ELKEDI

Lia, a twenty-one year old lady from a wealthy mafia Italian family finally finds love in a rival mafia family. After much persuasion she and her lover, Franco are able to convince their families that their love for each other was real and deep and they later get married. However, on their wedding day Franco starts to behave strangely. He is not the man that Lia used to know when they were dating. He changes from the sweet loving and caring gentleman that he was while they courted to an arrogant and abusive husband. Franco opens up to Lia's elder brother, Lorenzo, on their wedding day that he won't be the husband that Lia had always dreamed of. He promises to make her life a misery. Lorenzo is shocked by Franco's openness particularly as they were just getting married and tries to persuade Lia to call off the wedding. Lia does not listen to Lorenzo because according to her it was not news that the Franco's family was a rival mafia family. She believed that they had crossed that hurdle successfully when both families agreed to their marriage. She dismisses Lorenzo's warnings which she thought were based on that ground. Lorenzo, however, goes on to tell the rest of the family what Franco had told him personally. After the wedding, Lia begins to experience what Lorenzo her brother tried to warn her about. Franco had started abusing her both physically and verbally. However, Lia not knowing the reason for this sudden change in her husband was determined to keep her marriage. Two years after their wedding, she still had not conceived. This she attributed to the lack of peace and love she was experiencing in her marriage. Her love for Franco however was still very strong and she was determined to make her marriage work. One day she came back from shopping at noon to find Franco, her husband stark naked with another lady on their matrimonial bed. This was when she realized that her relationship with Franco had so much degenerated. She decided to leave him for a while until he was willing and ready to get help to restore their union. Lia ends up going back to her father's house. Her brother Lorenzo one day discovers some scars and bruises on his sister's body giving him a clearer picture of what she had been through while she was with Franco. He accuses her of lying and covering up for Franco all this while. Against Lia's wish he reveals it to the family and vows to avenge every pain Franco had put his sister through. Franco on the other hand does not change his ways. He decides to continue to have all the fun in his life believing that Lia's love for him would soon make her come back begging once she comes back to her senses. Her brother tries to persuade her to divorce Franco, but she refuses as she still loved Franco very much. This only infuriated Lorenzo the more. He swore he would kill Franco for breaking his sister's heart and taking his family for granted. He goes ahead to advise Lia not to bother thinking of going back to Franco because to him Franco was already a dead man. During a family gathering she begs her family to help her save her marriage as that was the only reason why she left her home in the first place. What had caused the sudden change in Lia's husband, Franco? Would Lia be able to restore the love she was sure Franco once had for her? Can she save Franco from Lorenzo's anger and promise to avenge every pain he had put her through? Read this compelling story to find out if true love is enough to bring about the love, peace and harmony Lia desires.

"Getting Nathan to marry me will surely be my first revenge for their betrayal, Nana." Clara said sobbing. Clara was a product of rape. She was hated by her mum from birth. Her mother Vivian, who was just sixteen as at that time, saw Clara as an obstacle to her becoming successful in life. Vivian had immediately ordered a trusted help to drop her at the staircase of the closest orphanage to where she lived on the day of her birth. Her grandmother who had almost completely lost touch with Clara's mother due to past grievances picked Clara from the orphanage and raised her till she was twenty-one years old. She is later persuaded by Nana, her grandma to accept her mother's invitation to come live with her. Clara also discovered that she had fallen hopelessly in love with Madam Whitson's soon to be son-in-law, Jonathan. Jonathan who was fondly called Nathan, was the billionaire CEO of the biggest conglomerate in New York. His good looks, imposing height and piercing dark eyes along with his massive wealth made him the most eligible bachelor in town. Madam Whitson's only child, beautiful spoilt Leticia who always got what she wanted was one person no one wanted to have issues with as she was capable of anything. She was so evil that there were rumors that she once drugged her mother to prevent her from having more children and poisoned thereafter the maid who had assisted her in the act. As the truth began to unravel as to why Clara had been sent for by her mother and later sent away again after been used, Clara decided to fight against the devilish Leticia and her mum. Would she be able to get Nathan to go against his beloved mother's dying wish and marry her? Was she ready to face the ambitious and deadly Leticia in a love battle? What was the last truth she needed, to finally destroy those who had terribly wronged her? Discover this in this captivating story of love, betrayal and revenge.

On my wedding day, my father sold me to the Chicago Outfit to pay his debts. I was supposed to marry Alex Moreno, the heir to the city's most powerful crime family. But he couldn't even be bothered to show up. As I stood alone at the altar, humiliated, my best friend delivered the final blow. Alex hadn't just stood me up; he had run off to California with his mistress. The whispers in the cathedral turned me into a joke. I was damaged goods, the rejected bride. His family knew the whole time and let me take the public fall, offering me his cousins as pathetic replacements-a brute who hated me or a coward who couldn't protect me. The humiliation burned away my fear, leaving only cold rage. My life was already over, so I decided to set the whole game on fire myself. The marriage pact only said a Carlson had to marry a Moreno; it never said which one. With nothing left to lose, I looked past the pathetic boys they offered. I chose the one man they never expected. I chose his father, the Don himself.

My marriage to Joshua Caldwell was a prison sentence. I was a Hartman trophy, sold to the powerful family who had destroyed mine. Then I discovered he was cheating. His mistress was pregnant with the child he denied me, and he was stealing my secret song lyrics to build her career. When I confronted him, he called me a spineless liability and threatened to destroy what was left of my family. To make matters worse, a one-night stand with a stranger turned out to be with my husband's brother, Anthony Caldwell-the Don of the city. He knew all of Joshua's secrets and used them to trap me in a twisted game, seeing me as nothing more than an asset. They both thought I was a broken doll they could control. I wrote a song for his mistress, a beautiful execution with a single, impossible note I knew would destroy her voice. She sang it, and now her career is over. Now the Don has summoned me to Chicago, not knowing the woman he thinks is his asset is the one who just burned his brother's world to the ground.

Becoming a bride to settle a debt was never part of my dreams. Yet, my stepbrother's betrayal and a trap party turned my life upside down, shattering my illusions of a joyful marriage. Now, I'm faced with the harsh reality of being married to a ruthless Mafia boss, Alessio Marino. Can I trust his promises, or will my situation be worse than the abuse I endured from my stepbrother? With love stripped from my wedding vows, all I can do is cling to hope for God's mercy and summon the strength to navigate this perilous new life.

At my boyfriend's poorest moment, I suddenly broke up with him. Later, he became a Don in the Mafia and married me by any means necessary. Everyone said he loved me to the bone. But every night, he brought different women home, deliberately trying to provoke me. I asked no questions, shed no tears, and never disturbed his trysts with his mistresses. He went crazy with rage instead, kissing me fiercely and demanding, "Why aren't you jealous?" He didn't know I was sick. Dying. While he was furiously taking his revenge on me, I was slowly walking toward death.

I watched my husband sign the papers that would end our marriage while he was busy texting the woman he actually loved. He didn't even glance at the header. He just scribbled the sharp, jagged signature that had signed death warrants for half of New York, tossed the file onto the passenger seat, and tapped his screen again. "Done," he said, his voice devoid of emotion. That was Dante Moretti. The Underboss. A man who could smell a lie from a mile away but couldn't see that his wife had just handed him an annulment decree disguised beneath a stack of mundane logistics reports. For three years, I scrubbed his blood out of his shirts. I saved his family's alliance when his ex, Sofia, ran off with a civilian. In return, he treated me like furniture. He left me in the rain to save Sofia from a broken nail. He left me alone on my birthday to drink champagne on a yacht with her. He even handed me a glass of whiskey—her favorite drink—forgetting that I despised the taste. I was merely a placeholder. A ghost in my own home. So, I stopped waiting. I burned our wedding portrait in the fireplace, left my platinum ring in the ashes, and boarded a one-way flight to San Francisco. I thought I was finally free. I thought I had escaped the cage. But I underestimated Dante. When he finally opened that file weeks later and realized he had signed away his wife without looking, the Reaper didn't accept defeat. He burned down the world to find me, obsessed with reclaiming the woman he had already thrown away.

Andrew Hebert, the man who promised to protect me, stood on a stage and announced his engagement to my tormentor. It wasn't just heartbreak; it was a business deal. He was selling me to a creditor to cover his gambling debts. The applause of the powerful families was a death sentence, each clap sealing my fate as collateral. Andrew had paraded me here just to show everyone I was an asset to be liquidated, while his new fiancée smirked at me from the stage. I was trapped, with no money and no one to turn to. The man I loved was leading me to the slaughter. But as I fled into the library, a voice emerged from the shadows, deep and dangerous. Damien Maddox. The Dark Don. The only man Andrew feared. He offered me a different kind of cage, one with the power to burn Andrew's world to the ground. With nothing left to lose, I looked the devil in the eyes. "Take me with you."

On the night of my career-defining art exhibition, I stood completely alone. My husband, Dante Sovrano, the most feared man in Chicago, had promised he wouldn’t miss it for the world. Instead, he was on the evening news. He was shielding another woman—his ruthless business partner—from a downpour, letting his own thousand-dollar suit get soaked just to protect her. The headline flashed below them, calling their new alliance a "power move" that would reshape the city. The guests at my gallery immediately began to whisper. Their pitying looks turned my greatest triumph into a public spectacle of humiliation. Then his text arrived, a cold, final confirmation of my place in his life: “Something came up. Isabella needed me. You understand. Business.” For four years, I had been his possession. A quiet, artistic wife kept in a gilded cage on the top floor of his skyscraper. I poured all my loneliness and heartbreak onto my canvases, but he never truly saw my art. He never truly saw me. He just saw another one of his assets. My heart didn't break that night. It turned to ice. He hadn't just neglected me; he had erased me. So the next morning, I walked into his office and handed him a stack of gallery contracts. He barely glanced up, annoyed at the interruption to his empire-building. He snatched the pen and signed on the line I’d marked. He didn’t know the page tucked directly underneath was our divorce decree. He had just signed away his wife like she was nothing more than an invoice for art supplies.

I watched my husband, the most feared Capo in New York, sign away our marriage with the same cold indifference he usually reserved for ordering a hit. The nib of his Montblanc pen scratched against the paper, drowning out the rain hitting the coffee shop window. He didn't bother to read a single word. He thought he was signing routine shipping manifests for the family business. In reality, he was signing the "Dissolution of Union" papers I had hidden beneath the cover sheet. He was too distracted to check. His eyes were glued to his encrypted phone, frantically texting Sofia—the widow, the tragic beauty, the woman who had haunted our marriage for three years. "Done," he grunted, tossing the stack into his armored SUV without even glancing at me. "Business is concluded, Elena. We leave." Moments later, his phone rang with her special emergency tone. His demeanor shifted from cold boss to frantic protector instantly. "Driver, divert. She needs me," he roared. He looked at me with zero affection and ordered, "Get out, Elena. Luca will take you home." He kicked me out of the car into the pouring rain to rush to his mistress, completely unaware he had just legally granted me my freedom. I stood on the curb, shivering but smiling for the first time in years. By the time the Don realizes he just signed his own divorce, I will be a ghost in San Francisco. And he will have nothing left but his shipping logs and his regret.

My grandfather sold me to a man named Maverick to settle his gambling debts. I stood on the private platform at Union Station, a human payment waiting to be collected. But he never came. An hour later, his assistant called to say the deal was off. I was told to disappear by morning or face the consequences. My family blamed me for their ruin and threw me out onto the street. Homeless and disowned, I had no choice but to take a low-level job at Prosperity Group, the biggest investment firm in Chicago. I needed to survive. I never understood why he rejected me. I had followed every rule, worn the red dress he demanded, and waited like a lamb for slaughter. Why would he agree to save my family only to destroy us at the last second? On my first day, I was called into the CEO's office. The man behind the desk was Damien Maddox, the city's most ruthless billionaire. He looked at me with a chilling familiarity. He was the man who had bought me. And he was the man who had thrown me away.

I replaced my twin sister in a marriage contract to the ruthless Mafia Don, Donovan Blackwood. For three years, I was a ghost in his home, silently enduring his coldness while he flaunted his mistress, Chloe. On the very last day of our contract, Chloe staged an accident. Donovan didn't hesitate. He forced me to drain my blood to save her life. Then, to prove his loyalty to her, he drove me to the cliffs and pushed me into the freezing ocean. He even locked me in a cellar infested with spiders—my deepest phobia—because she lied and said I threatened her. He thought he was punishing the spoiled, arrogant Isabella. He didn't know he was breaking Ava, the woman who had silently memorized his allergies and waited up for him in the dark every single night. When I finally took my fifty million dollars and vanished, I left behind nothing but the divorce papers and a photo revealing the truth. He tore the city apart, destroying my family to find me, only to realize he had tortured the wrong woman. Now, he is standing on my porch in the pouring rain, staring in horror at the simple wooden ring on my finger given to me by another man. He falls to his knees, begging for a chance to love the wife he tried to destroy. I look at him, feeling absolutely nothing. "It's too late, Donovan," I say, locking the door. "You killed her."