The Unwanted Bride Becomes The City's Queen

I was the spare daughter of the Vitiello crime family, born solely to provide organs for my golden sister, Isabella. Four years ago, under the codename "Seven," I nursed Dante Moretti, the Don of Chicago, back to health in a safe house. I was the one who held him in the dark. But Isabella stole my name, my credit, and the man I loved. Now, Dante looked at me with nothing but cold disgust, believing her lies. When a neon sign crashed down on the street, Dante used his body to shield Isabella, leaving me to be crushed under twisted steel. While Isabella sat in a VIP suite crying over a scratch, I lay broken, listening to my parents discuss if my kidneys were still viable for harvest. The final straw came at their engagement gala. When Dante saw me wearing the lava stone bracelet I had worn in the safe house, he accused me of stealing it from Isabella. He ordered my father to punish me. I took fifty lashes to my back while Dante covered Isabella's eyes, protecting her from the ugly truth. That night, the love in my heart finally died. On the morning of their wedding, I handed Dante a gift box containing a cassette tape—the only proof that I was Seven. Then, I signed the papers disowning my family, threw my phone out the car window, and boarded a one-way flight to Sydney. By the time Dante listens to that tape and realizes he married a monster, I will be thousands of miles away, never to return.

Chapters

Chapter 6

Seraphina Vitiello POV:

The diamond on Isabella's finger was the size of a quail egg.

It caught the fractured light of the crystal chandeliers, sending aggressive little rainbows dancing across the ballroom ceiling.

The crowd erupted.

Men in five-thousand-dollar suits clapped Dante on the back, while women in silk gowns dabbed at dry eyes, feigning emotion.

"To the union of Chicago's finest!" someone toasted, their voice booming over the applause.

I stood by a marble pillar, my hands clasped tightly behind my back to hide the trembling.

I wasn't shaking from sadness.

I was shaking from the sheer, exhausting effort of existing in this room without screaming.

Isabella was glowing. She held her hand up, admiring the ring, preening like a peacock displaying its feathers.

Then, her eyes found me in the shadows.

Her smile sharpened into something predatory.

"Seraphina!" she called out, her voice cutting through the din. The room quieted instantly. "Don't be shy. Come wish us well."

Dante turned. His face was impassive, a beautiful mask of stone.

I forced my legs to move. The crowd parted like the Red Sea, but instead of awe, their eyes held a mixture of pity and amusement.

The spare. The failure.

"Happy birthday, Isabella," I said, willing my voice to remain steady. "Congratulations on the engagement."

"Where is my gift?" she asked, extending her manicured hand. "You didn't forget, did you?"

I reached into the small, unassuming clutch I was allowed to carry.

I pulled out a velvet box. Inside sat a pair of pearl earrings. They were simple, elegant, and had cost me three months of saving from the pittance of an allowance my father granted me.

Isabella snatched the box. She didn't even glance at the earrings.

Her eyes dropped immediately to my wrist.

My heart stopped.

I had forgotten.

In my desperate haste to dress, to hide the bandages on my arm, I had left the bracelet on.

It was nothing to look at. Just a string of rough, unpolished lava stones. Cheap. Ugly.

But in the safe house, in the dark, Dante used to run his thumb over those stones. He used to count them when the pain of his injuries threatened to pull him under.

*One, two, three... you're here, Seven. You're here.*

Dante's eyes followed Isabella's gaze.

He froze.

The air in the room seemed to drop ten degrees, sucking the warmth right out of my lungs.

He reached out and seized my wrist. His grip was like a vice, crushing the healing bones underneath.

"Where did you get this?" he demanded. His voice was low, vibrating with dangerous intent.

I flinched, trying to pull back. "It's mine."

"Liar!" Isabella shrieked.

She dropped the earrings to the floor. She clutched her chest, her face twisting into a practiced mask of distress.

"That's mine!" she cried, looking around for sympathy. "Dante, that's the bracelet I wore when I took care of you! I told you I lost it! She stole it!"

The room gasped.

The thief. The jealous sister.

Dante looked from Isabella to me.

He didn't see the truth. He didn't see that the bracelet was worn down by my fingers, that it fit my wrist perfectly, that it smelled of my skin.

He saw a thief.

"You stole from her?" Dante snarled, his eyes dark with disgust. "Is nothing sacred to you? You try to steal her life, and now her memories?"

"I didn't," I whispered, the words choking me. "I am Seven. This is mine."

My father stepped forward.

He didn't ask for an explanation. He didn't look at the evidence.

He swung his hand.

The slap connected with the side of my head with the force of a sledgehammer.

I stumbled back, the world tilting on its axis.

My heels caught on the hem of my dress.

I fell backward, crashing directly into the champagne tower.

Glass shattered.

The sound was deafening as hundreds of crystal flutes came crashing down around me.

Shards sliced into my arms, my back.

Sticky, golden champagne soaked my hair, stinging the fresh cuts like acid.

I lay there in the ruin, gasping for air, tasting blood and expensive wine.

My mother walked over. She held a glass of red wine in her hand.

She poured it over my face.

"Disgrace," she spat, the red liquid dripping down my cheeks like false tears. "You are a stain on this family."

I wiped the wine from my eyes, blinking through the stinging burn.

Through the red blur, I saw Dante.

He wasn't moving toward me. He wasn't helping me up.

He was holding Isabella, checking her hands with frantic tenderness to make sure none of the flying glass had touched her.

Continue to next part

I woke up to find that I had lost five years of my memory. I was told that I had been married to Caspian, the ruthless Godfather of the New York Mafia, for five years. I had harbored a crush on him for a long time, so marrying him should have been good news. But the terrible truth was, he didn't seem to love me. After losing my five years of memory, he felt like nothing more than a stranger to me. "Break the blood oath, Caspian," I said. "We're getting a divorce." Yet later, he would pace outside my door late at night, refusing to leave: "Darling, just look at me one more time, please?"

Mafia Modern Romance

8.1

Claimed: Owned By The Don

8.1

He's known as the devil behind Club Eden,and she's the journalist that was sent to expose him, but when power tastes like pleasure, how do you stop craving the man who owns your body, and maybe your soul? Raven Knight doesn't scare easily. She's a fierce investigative journalist with a history of burning corrupt empires to the ground. Her latest assignment was to go undercover at the city's most elite and dangerous strip club to uncover what billionaire club owner and mafia Don, Jaxon Morreau was hiding, but what she didn't expect was him. Jaxon Morreau is a mafia Don with blood on his hands and control in his veins. Jaxon is cold, brilliant and totally untouchable, that is until Raven Knight stumbles into his world and becomes the obsession he never saw coming. She's everything he shouldn't want, she's too sharp, too stubborn, too pure, and yet he'll break every rule to keep her, even if that means war. As passion turns into possession, secrets unravel, and danger closes in from all sides, including Jaxon's jealous younger brother, Zane, whose obsession with Raven runs darker than anyone knows. Now, she must choose, either her freedom, or to surrender to the man who wants to own her; mind, body and soul. Welcome to Club Eden where nothing is safe, especially your heart.

Billionaire Mafia Modern

9.7

I DON'T WANT HIM BACK

9.7

Blurb: She signed the divorce papers. He never signed away his obsession. Veronica Stanford was the perfect wife-devoted, patient, and hopelessly in love. But when her billionaire husband, Jason Harper, trades her in for her treacherous best friend, Rhea, Veronica's world shatters. Broken and betrayed, she drowns her sorrows in a bar, only to be saved by a dangerously alluring stranger with emerald-green eyes and a lethal reputation: Monte "Four" Zagcanni, the ruthless heir to a mafia empire. Four is everything Jason isn't-dark, dangerous, and devastatingly protective. When Veronica discovers she's pregnant with Jason's child, she strikes a deal with Four: a fake marriage to shield her from scandal. But what starts as a cold arrangement ignites into a passion neither can resist. Jason, realizing his mistake too late, wants Veronica back-along with the son he never knew existed. But Four isn't a man who surrenders what's his. And Veronica? She's done being the meek wife. Betrayal runs deep. Revenge burns hotter. As secrets unravel-her father's bloody past, Rhea's twisted obsession, and Jason's deadly lies-Veronica must decide: trust the man who destroyed her once, or surrender to the devil who might destroy her forever. One wants her back. The other wants her forever.

Mafia Modern Romance

7.8

Not For Sale: The Debt Is Paid

7.8

Seven years. That was the price tag attached to my father's life. When my father gambled away money he didn't have, Michael Vance paid the debt. He bought my father's safety, and in return, he bought me. I was nineteen then. A peasant girl he polished up to look like a mob wife. I was reapplying my lipstick in the vanity mirror of his armored SUV when I found a diamond choker tucked behind the sunshade. It was a million-dollar piece of jewelry that wasn't mine, engraved with a date that wasn't my birthday. That night at the gala, Michael threw his mistress's heavy fur coat at me. "Hold this, Sarah. Jessica gets hot easily." I stood there like a servant, buried under the scent of another woman’s perfume, watching my fiancé hold her on the dance floor with a tenderness he never showed me. When I stumbled from hunger, he called me a liability to his image. But when Jessica faked a crisis, he abandoned me at the venue to rush her home. I walked to the nearest trash can and shoved the expensive fur down past the half-eaten caviar. As the sugar from a cheap candy bar hit my bloodstream, the fog lifted. I realized I wasn't a wife-in-training. I was a debt that had been paid in full. I left the penthouse, the ring, and the life. But Michael wouldn't let his property go. He cornered me in a parking garage, screaming that I belonged to him, threatening to start a war. He didn't expect me to be standing next to David Chen, the Underboss of the rival Triad faction. And he certainly didn't expect me to take off my Louboutin stiletto and use it as a weapon. "I don't love you, Michael," I said, looking him in the eye as he knelt on the concrete. "And I'm not for sale anymore."

Mafia Modern Romance

9.4

THE BRIDE HE NEVER WANTED

9.4

The Bride I Never Wanted One betrayal. One reckless decision. One deadly mistake. The night before my wedding, I found my fiancé in bed with my maid of honor. Heartbroken and humiliated, I did what any rational woman would do-I ran. What I didn't expect was to find a stranger on a bridge, seconds from jumping. A woman being forced to marry a monster. A mafia boss named Dante Castellano who killed without mercy and ruled without conscience. In my shattered state, I made her an offer: I'd take her place. One ceremony. One night. Then we'd both disappear and start over. I thought I was saving her life. I didn't know about the blood oath. The binding that couldn't be broken. The centuries-old tradition that would chain me to Dante until death-mine or his. Now I'm trapped in a world of violence and secrets, married to a man who's as dangerous as he is magnetic. A man whose cold grey eyes see too much. Who touches me like he owns me. Who's starting to suspect his bride isn't who she claims to be. Dante Castellano doesn't forgive deception. And I just became his wife under the biggest lie of all. They say you should be careful what you wish for when your life falls apart. They're right. Because I wished for escape, and instead, I got a beautiful nightmare in an Italian suit. Now I have two choices: make him believe I'm his perfect wife, or die trying. He wanted a convenient bride. He got me instead. God help us both.

Mafia Modern Romance

8.7

The Dark Don's Captive Mafia Queen

8.7

I was kidnapped by the most dangerous mafia boss in Chicago, and the whole city wept for my heartbroken fiancé. Julian Hayes, the righteous Assistant District Attorney, played the tragic hero perfectly in the press. But the truth was, he orchestrated my kidnapping himself. For years, he manipulated me into draining my mother's untouchable mafia fortune to fund a rival mobster. Once he got the money, he threw me to Damien Moretti, the ruthless Dark Don, to be ruined. Julian did it all so he could cleanly break our engagement and marry my illegitimate half-sister, Mona, taking my birthright along the way. For a month, high society pitied the defiled girl locked in a monster's gilded cage, while my father eagerly prepared to hand Mona my legacy. They all thought I was weeping in the dark, waiting to be killed by a cold-blooded savage. They didn't realize the monster they threw me to was exactly the weapon I needed. When Mona sneaked into my gilded cage to gloat and demand I sign away my inheritance, I didn't cry. Instead, I grabbed her silver letter opener, ruthlessly sliced my own arm open, and let out a terrified scream. Damien descended like a god of death, violently hurling Mona against a stone fountain just for spilling my blood. I looked at the Don, my arm dripping crimson, and made a devil's bargain. "Let me go back to my father's house to wage my Vendetta. When I'm done, I will be your wife." The beast smiled and agreed. Tomorrow, my betrayers will learn what happens when you throw a princess to a monster, and she comes back a queen.

Mafia Modern Romance

The Unwanted Bride Becomes The City's Queen

Chapter 6

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