Gong Zi

On my birthday, my husband Dante asked for a divorce over a plate of cold lasagna. He held my hand, tears in his eyes, and told me his mistress was pregnant. "It’s a miracle, Elena," he wept. "God has finally given me a son." He looked at me with pity, calling me "broken" because I hadn't given him an heir in eight years. He moved his pregnant mistress into the penthouse I paid for, and his mother mocked me as a "dry vine" while cooking tonic soups for the new woman. They didn't know the truth I had buried three years ago. I remembered the day the doctor slid the file across the desk: *Azoospermia. Zero sperm count.* Dante was the sterile one. I had burned the results to protect his fragile ego as a Mafia Don. I took the blame. I drank his mother's vile herbal poisons every morning until I vomited, just to keep his secret. Now, he was discarding me for a "miracle" that was biologically impossible. I signed the divorce papers without a tear. Then I bought the debt of his company, put on a blood-red dress, and walked into his heir's Christening. I didn't come to object. I came to plug a USB drive into the projector and show the entire underworld exactly whose "miracle" that baby really was.

I was the mute fisherman's daughter who married the King of New York, only to become his prisoner. Dante Vitiello didn't love me; he used my silence as a weapon and let his mistress, Valeria, rule my home. When Valeria poisoned herself to frame me, Dante didn't look for the truth. He drained my blood to save her life, then threw me into a freezing dungeon to rot among the rats. He planned to marry her while I shivered in the dark, telling me I was nothing but gutter trash. With no voice to scream and no way to fight, I chose the only escape left. I swallowed a vial of lethal pufferfish toxin, trading my life for a coma that mimicked death. I wanted to haunt him. I wanted my cold body to be his punishment. But when I woke up a year later, the world had changed. I wasn't in hell. I was in a clinic, and Dante was lying on the floor with a bullet in his temple. He had discovered the truth too late. To wake me up, he had accepted a deadly game of Russian Roulette. He signed our divorce papers with a steady hand, then pulled the trigger to buy my freedom. The monster was dead. And for the first time, the silence belonged to me.

For five years, I sealed my own wolf and pretended to be a "Wolfless" weakling, all to soothe my Alpha husband's fragile ego. But when his mistress committed a crime, Ignatz commanded me to take the fall. Desperate, I revealed the secret I had been keeping: I was pregnant. I thought it would save me. Instead, he sneered at my stomach. He called our child "biological waste" compared to the "high-born" heir his mistress was carrying. He ordered his guards to drag me to the clinic to "fix the mistake." I managed to escape the needle, only to be hunted down and thrown into a silver mine. The toxic metal didn't kill me, but the agony did something worse. It killed my unborn pup. While I lay bleeding in the dark, Ignatz hosted a grand gala. He publicly rejected me, dissolving our bond to marry his mistress, believing I was dead and gone. He didn't know his mistress was actually carrying a Rogue's bastard. He didn't know he had just murdered a Royal Prince. And he certainly didn't know that the grief had shattered the seal on my powers. The "Wolfless" girl died in that mine. The White Wolf rose in her place. Three days later, I crashed his engagement party. But I didn't come alone. I walked in flanked by the Royal Army and the Supreme Alpha, ready to burn his pack to the ground. Ignatz fell to his knees when he saw my glowing eyes, but I only had one thing to say. "Kneel."

Ten years ago, I saved the life of New York’s most dangerous mob boss with a sewing kit. I gave Ethan Reed my youth, my loyalty, and my heart. But the moment his ex-girlfriend Chloe returned, I became disposable. It didn't matter that she had abandoned him. It didn't matter that she poisoned me, killing the unborn child Ethan didn't even know we had. When Chloe needed a kidney transplant due to her drug abuse, Ethan didn't protect me. He strapped me to a gurney. "It's just one kidney, Ava. You owe me." He harvested my organ to save the woman who murdered his heir. And when he was done, he decided I was a loose end. He dragged me to the edge of a bridge in the pouring rain. "This is how it ends," he said, his eyes devoid of love. "A tragic suicide." He pushed me into the freezing water, watching me drown to secure his happy ending. He thought I was dead. He thought the canary had sung its last song. But he forgot one thing. I was the chemist who built his empire. When his greatest rival pulled me out of the river, I didn't pray for salvation. I prayed for revenge. Three months later, I walked into his charity gala on the arm of his enemy, wearing a white suit and a smile sharp enough to cut glass. Ethan dropped to his knees when he saw me. But I wasn't there to forgive him. I was there to burn his house down.

I was standing in five thousand dollars of hand-stitched lace when I received the medical report. My fiancé, Dante de Rossi, the future Don of Chicago, had gotten another woman pregnant. He didn't apologize. He didn't beg. He looked me in the eye and called it a "strategic necessity." "Isobel saved my life five years ago," he said coldly. "I owe her this child. You will raise it as your own. It is the price of the Peace Treaty." He forced me to cancel our engagement photos so he could take them with her. He took her on the vacation meant for our honeymoon. At dinner, he ordered me the seafood risotto, completely forgetting my deadly shellfish allergy, while fussing over Isobel’s water temperature. When I tried to leave, he cornered me. "You are a mob wife, Nina. Act like one. She is the hero who saved me." I wanted to laugh. Because five years ago, in that alley, Isobel wasn't even there. I was the one in the mask. I was the one who stitched his femoral artery and saved his life, risking my own medical license. He was destroying our twenty-year relationship to pay a debt to a liar. I didn't scream. I didn't fight. I simply picked up a red marker and walked to the calendar. On the day of our wedding, while Dante stood at the altar waiting for his obedient Queen, I was already boarding a one-way flight to the other side of the world. I left him nothing but four words scrawled across the date: "Let's break up, Dante."

Everyone in Seattle said my five-year marriage to tech mogul Elias Odonnell was a placeholder. I never believed them. He was the man who would delay a billion-dollar meeting for my food cravings and donate his own rare blood to save my father' s life. The day I discovered I was pregnant, I overheard him on a call with his childhood sweetheart, Juli. "Marrying Gemma was just the only way to get close enough to her father to cure you." My world shattered. He brought Juli into our home, pretending she was my doctor. They tormented me, locking me in a panic room to trigger my deepest fears. Then, during a forced mountain hike, a sudden shove sent me falling from a cliff. I lost our baby. In the hospital, I overheard the real reason he saved my life. It wasn't for me, but to keep my father emotionally stable so his "liver tissue quality" wouldn't be compromised before the harvest. He called our dead child "a complication I've now been spared from dealing with." With nothing left to lose, I found an unlikely ally in my father's surgeon, a man who owed my dad his career. He came to my room and whispered, "We'll stage a fake surgery. While everyone is distracted, I'll get you and your father out of here."

As a ghost, I watched my parents arrive at my crime scene. My mother, a renowned surgeon, and my father, the District Attorney, were there to consult on the brutal murder of an unidentified young woman. That young woman was me. But they didn't know. To them, I was just Jane Doe, a messy case and an inconvenient headline. My mother examined my broken body with chilling detachment, her analysis of the torture wounds purely clinical. My father arrived, complaining about the political fallout and the bad press. Standing just feet from my corpse, they discussed their "missing" daughter-me. "She's just being dramatic," my father scoffed. "Probably shacked up with some loser to get back at us." They were more worried about my adopted brother, the golden boy Javon, and his upcoming championship game. I was the family's problem in life, and it seemed I was an even bigger problem in death. The irony was a physical weight. They were talking about me, their lost daughter, while my body lay decomposing at their feet. They were blind, wrapped up in their perfect lives and their love for the son who orchestrated my end. But they would find out. The killer made one mistake. He forced me to swallow a tiny pet microchip, a clue registered in my name. A piece of evidence that would not only give me back my identity but would expose the monster they called a son and burn their perfect world to the ground.

For three years, I paid millions to have Caleb Mitchell as my boyfriend. I funded his sister's experimental cancer treatment, and in return, the brilliant, proud student played the part of my loving companion. He resented being bought, but I was foolish enough to fall in love with him. That foolishness ended two months ago, after a fall from a horse left me with a concussion. I woke up with the horrifying knowledge that my entire life was a lie—I was just the villainess in a novel, a footnote in a story about him. In this story, Caleb was the hero, destined to reunite with his true love, Frances. I was the obstacle he had to overcome. My pre-written fate was to go mad with jealousy, try to destroy them, and end up ruined and dead. I thought it was a hallucination until the plot began to unfold. The final proof was the vintage watch I spent months restoring for his birthday. A week later, he gave it to Frances, telling her it was just some old trinket he'd found. According to the script, seeing that watch on her wrist was supposed to make me fly into a hysterical rage, sealing my tragic fate. But I refuse to follow their story. If the villainess is destined for a tragic end, then this villainess will simply disappear from the book altogether. I slid a black credit card across the polished desk. "I want to be declared dead," I told the man who specialized in new beginnings. "Lost at sea. No body."

After six long years, I walked out of prison on my 30th birthday, ready to reclaim my life. Instead, my ex-husband, Ryan, arrived with his high school sweetheart, Gabby, who coldly informed me Ryan's sleek new Tesla had "Gabby's seat." My own son, Caleb, now ten, peered from the back, his eyes mirroring his father's icy gaze, asking why I was even trying to get into "Aunt Gabby's seat." Then came the demand: apologize to Gabby publicly for what I "did," or Caleb would forever believe I was a "crazy liar" who attacked Gabby, his "real mom." Just when I thought it couldn't get worse, a deliberate hit-and-run orchestrated by Gabby left me broken and vulnerable in a hospital bed, part of a sinister plan to fake amnesia and commit me to a mental institution permanently. How could the man I built an empire with, and my own child, be so utterly poisoned against me? But they underestimated me. Prison taught me how to survive, how to wait, and how to call in a forgotten favor from a dying mob boss. I'm Jocelyn, and the comeback they never saw coming just started.

On my 30th birthday, I stood in a grand gala, believing I was celebrating twelve years with Ethan, the man I loved, and his big project win. But my "celebration" was a pathetic banner and a wilting cupcake, while the main stage projected a smiling tribute to Ethan and his "brilliant protégé" – his intern, Madison. Ethan, oblivious, pointed to the cupcake, "Madison arranged that. Sweet, right?" His intern's "adorkable" hug felt like a trap, her eyes gleaming with malice. The betrayals escalated: abandoned on a dark train platform for Madison's "panic attack," our anniversary skipped for her "lost keys," and the ultimate insult – being asked to give her my concert ticket. The final blow came when Ethan, in a fit of rage, weaponized my deepest shame, snarling, "You' re just like your father, always putting your hands on things that don't belong to you." In that crushing moment, my twelve years of love for him disintegrated into ash, leaving behind only chilling emptiness and the realization he was a stranger. Ethan, full of arrogant certainty, winked, "Give her a week. She' ll come crawling back." He had no idea I'd just accepted a promotion to Program Director of my non-profit' s international branch – in London. I quietly packed two suitcases, deleting him from my life as I hailed a taxi to Logan International. When he frantically called, yelling, "What is wrong with you?", I simply said, "It's over," then blocked him and turned off my phone, finally free. But my past wasn't quite done with me, and soon, Ethan and Madison would confront a terrifying truth that would change all our lives forever.

Sarah was a calm, capable project manager, often jokingly called a "MIL Whisperer" by her friends. She prided herself on being a "domestic diplomat," adept at navigating the trickiest family dynamics. This was her fourth marriage, and she felt well-prepared for any mother-in-law challenges. What Sarah didn't fully realize was the scale of the battlefield she had just entered. Her new husband, Michael, came with a notorious mother, Brenda. This woman had systematically destroyed his previous two marriages, framing one ex-wife for her business's collapse and the other for a manufactured addiction, all to assert absolute control over Michael. Brenda began her campaign of terror immediately. At a "welcome to the family" BBQ, she served Sarah a malicious "artisanal slider" packed with an insane amount of habanero peppers and salt, a public trap. Later, Sarah discovered Brenda had planted a hidden nanny cam in her master bedroom, mirroring the psychological warfare used against former daughters-in-law. Most women would feel overwhelmed, targeted, and utterly helpless by such calculated malice. But Sarah wasn't most women. She had faced worse, and she knew Brenda's every move was a performance, a deliberate attempt to shame and break her. This wasn't just a personal attack; it was a project. Brenda wanted to play dirty with cameras and public humiliation? Fine. Sarah decided to show Brenda exactly how deeply that game could be played, ready to strategically use Brenda's own tactics to dismantle her carefully constructed empire of control.

My wife, Sarah, had conveniently "disappeared" three years ago, leaving me, Ethan Cole, the music mogul, free to thrive with my new star, Tiffany Vance—who just happened to be my high school tormentor and current lover. Life was perfect, until Tiffany needed a "raw" memoir and suggested Sarah write it. I returned to Sarah’s godforsaken hometown, expecting to drag my "dramatic" ex-wife back, only to be told by her brother, David, and an old woman, Maria, that Sarah had been dead for three years. I laughed in their faces, accusing them of lying, shoving David, and nearly strangling Maria. I refused to believe it until I ordered my men to dig up her grave. Seeing Sarah’s bones in that cheap coffin felt like a punch to the gut. Then, the world truly tilted when I learned Maria, the woman I’d just assaulted, was my own long-lost mother, whom I believed dead. Tiffany tried to soothe me with a fabricated story of saving me from drowning, holding up a tarnished locket as proof. But the inscription on that locket, a tiny "S.J." and a unique dent, screamed a different truth. It was Sarah’s. She was my savior, not Tiffany. Tiffany had stolen her heroism, just as she'd stolen my life, and used me as a weapon against Sarah and my family. The realization was a cold, terrifying clarity, revealing the monstrous fool I'd been. My world, built on lies and cruelty, shattered. The man who had unknowingly destroyed my life would now be the instrument of ultimate vengeance, vowing to uncover every one of Tiffany’s twisted schemes, every lie, and make everyone involved pay.

Zoe's friend needed her help. Zoe had to help her scare away the blind date she was on. To that end, she wore an insane amount of makeup underneath a wig to disguise herself. However, her plans are derailed when the blind date turns out to be the legendary heart-throb of the campus, Wade. Intrigued by this woman, Wade starts scheming schemes of his own. Zoe had thought that she could succeed easily but through various love traps, she is finally lured into Wade's arms.

Celia, born with a silver spoon in her mouth, suffered poverty because of her family’s bankruptcy. Hogan, the powerful CEO, looked down upon everyone in the world. An accident started the gear of their fate. She was trapped with this bossy devil. His limitless adoration finally won her heart. She thought she would have lifetime happiness, but there was a storm brewing. He was the one she loved, but also the one who hurt her the most. Tempted by devil's whispers, she had to pay for the price.

Seventeen years after going missing, Brooklyn was finally brought back to her ultra-wealthy biological family. But instead of a tearful reunion, her parents and sisters treated her like infectious garbage, mocking her cheap clothes and calling her a country bumpkin. They dumped her into a remedial class to hide her away, cut off her allowance, and threatened to lock down her trust fund to force her into absolute submission. One night, Brooklyn stood in the shadows of the estate and overheard a conversation that shattered everything. She hadn't wandered off as a child. Her parents had deliberately thrown her away because a fake fortune teller claimed her birth chart was a jinx to the family's wealth. They felt zero remorse, only plotting to banish her again the moment she turned eighteen. Her biological father thought he was putting a leash on a helpless, uneducated girl by cutting off her pocket change. He had no idea that Brooklyn was the anonymous VIP who casually dropped sixty million dollars on an emerald at the city's most exclusive auction. He didn't know she was the elusive medical genius that the world's most powerful billionaires were currently tearing the city apart to find. The last microscopic shred of hope for a family withered into cold ash in her chest. "Lock down my trust fund?" She pulled out her encrypted phone and activated her shadow networks, severing herself entirely from their pathetic surveillance. Since they believed she was a jinx, she was going to show them exactly what a real curse looked like.

I was three days away from marrying the Underboss of the Fazio crime family when I unlocked his burner phone. The screen glowed toxic bright in the dark next to my sleeping fiancé. A message from a contact saved as 'Little Trouble' read: "She is just a statue, Dante. Come back to bed." Attached was a photo of a woman lying in the sheets of his private office, wearing his shirt. My heart didn't break; it simply stopped. For eight years, I believed Dante was the hero who pulled me from a burning opera house. I played the perfect, loyal Mafia Princess for him. But heroes don't give their mistresses rare pink diamonds while giving their fiancées cubic zirconia replicas. He didn't just cheat. He humiliated me. He defended his mistress over his own soldiers in public. He even abandoned me on the side of the road on my birthday because she faked a pregnancy emergency. He thought I was weak. He thought I would accept the fake ring and the disrespect because I was just a political pawn. He was wrong. I didn't cry. Tears are for women who have options. I had a strategy. I walked into the bathroom and dialed a number I hadn't dared to call in a decade. "Speak," a voice like gravel growled on the other end. Lorenzo Moretti. The Capo of the rival family. The man my father called the Devil. "The wedding is off," I whispered, staring at my reflection. "I want an alliance with you, Enzo. And I want the Fazio family burned to the ground."

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.

"They say the dead don't come back. But I did. And I brought hell with me." Aria Moretti was supposed to die seven years ago when her entire mafia family was slaughtered in a brutal massacre. Instead, she escaped pregnant, alone, and marked for death. She fled to Lagos, gave birth in hiding, and spent seven years transforming from a sheltered princess into something far more dangerous. Now she's back in New York. Not for forgiveness. For blood. But her return puts her on a tight spot with Dante Russo the man she once loved and was forced to betray. He's no longer the loyal soldier from her father's organization. He's built himself into a billionaire empire while secretly ruling the city's underworld. Powerful. Ruthless. Unforgettable. And he's never forgiven her for disappearing. When Dante discovers Aria is alive, he should kill her for the betrayal he thinks she committed. Instead, he makes her an offer she can't refuse: Marry me. Six months. No questions asked. He needs a wife to legitimize his business expansion. She needs his protection to hunt her family's killer. It's purely transactional. A marriage of convenience. Nothing more. As they're forced into close contact, old attraction reignites into something explosive. Assassination attempts bring them together. Shared danger builds unexpected trust. And co-parenting the son Dante is just getting to know creates moments of tenderness neither expected. But as Aria gets closer to discovering who ordered the massacre, the lies holding their marriage together begin to crumble. A traitor is in Dante's organization. A jealous ex-lover plots to destroy their alliance. And Vincent Carozza Aria's godfather and the man she suspects killed her family is closing in for the final strike.

I didn't mean to call my boss. I definitely didn't mean to leave a seven-minute voicemail of dirty secrets about him. Working for Ruslan Oryolov is the job from hell. The man is impossible-demanding, arrogant, and way too gorgeous for his own good. After eighteen months of fetching his coffee and swallowing my pride, all I wanted was one night of stress relief. But the billionaire CEO of Bane Corporation isn't just a boss from hell. He's the head of the Oryolov Bratva-and now that he's heard every secret I never meant to share, he's decided to claim me. His contract. His rules. His protection for my three orphaned nieces and nephews-the only reason I'm signing my life away to a man I should fear. He owns my signature. He owns my safety. Now he wants my soul.

I hid my identity as the heiress of a top-tier wealthy family just to build a normal, quiet life with my fiancé, Jefferey. We had just picked out our dream villa, but a sudden bank notification shattered my illusion. The entire $7.8 million from our joint trust fund had been wired to a woman named Jessie Barr. When I hacked into his synced tablet, the truth hit me like a truck. Jessie wasn't just a stranger; she was his secret lover. They even had a four-year-old son who shared Jefferey's exact eyes. "The money is in your account. Our future is secure now. I'll leave her soon." Reading his messages to her, I realized my three years of devotion were nothing but a long con. I was just the final "project" he needed to fund his real family. He used my resources, my connections, and my money to build a life in the shadows with his true love, treating me like a naive piggy bank he could discard at any moment. I had given up my absolute power for a man who fed me nothing but lies. But Jefferey forgot one crucial detail. I wasn't just some helpless woman he could ruin. I calmly closed my laptop and dialed a number I hadn't called in three years. "Mom, I was wrong. I'm ready to accept the Romero family's marriage alliance." It was time to gut his company and take everything he owned.

I am the wife of Dante Moretti, a powerful Mafia Underboss. But in secret, I am "Spettro," the phantom architect who built his entire encrypted bootlegging empire. On my birthday, I came home to find him gifting our five-year-old daughter the exact plush toy he had violently slapped out of my hands months ago. Only this time, he was giving it to his mistress, Adriana, to present as her own. "Auntie Adriana is a million times better than Mommy." My daughter's innocent words pierced my heart, while Dante coldly dismissed my presence, treating me like an unwelcome stranger interrupting their perfect family. He mocked my mothering, allowed his mistress to sever my desperate phone calls with my child, and weaponized his power to break our daughter's spirit just to spite me. He sneered that my only purpose was to stay quiet, absolutely certain I would crawl back the second my allowance ran dry. He thought I was just a weak, submissive wife who had lost everything. He didn't realize that the empire he arrogantly ruled was entirely built on my stolen brilliance. I left my diamond ring on the table, violently slashed our ancient blood oath in half, and walked out of his gilded cage forever. Sitting in a cold warehouse, I placed my hands on my telegraph machine and initiated the Ghost Protocol to permanently paralyze his entire criminal network. The era of playing the dutiful wife was over. I am Donna Falcone, and the vendetta has just begun.

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.

On the night of my twenty-fourth birthday, my husband walked into our heavily guarded penthouse with his pregnant childhood friend and demanded a divorce to protect her bastard child—entirely oblivious to the fact that I was carrying his. My posture became a rigid thing at the long mahogany dining table. The wicks of the candles I had spent hours preparing had drowned, leaving greasy craters in the frosting. On the far side of that ruined confection, Christian Cavallaro stood. He was the Don of the Cavallaro Family—a man who had left two rival syndicates cooling on mortuary slabs before his twenty-fifth birthday, whose name was a quiet command that could make hardened men lower their eyes. His dark suits were always tailored to perfection, hiding the lethal weapons and scars beneath. But right now, he was just the man breaking my heart with a single sentence. Serena stood slightly behind him, her hand a pale guard over her still-flat stomach. She was a high-ranking Capo's daughter, a glamorous socialite who had spent the last few years in Europe. Now she was back, pregnant with a child fathered by an outsider from an enemy faction. In our circle, that was a crime punishable by death. Christian took a step closer. His gaze fell to the hollow of my collarbone. In the dim light, his pupils were wide, the shadows obscuring his intent. He told me the syndicate demanded blood for Serena's transgression. The only way to shield her was to give her child the protection of his name. He needed to marry her. My hand moved to my own flat stomach. Beneath my palm was the secret I had planned to share tonight—the tiny heartbeat I had imagined would complete our fractured family. A sudden, glacial clarity settled in my bones. I looked at the man who had pulled me out of the blood and trauma of my parents' assassination ten years ago. They had been loyal soldiers, dying to take bullets meant for his father. In return, I had been made a ward of the estate. A decade of devotion, bartered for this. I had folded my medical school acceptance letter and tucked it away to become a silent, suitable wife. I had weathered his mother's remarks about my low-ranking blood, learning to arrange my face into a serene mask. I had thought my devotion would eventually thaw his cold exterior. I was wrong. Christian reiterated the necessity of the divorce. He said it was only a temporary measure. I looked at Serena, and saw the smirk that flickered for an instant behind her sculpted mask of fear. I realized then that bringing a child into this penthouse—where any window might splinter inward from a sniper's bullet—would be a life sentence. My baby would be born into a cage of paranoia and blood, with Serena's poisoned presence a permanent threat. If I revealed my condition now, his child would forever chain me to his syndicate. I would never be free. Neither would my child. I lowered my hand from my stomach and folded it over my other hand on the table. I looked directly into my husband's eyes, and I told him I agreed to the divorce.

I was the wife of Dante Cavalli, the most ruthless mafia Don in the country. But today, his Underboss slid mandatory annulment papers across my hospital bed, ordering me to dissolve our marriage. In my past life, I dropped to my knees and begged them not to abandon me. I spent the next thirty years locked in Dante's massive penthouse, waiting for a man who bathed the streets in blood but never gave me a single drop of warmth. My aristocratic mother-in-law stripped me of every cent, leaving me completely isolated. I foolishly threw away a brilliant surgical career to be a submissive, obedient mafia wife. In the end, Dante never came to see me, and I died entirely alone in that massive, empty bed. Until my last breath, my chest was suffocated by a lifetime of regrets. I couldn't understand why I had sacrificed my freedom and my scalpels for a man who would only feel a twisted guilt decades after I was already a cold corpse. Opening my eyes again, Fate had dragged me back to the exact day my nightmare truly began. Matteo stood at the foot of my bed, clearly expecting my usual pathetic tears. "Take your time to think about it." This time, I didn't cry or beg for my life. I just picked up the fountain pen, signed my name, and walked out to reclaim the scalpel I had abandoned.