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The Butterfly Mind
The Butterfly Mind
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Novels by The Butterfly Mind

Velvet Chains

Velvet Chains

In the shadows of the city’s most notorious club, where danger and desire intertwine, he sees her. Valerio Moretti—ruthless, feared, and untouchable—is the most dangerous name in the criminal underworld. He owns the city, one blood-soaked deal at a time. Women throw themselves at his feet, yet none have ever caught his eye... until her. Sera Devlin is an enigma behind red velvet curtains. A stripper who doesn’t belong. Her stiff movements, wide eyes, and barely concealed fear as men paw at her set her apart from the others. She's innocent—too innocent for a place like this. And that's what draws Valerio in like a flame. One night, Valerio breaks the rules—his own rules—and barges into her dressing room. Half-dressed and startled, Sera throws him out without a second thought, unaware she's just challenged the devil himself. Now, Valerio is obsessed. She doesn’t know who he is. She doesn’t want him. But he always gets what he wants—and he wants her. As their worlds collide in a twisted game of dominance, secrets, and forbidden desire, Sera finds herself caught in a cage made of diamonds and danger. But behind Valerio’s control lies a man with a dark past... and behind Sera’s fear, a secret that could shatter them both. He’s her captor. She’s his temptation. And in this game, love could be their ultimate ruin.
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Chapter: Chapter 17 — A Cage Without Chains
Sera thought that after she'd strapped on the anklet around her ankle — after she'd held her tongue and *given in* silently — things would calm down.They did not.Valerio didn't storm into her suite.He didn't touch her.He didn't even speak to her the following day.But the world outside her *altered*.In a quiet. Unseen. Complete manner.It started with what she wore.The closet that used to be filled with her plain jeans and frayed sweaters was now packed with silk, lace, leather.Gowns so sheer they were almost invisible.Lingerie that seemed to promise defeat.Shoes with heels so high they made her legs tremble.Sera wouldn't wear any of it initially.She stormed back into her old jeans and sweatshirt, refusing to admit the boxes that piled up day by day.Pretending she wasn't interested in the fine material, the brutal cut of the clothing.But Valerio was patient.Patient, and cruel.When she entered the hallway to find something to eat, she noticed a new notice on the door.**
Last Updated: 2025-04-21
Chapter: Chapter 16 — The Devil's Courtship
Two days passed without Sera leaving her suite after witnessing the murder she saw Valerio perpetrate.She stayed huddled on the oversized velvet sofa, wrapped in a blanket, jolting at every knock, every creak of footsteps outside the hall.Her mind went round and round with it over and over — the calculating competence, the factual brutality.She couldn't *want* a person like that.She *couldn't*.And yet…She slept with him at night.Of silk and blood.Of pinning hands and bruising mouths, a voice speaking foul, awful promises on the skin.She woke gasping, dripping with sweat, legs clenched around an ache she was not about to name anything.*It's fear,* she lied to herself.*Nothing else.*She was lying though.And despised herself for it.---On the third day, gifts arrived.The first was a simple, elegant box set on the coffee table when she didn't notice.Inside, supported by black velvet, was a thin, delicate anklet of gold.Delicate. Thin.And a tiny ruby pendant shaped like
Last Updated: 2025-04-21
Chapter: Chapter 15 — Blood and Velvet
Sera thought she knew the shadows that lurked in Valerio Romano.She was wrong.It happened one evening, late.She had walked the perimeter of the penthouse, tense and restless, when she heard the noises of voices from the staircase — low, rough, insistent. Hairs on the back of her neck stood on end immediately.Sera knew she shouldn't be outside. Knew no good could ever come from listening in on the Devil.But her curiosity, her stubbornness, overpowered her.She crept towards the stairwell door, ear pressed against cold metal.She only caught fragments at first.".told you." ".disrespect."".deal was clear."".you *lied,* you little shit."And then a sickening *thud*, the unmistakable sound of flesh meeting flesh.Sera's stomach twisted.She rested her hand on the door, heart thumping painfully against her ribs.Another sound — a low, throaty groan of pain.And then—"You don't steal from me," Valerio's voice stated, icy and lethal."You don't lie to me."There was a gurgling, we
Last Updated: 2025-04-18
Chapter: Chapter 14 — Cracks in the Armor
Sera didn't say a word to him the next day.Not when Matteo delivered her breakfast — a lavish spread of fruit, pastries, coffee — on Valerio's orders. Not when she opened the front door that evening and heard the unmistakable thud of Valerio's heavy footsteps coming into the penthouse. Not even when he stood in the living room, eyes burning into her back where she was curled up on the giant velvet couch, lost in a book she wasn't even reading.All she had left to fight with was silence.She refused to look up. Refused to even glance at him.Valerio stood there for a moment.Then, silently, he vanished into the depths of the penthouse.Sera shook with her breath once he was gone.But her heart still pounded in her chest. She could sense every gasp he took when he was near, the way the air around him became dense. It was maddening. infuriating.She loathed him. She loathed the way he could make her body betray her. She loathed the way part of her—the weakest, darkest part—ached
Last Updated: 2025-04-18
Chapter: Chapter 13 — The Price of Disobedience
Sera waited until after midnight.The penthouse was as silent as if she was the only one in it. The only sounds the distant hum of the city far below and the soft lapping of the curtains from the gentle air of the vent.Matteo had stood watch by the door before, but she'd seen through the peephole, waiting. Listening. At dinner, he'd disappeared—one way or another he'd assumed she was clever enough to know she couldn't get away. They hardly knew Sera Vale at all. With her heart racing, she jammed a few necessities into the little leather bag — ID, what little cash she had, her brother's hospital information.She wore her soft slippers into the house to mute her steps across the marble floor. All the shadows breathed. All the creaks of the wood made her nerves scream.The service elevator.She remembered Matteo having pointed it out in the first place, laughing. "Even rats have to have a way out, right?"It was hidden behind the big kitchen — probably where deliveries came and went.
Last Updated: 2025-04-17
Chapter: Chapter 12 – The Devil's Chains
The next morning, Sera woke to the rude boom of someone knocking on her door.She rolled over, struggling up from the worn mattress. Her whole body ached, each muscle taut with tension, with restless tossing and turning. Her broken nightstand's clock beeped out a bitter 7:02 AM.Way, way too early for anything to be good.Sera jerked the door open, ready to bark at whoever it was—And froze instantly.Two men in black suits stood in the hall. Both linebacker-huge, both wearing shades even in the grimy, dim lighting of her crummy apartment complex.Behind them was a third man. Younger, smoother. No shades. But his stance radiated *deadly* too.He gave her a crooked grin that didn't reach his hard brown eyes."Sera Vale?" he asked, voice as smooth as a car salesperson but with the unmistakable trace of a man who could snap a neck without wincing.She gulped hard."Who are you?" she croaked, keeping the door shut tighter.The younger guy stuck his hands innocently into his pockets. "N
Last Updated: 2025-04-17
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