Escaping The Cage: I Married His Worst Enemy

My husband, the Capo of New York, gripped my hand as we walked into the soundproofed room. He wasn't there to save me. He was there to watch the family doctor carve out my mind. A stranger named Sofia claimed I had sold her to a brothel twelve years ago. It was a lie. But Dante looked at me with cold marble eyes, believing the woman sobbing in his arms over the wife he had vowed to protect. "Sit, Elena," he ordered. He strapped me into the chair. He watched as they injected liquid fire into my veins to force a confession. He dragged me to the kennels, forcing me to feed the dogs I was terrified of, and watched as they tore into my flesh. He even locked me in a freezer to "cool off" my jealousy. The final straw wasn't the pain. It was hearing him plan a Vow Renewal with Sofia, intending to parade me as her Maid of Honor to teach me humility. I realized then that Elena Moretti had to die. So, I set the hospital room on fire. I left my wedding ring in the ashes and vanished into the night. Six months later, Dante found me in Paris. He fell to his knees, begging for forgiveness. I looked at him with dead eyes and handed him a knife. "Kill yourself," I said. "That is the only way I will believe you are sorry."

Chapters

Chapter 9

Dante POV:

The whiskey burned on the way down, a liquid fire that did nothing to cauterize the gaping wound in my chest.

Nothing hurt enough to match the void she had left behind.

I slumped in the darkness of my study, the only illumination coming from the moonlight bleeding through the blinds. The ring sat on the mahogany desk in front of me. I had been staring at the diamond for two days, waiting for it to speak, to forgive.

The heavy door creaked open.

Sofia slipped inside. She was a shadow wrapped in a black silk robe, sheer enough to tease the lace beneath. She didn't smell like mourning. She smelled of expensive perfume and opportunity.

"Dante," she cooed, sauntering toward me. "You haven't slept."

"Get out," I said. My voice was gravel, scraping against my throat.

"You need comfort," she whispered. She rounded the desk, her hands sliding onto my shoulders like cold weights. "She was sick, Dante. She started the fire. She wanted to die. You can't blame yourself for her madness."

She ran her palms down my chest, tracing the muscles.

"We are the survivors," she murmured, her voice dripping with rehearsed sympathy. "We need to live. For the Family."

She lowered herself onto my lap, straddling me. She leaned in, her lips parting to kiss me.

I snatched her wrists, halting her.

I looked at her. I scrutinized her.

There was no sadness in her eyes. Only calculation. Only a predator's hunger.

"You're glad she's dead," I said.

"I'm glad you're free," she corrected, leaning closer. The silk of her robe slipped, exposing the curve of her shoulder.

My eyes dropped to her collarbone.

Smooth, unblemished skin.

I froze.

"Where is it?" I asked, my voice dropping to a dangerous whisper.

"What?"

"The scar," I said, my grip crushing her wrists. "Giulia fell out of a tree when she was ten. She needed twelve stitches. She had a jagged, silver scar right here."

Sofia’s eyes widened. Panic flickered behind her mask. She tried to pull away. "I... I had it removed. Laser surgery. To look perfect for you, baby."

"Laser surgery doesn't erase deep tissue scarring," I snarled.

I shoved her off me. She stumbled back, barely keeping her balance in her heels.

"And Giulia was allergic to strawberries," I said, rising from the chair like a waking nightmare. "You ate a strawberry tart at the rehearsal dinner."

"I grew out of it!" she stammered, retreating toward the door. "People change!"

I stalked toward her. The predator in me snapped its chains. The grief was still there, but now it was fueling something darker.

Rage.

"Get out of my sight," I said, the command vibrating in the air. "Go to your room. If you try to leave the estate, the dogs will be the least of your worries."

"Dante, baby, you're just stressed..."

"GO!" I roared, snatching a crystal tumbler and hurling it against the wall.

It shattered inches from her head. She fled, slamming the door behind her.

Silence rushed back in, deafening and cold.

I looked down at my own chest, at the tattoo inked over my heart. *XY*.

Xu Yuan. Elena’s birth name. The name only I was supposed to know.

I had betrayed that name. I had tortured the woman who bore it.

And for what?

For a stranger with smooth skin and a heart full of lies.

A terrible, serpentine suspicion began to coil in my gut, turning my blood to ice.

I snatched up the phone.

"Get the car," I ordered my head of security. "We're going to the morgue. I need to see the body."

Continue to next part

Ashlyn was supposed to be just a fragile college student, selling her rare blood to a vicious crime syndicate enforcer to keep his dying sister alive. But the dynamic shattered when Alex returned from a two-month disappearance. He stepped into the penthouse covered in dirt and blood, sporting a horrific, jagged knife wound slashed completely across his face. Knowing exactly how to exploit his insecurities, Ashlyn played the role of the terrified victim to perfection. She screamed, pushed against his chest, and called him a terrifying monster. Humiliated and enraged by her blatant disgust, Alex violently smashed a marble table and kicked her out. He forced her out into a freezing, torrential rainstorm without a coat, vowing to kill her if she ever showed her face again. What the ruthless enforcer didn't know was that her pathetic, trembling tears were a flawless, calculated lie. She wasn't a helpless, greedy girl. She was a cold-blooded corporate mastermind hiding from a family of elite assassins. She desperately needed his impenetrable penthouse fortress to stay alive, and she knew the only way to secure her place wasn't to ask for it, but to make him beg for her return. Three days later, his sister's organs began to fail, and the hospital's blood bank ran dry. "I'll pay you whatever you want. Just get here." Listening to the desperate, broken voice of the monster over her burner phone, Ashlyn smiled coldly in the dark. The trap had snapped shut, and he had just handed her all the power.

Billionaire Mafia Modern

8.1

His Unwanted Bride, Another Man's Queen

8.1

My fiancé, the ruthless Mafia Underboss, tore my dead mother's necklace from my throat and fastened it around another woman's neck. "Diana needs it," Arthur said, his eyes cold. "My blood remembers loving her. It calms her anxiety." He was referring to the bone marrow transplant that saved his life. Diana was connected to the donor, and Arthur believed his new blood made him belong to her. I became a ghost in my own home, forced to watch him crown a usurper. When Diana faked a fall at a gala, accusing me of pushing her, Arthur didn't hesitate. He decided to "discipline" me publicly to teach me respect. He raised the whip. "Arthur, please, I'm pregnant!" I screamed, shielding my stomach. "Don't lie to me," he spat, and the lash came down. I lost our baby on that cold marble floor in a pool of blood. He didn't believe me. He stepped over my body to take Diana to dinner. He didn't stop there. He let my grandmother die in the ER to tend to Diana's bruised nose. He even dug up my grandmother's grave because Diana wanted the view for a garden. I finally fled, vanishing into the night. It wasn't until months later, when he found the autopsy report of our unborn child and the toxicology results proving Diana had been drugging him, that the fog lifted. He tracked me down to a small town, where I was finally healing with a good man. The feared Underboss fell to his knees in the pouring rain, holding the whip he had used on me, shaking violently. "Beat me, Ella," he begged, tears mixing with the mud. "Hurt me. Make us even." I looked at the monster I used to love and dropped his ring into the dirt. "You can't bring back the dead, Arthur," I whispered. "And you are dead to me."

Horror Mafia Romance

9.6

I Was the Deal He Sacrificed

9.6

Noa built the Ward empire alongside her husband Elias, only to be cast aside for his nephew’s widow, Harper. When Elias’s enemies abduct Noa, he refuses to rescue her, prioritizing Harper’s pregnancy over his wife’s life. After eight months of brutal captivity and degradation, Noa finally escapes. She returns to find her own twins neglected while Elias celebrates his new child. Silent and determined, she takes her children and vanishes to start anew.

Action Mafia Mystery Romance

8.2

Mafia Princess's Vengeance for Lost Heir

8.2

At my ten-week ultrasound, I was supposed to be celebrating the future of the Falcone family. I was Isabella Falcone, wife to the most powerful Don in the south. But when the nurse called my name, the man who stood up beside his pregnant mistress was my husband. In the sterile silence of that waiting room, he chose her. He later confessed he was being blackmailed by her family-a weakness that was a death sentence in our world. That night, he moved his mistress into our home, into my bedroom, and locked me away like a prisoner in the staff quarters. He wasn't imprisoning his wife; he was guarding an asset. He needed the legitimate heir I carried to save his crumbling empire. His betrayal was absolute when his own mother and my adoptive parents arrived while he was away. They forced me to sign divorce papers, then told me they were taking me to a clinic. His mother pulled out a gun and pointed not at my head, but at my stomach. "We're terminating this complication," she said coldly. As they dragged me from the house, my world went dark. But through the haze, I saw a fleet of black cars blocking the gate. An army of men poured out, led by a face I had only ever seen in a photograph. Days earlier, locked in my room, I made a single phone call to the only man more powerful than my husband: my biological father, the head of the Chicago Outfit. And he had come to collect his daughter.

Mafia Modern Romance

8.6

Once His Little Girl, Now His Proper Mafia Wife

8.6

"I was sold to a devil - a man who owned empires, destroyed lives, and believed love was weakness. That devil now owns me." When 19-year-old Malissa is betrayed by her own father and sold to settle a mafia debt, she's forced into the cruel, mysterious world of Hayden Castellano - a ruthless mafia king known for his cold heart and blood-stained hands. She's to serve as his slave. No rights. No freedom. No escape. But Hayden didn't expect her fire. Her resistance. Her refusal to break. As days turn into weeks, their war of wills turns into something else - something dangerous. Hayden becomes possessive. Obsessive. And just when Malissa starts to feel the pull of his tortured soul, she uncovers secrets that could cost her everything - including the truth about her own bloodline. Because in Hayden's world, love doesn't save you. It marks you for death. "He said he owned me. He never expected I'd own his heart."

Mafia Modern Romance

8.4

After My Groom Poisoned Me, He Married His Mistress Instead

8.4

On what should be her wedding night, a deadly syndicate assassin stands in her bridal gown, her lethal weapons hidden beneath the lace. She is ready to marry Kaiser, the powerful man whose empire she helped build from the shadows. But instead of a union of equals, she faces a chilling betrayal. In this dark mafia romance, her night of promised love transforms into a brutal fight for survival as she seeks ultimate vengeance.

Action Mafia Mystery Romance

Escaping The Cage: I Married His Worst Enemy

Chapter 9

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