him.This isn’t a love story. This is the other kind.

Ruthless Princess


Rachel Van Dyken - 2020
    A mafia romance about best friends turned enemies by Rachel Van Dyken, the number one New York Times bestselling author of the Eagle Elite series.The enemy of my enemy is my friend…I never thought my father would ask this of me, to become the second generation at Eagle Elite University, to rule with an iron fist, and to take care of anyone who gets in our way.But ever since the incident.Ever since Him.There’s been a war in our little clique.After all, a house divided cannot stand.He’s the problem, not me.He used to kiss me like I was his oxygen.Now he looks at me like I’m his poison.But we both drank it, again and again, never believing there would be a day when our love would start a war.And our friendship would shatter into a million pieces.Then again, the worst thing you could do in the mafia is hang on to hope that your life will be normal.The second worse thing?Fall in love with your best friend.Enemy.And heir to the Nicolasi throne.

Run Baby Run (Daddy Loves You)


Margot Scott - 2020
    A former cop has no business being with someone like me, a lonely unwanted girl with no address or family.But for some reason, he wants to take care of me.When I needed a place to stay he opened his doors, and as soon as I stepped inside, it felt like home. For the first time in my life, I feel safe enough to stop running.He wants to give me a second childhood, better than the one I've known.A chance to be the little girl I've always been in my heart.Jonah's baby girl.Daddy's angel...Introducing book one in the Daddy Loves You Series from Margot Scott. This new series is bursting at the seams with fast and filthy age-gap instalove. Absolutely NO cheating or cliffhangers, with a guaranteed HEA!