Yue Rujing

For six years, Isabella Rossi used her family's immense wealth to save her husband's Mafia empire from bankruptcy while he fought on the front lines. Her reward? Don Damien Moretti returns with a mistress, a secret son, and a demand: Accept them, and keep paying the bills. He expects her to swallow her pride. Instead, Isabella closes her checkbook. She demands a divorce, cuts off their funding, and leaves his "glorious" empire to starve. But a Queen stepping down draws wolves. Enter Giovanni Falcone-the ruthless, untouchable King of the New York Underworld. He doesn't want her money; he wants her. Now, her ex-husband is begging for her back. But Isabella? She's too busy building her own empire-and watching his burn.

My husband, Jerrold, rushed out for an emergency IT call, leaving his phone behind. A bank alert flashed across the screen: a $2,500 mortgage payment to his ex-wife, Jackie Reid. My heart sank. For five years, he' d told me his take-home pay was only $4,000 a month, and I struggled to cover our family' s expenses on the meager $1,200 allowance he gave me. When I confronted him, he stammered excuses, and his parents, who knew all along, defended his 'obligation' to his past. But the lies ran deeper. I soon discovered his real income was over double what he claimed, and our entire five-year marriage was built on a foundation of deceit to pay for his guilt over cheating on his first wife. He had me clipping coupons and telling our son, Leo, 'no' to simple treats, all while he secretly funneled $150,000 of our money to his ex. He wasn't just lying; he was stealing our future. That's when I stopped crying and started collecting evidence. I hired a lawyer and walked into that courtroom ready to take back every penny he stole from me and our son.

My father-in-law was killed in a hit-and-run. But the first thing my husband said in the hospital waiting room wasn't about his grief. It was about money. "Take the seventy-five thousand dollars, Eve. Your father wasn't worth more than that." He thought the man lying in the morgue was my father. He handed me a settlement agreement that framed him as a con artist who' d staged the accident for a payday. I refused. He became a monster, threatening me before cutting me off financially. I soon discovered why: the driver was his pregnant mistress, and this was all a desperate cover-up to protect her. He was willing to destroy my family to save his new one. He called me weak and sentimental, an emotional nuisance he could easily manage. He was so sure he could break me and buy my silence. In court, his lawyer presented the settlement agreement, ready to paint me as a greedy, unstable liar. But then the judge cleared her throat to make the formal announcement. "The deceased is Mr. Gordon Charles." It wasn't my father on that morgue slab. It was his.

The day Michael Miller came back from the dead was a Tuesday. I was in my home office, the one that used to be his, when the doorbell rang, followed by a commotion downstairs. A man' s voice, familiar yet chillingly out of place, echoed through the house. It was Michael Miller, my husband, whose funeral I' d attended three years ago. He stood there, healthy and tanned, not alone. A blonde woman clung to his arm, and beside them, two children with his dark hair and pale blue eyes stared up at me, their faces hostile. "Ava," he said, his voice smooth, as if he' d just returned from a business trip. "I' m home." He introduced the woman as Chloe Davis and the children as Jasper and Ruby, explaining casually that he had faked his death to escape crushing debts. He expected me to accept them, to move into a guest room, to welcome his new family into our home. His mother, Eleanor, and siblings, Sarah and Ben, burst in, not with shock, but relief, claiming amnesia had kept him away. They sided with him, Eleanor even suggesting I move to the guest cottage. The family I had tirelessly saved from ruin, the company I' d rebuilt from scratch after his "death," now saw me as an inconvenience, a lingering ghost in my own life. I thought of the child we were supposed to have, the one I lost due to the stress of saving his company, of dealing with his fake death. The painful memory of my miscarriage, alone in this big, empty house, while he was off starting a new life, a new family. Then, Chloe' s son, Jasper, kicked my shin and called me an "old witch." Chloe giggled. The dam holding back my buried grief and rage shattered. I looked at their arrogant faces, their triumphant sneers. They had no idea who I had become in the fire of his betrayal. They didn' t know the thriving Miller Corp was no longer theirs. It was mine.

The exclusive bar hummed with the city' s elite, and from my secluded booth, I had a perfect view of my brother, Ethan, and my fiancé, Noah, holding court at the bar. They were betting on me, on my future, confident I was a nervous wreck after a minor accident, completely unaware I was meticulously listening to every word. I had been back with the wealthy Smith family for six months, a life everyone envied: a mansion, endless credit, an influential fiancé. But it was all a charade; beneath the surface, I was nothing more than their pawn, their trophy, targeted by my brother' s arrogance and my fiancé' s oppressive control, while the adopted daughter, Chloe, simmered with resentment. I was a victim, a fragile damsel in distress. Everyone saw it but me. I watched them, learned their weaknesses, and then I orchestrated my own engagement to Noah, making him believe he was securing the true heiress, all while pulling his strings. They were consumed by their petty rivalries, completely blind to the game I was playing, a game where their arrogance was my ultimate weapon. Their bet on me was just the beginning; I was playing for a much bigger prize. With chilling precision, I created scenarios, fanned their egos, and subtly moved them into positions where they would self-destruct, all while I appeared to be the struggling, innocent girl. I was merely the quiet, fragile girl they thought they were protecting. They talked about winning, but they had no idea they were already losing. The truth was, I wasn't just in the game; I was the game master, and they were all about to find out exactly what happens when you underestimate a Smith.

My mother, Evelyn, was born deaf-mute, burdened by an ancient prophecy: she would speak three times, and disaster would follow each utterance. I, Sarah, grew up under this constant, quiet dread. The first words came when I was a teenager, a rough whisper to my father, David: "Don't go, David." Hours later, he plunged from our high-rise balcony, an "accident" that shattered our lives. But I saw the grainy security footage: Mom stood in the doorway, simply watching him fall, her face a chilling, unreadable mask. She then vanished to her hometown, Blackwood Creek, leaving me with a growing, terrible suspicion. Five years passed, my fiancé Mark brought a fragile peace, but Mom's cryptic second words to him at a public dinner reignited the whispers. The next night, Mark was climbing his balcony railing, vacant-eyed, just like Dad, saved only by his parents' timely intervention. Then, the staticky, desperate phone call: Mom's third utterance, "Sarah, listen to me. You have to get away... Mama loves you." Her voice was raw with terror, not manipulation. Moments later, the news screamer: Evelyn Hayes found dead, an apparent suicide in Blackwood Creek. Suicide? After that warning, after that desperate love? My heart screamed; the official story felt like a carefully constructed lie designed to hide something monstrous. I refused to believe it. My mother's last terrifying words, her love, and her impossible death demanded answers. Blackwood Creek held those secrets, and I swore to uncover them, no matter the cost.

Five years ago, I drove away from Boston, vowing never to look back at the city that had shattered my world. I had meticulously rebuilt my life in Portland, nurturing a freelance design business, a loving marriage with my supportive husband, David, and a joyful life with our son, Leo. But a mandatory design conference now pulled me back, forcing me to confront the ghosts of a past I had believed were long buried. The first ghost appeared in the form of Jessica Bellwether, a former sorority sister, whose familiar laugh cut through the convention center's buzz. She approached me with that same pitying smile, mentioning "him." "He still talks about you," she whispered conspiratorially, her words a deliberate jab. "If you just admitted your mistake, he' d take you back." Mistake? That singular word plunged me back into the nightmare of my own rehearsal dinner. I was there, in a beautiful white dress, standing before two hundred of Boston' s elite, when Ethan Hayes, my fiancé, produced a sheaf of printed messages. He publicly branded me a deceitful woman, twisting my most intimate expressions of grief for my beloved, deceased brother, Mark, into fabricated evidence of a secret lover. Chloe Vance, his ambitious colleague, had orchestrated the deception, and he, in his blind fury and pride, had cast me aside without a single question. My world disintegrated on that elegant ballroom floor, a public execution orchestrated by the man who had promised me forever. How could he have so easily devoured such a monstrous lie, so readily destroying me and the memory of my brother? The sheer unfairness and the profound pain of his betrayal had lingered for half a decade, a scar hidden beneath my newfound peace. Now, Ethan, hearing whispers of my quiet happiness, has tracked me across the country. He' s invaded my serene Portland life, demanding answers, accusing me of abandoning him. His audacious presence has rekindled a righteous anger I swore I' d never feel again. This time, I won' t just walk away; I will speak my truth, and he will finally hear the brutal reality of what he truly did.

The scent of lavender oil was thick in the air, a constant reminder of my new life as a blind massage therapist. Years ago, while proctoring an SAT exam, my sight inexplicably vanished, leaving me to navigate a world of sound and touch. But my quiet existence shattered when two familiar voices, brimming with arrogance, drifted in: Vic Stone, boasting about cheating, and David Miller, whispering about 'the culprit' who was 'right there in the exam room' when I went blind. My hands froze, my heart hammering as the full, horrifying realization hit me: my tragedy wasn't a freak accident, but a premeditated attack. My entire life, my career, my very existence, had been stolen by someone in that room. Who was this mastermind, hiding in plain sight? Why me? And what did David know that he couldn't openly say? The injustice burned hotter than any anger I'd ever known. Before I could demand answers, a sudden, blinding pain plunged me into a different kind of darkness. Yet, I gasped awake, light flooding my vision, back in that SAT room on the very day it happened. I was Michael Davies, proctor, again – with a terrifying second chance to stop my own undoing, and expose the monster who stole my life.

After her parents died in a car accident, Sheri and her sick sister were not only driven out of their homes but their family business was torn from their grasps. Everyone had already abandoned her for good. She had no hopes until she met Elliot. Although she no longer recognized him, she was actually the woman who he had spent years finding for. Regardless of her helplessness, he offered her a deal—he would give her everything she ever wanted if she would marry him. Now that he had her in his arms, he would do everything he could to make her happy. He would shower her with all the love he had in his heart.

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.

Three days after my fiancé publicly dumped me for my stepsister, the Supreme Don issued a command that silenced the entire estate. I wasn't being cast aside. I was being sold to Damien Russo. The "Broken Don." A crippled, scarred monster rumored to have murdered his last two wives. My adoptive mother, Elena, didn't cry for me. She smirked. To her, I was finally being disposed of. She was so confident I was walking to my death that she decided to loot my corpse before I even left. She forged documents to steal my entire inheritance—my biological mother’s trust fund—to pay for my stepsister’s lavish wedding to my ex. "She won't need money where she's going," my stepsister laughed, wearing a dress bought with my stolen funds. They thought they were sending a lamb to the slaughter. They thought I was too weak, too stupid, and too afraid of the monster to fight back. But they made a fatal mistake. With my aunt’s help, I didn't just find the proof of their embezzlement; I found a weapon. I’m not running from the monster. I’m going to marry him. And when I hand him the evidence that the Herrera family stole from his bride, he won't be my executioner. He will be my vengeance.

I was the perfect Mafia wife, my dowry the foundation of my husband's ambition. I paid for his Yale degree, his tailored suits, and the very mansion he called his own. My reward? He paraded his mistress into my bedroom and declared her his second wife, expecting me to silently finance their affair. They thought they had broken a merchant's daughter. They forgot I was raised by wolves. Armed with a blood chit—a life debt owed to my family by the most feared man in Chicago—I walked into the lion's den. I went to Damien 'The Wraith' Falcone, the Dark Don who rules the Outfit with an iron fist, to demand a simple annulment. But the King of Chicago isn't interested in simple transactions. He saw the steel beneath my silk, the vendetta burning in my eyes. He granted me my freedom, but at a price: my allegiance. Now, I'm a pawn in his lethal game of thrones, caught between a treacherous husband I swore to destroy and a ruthless Don who looks at me with a terrifying, possessive hunger. In a city built on loyalty and betrayal, I'm about to teach them all that a queen's wrath is the deadliest weapon of all.

"Happy Anniversary," my husband said, sliding the separation agreement across the mahogany desk. It was the eighteenth time in five years I had signed these papers. Matteo De Luca, the most ruthless Capo in New York, checked his Rolex with cold impatience. "Sign it, Sera. Bianca is on the ledge again. She needs to see we're over, or she jumps." Bianca. The ward. The broken bird. The woman whose fragile psyche dictated every moment of my marriage. I signed my name, and he left me alone on our anniversary to save her. Again. But saving her wasn't enough. When Bianca pushed me down a flight of marble stairs in a fit of jealous rage, shattering my spine and leaving me paralyzed, I thought Matteo would finally choose me. I was wrong. I woke up in the hospital to find him holding her hand, not mine. "The security footage has been wiped," he told me, his voice void of emotion. "We cannot have a scandal. You fell, Sera. That is the story." He erased the truth. He erased my pain. He protected the woman who crippled me over his own wife. Two months later, he wheeled me into a gala, playing the doting husband while I sat in the chair that was my prison. He didn't know I had a burner phone hidden in my velvet dress. He didn't know that tonight, the obedient wife was going to die on the pavement, and a ghost would rise in her place. I looked at him one last time and dropped the phone in his lap. "I hope she's worth it."

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 stood before the altar of the grand gothic cathedral, about to marry Julian Moretti, the grieving adopted son stepping up for the comatose Don. To the hundreds of mafia men behind us, it was a dutiful wedding. But I knew the horrifying truth. Julian and his pregnant mistress, Clara, had orchestrated a brutal plot to steal my dowry and secure his place as the next Don. In my past life, I was completely blind to their betrayal. Julian trapped me in our apartment and set it ablaze. I could still feel the blistering heat of the fire. I could still hear my mother’s agonizing screams and my little brother Antonio’s desperate coughing as the smoke filled our lungs. My entire family was burned alive just so Julian could swap the brides and put his whore in my place. I died in pure agony, filled with hatred and despair, wondering why I had trusted a monster. God hadn't saved me from those flames. The Devil had. And he sent me back to this exact moment at the altar. "Do you, Isabella Rossi, take Julian Moretti to be your lawfully wedded husband?" the priest asked. Julian reached for my hand with a sickeningly gentle smile. I didn't give it to him. I tore back my lace veil and turned to face the crowd. "You are mistaken, Father," I said, my voice like ice. "The man I am bound to marry is your Don. Damien Moretti."

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.

For seven years, I was his eyes. But the moment he regained his sight, he decided to marry someone else. Seven years of devotion couldn't buy his heart. I gave him back his dignity. Now that he was restored as the Godfather of the New York Mafia, he laughed with others, degrading me to the status of a mere "mistress." He thought I didn't understand Italian, but I heard him loud and clear: he was going to marry his first love. He arrogantly believed I would always love him, willing to stay in his penthouse like a caged bird. But he was wrong. I boarded a one-way flight to Australia. Dante, I don't want you anymore. By the time he returned home, he would have lost me forever. But a sore loser refuses to concede. Even if he had to burn the world to the ground, he would search for me and beg for my forgiveness.

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.