Discarded Heiress: Reborn from Mafia Prison
Seven years ago, my fiancé, Don Dante Moretti, sent me to prison to take the fall for my adopted sister, Chiara. He called it a gift—a way to protect me from a worse fate.
Today, he picked me up from prison only to abandon me at my family's estate. His reason? Chiara was having another one of her "episodes."
My parents then informed me I'd be staying in the third-floor storage room, so as not to disturb the fragile girl who stole my life.
They celebrated her "recovery" with a lavish dinner party, while I was treated like a ghost. When I refused to join, my mother hissed that I was ungrateful, and my father called me jealous.
They assumed I couldn't understand their venomous whispers. But prison was my university. I learned Spanish. I understood every word.
It was then I realized I wasn't just a sacrifice; I was disposable. The love I once felt for all of them had turned to ash.
That night, in the dusty storage room, I logged onto an encrypted channel I'd set up years ago. A single message was waiting: "The offer stands. Do you accept?" My hands, scarred and steady, typed back, "I accept."
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Chapter 2
Alessia POV:
Before Chiara, I had a future. A full scholarship to a prestigious art school on the East Coast. Dreams of galleries and studios, of a life painted in color instead of blood.
Chiara, with her feigned heart condition and bottomless needs, had devoured it all. My college fund was siphoned off for her "specialists" and "treatments." My dreams were dismissed as selfish fantasies.
Now, my only future was a one-way ticket to Dominica. The confirmation email had landed in my inbox a few hours after my acceptance. A car would pick me up in three days. Three days to endure this place I once called home.
Drawn by a morbid curiosity, I went downstairs. The formal dining room glowed with candlelight, a feast sprawling across the mahogany table. It was a celebration.
For Chiara's "recovery."
She was nestled against Dante's side, looking pale and lovely in a silk dress. My mother fussed over her, my father watched her with adoration. They were a perfect family.
And I was a ghost at their feast.
No one acknowledged me until Dante finally looked up, his eyes dark and unfathomable. "Alia. Come, sit."
It was an order, not an invitation.
I held my ground by the door.
Chiara, playing her part to perfection, sighed weakly. "Dante, darling, could you peel a grape for me? My fingers are just so tired."
For a fraction of a second, he hesitated. A flicker of conflict-a storm I recognized-crossed his face before it was smoothed away. He picked up a grape, his large, capable hands-hands that had built a criminal empire, hands that had once held me with such tenderness-peeled the thin skin with practiced care.
Something inside me snapped. Quietly. Irrevocably.
I turned to leave.
"Desagradecida," my mother hissed, the Spanish word for ungrateful slicing through the air like a whip.
"She's just jealous of Chiara," my father added, his tone dripping with disdain. "Always has been."
They thought I wouldn't understand. They assumed seven years in a federal penitentiary had left me uneducated, broken. But prison hadn't broken me; it had been my university. I'd learned to survive. To listen. And to navigate the intricate hierarchies and alliances behind bars, I had mastered multiple languages, Spanish chief among them.
I understood every venomous word.
A cold resolve settled deep in my bones. I didn't go back to the storage room. I walked straight through the grand foyer, past the disapproving stare of the butler, and out the heavy oak doors.
The cool night air struck my face. I kept walking, down the long, manicured driveway, until the oppressive weight of the estate was behind me.
It was only then, as my cheap prison-issue shoes hit the public pavement, that I remembered.
It was my birthday.
Another milestone they had forgotten. Another piece of me they had discarded.
I wasn't just leaving. I was erasing them.