Castello di Lusso

About the book

She refused to be a pawn. So they made her a queen. After severing ties with a toxic corporate world in Atlanta, Simone Bellamy has built an independent life and an architecture firm of her own. When she travels to the shores of Lake Como to transform a magnificent seventeenth-century stone fortress into an exclusive luxury wellness retreat, the commission appears to be her crowning achievement. But the project’s powerful investor, Arthur Thorne, has motives extending far beyond architecture. He intends to use Simone as leverage to force his estranged son, Italian master craftsman Elias Thorne, back into the family empire he escaped. When Arthur launches a campaign of corporate sabotage, he expects Simone to surrender beneath the weight of his wealth and influence. Instead, she and Elias must protect the project, defend the lives they built independently, and confront a dynasty determined to control them both. Against the breathtaking backdrop of Lake Como, Simone discovers that love does not have to demand surrender—and that true power is not inherited. It is built. Castello di Lusso is a sophisticated contemporary romance about Black excellence, architecture, family power, hard-won sovereignty, and creating luxury with a soul. It is Book Two of The Bella Musa Stories.