From Mafia Pawn To The Don's Queen

It wasn't a gun, but the pen in my hand was going to end my life just the same. Liam, the man I was supposed to marry in a month, pointed to the tablet on his desk. It showed a live feed of my mother’s hospital room. "Sign the confession, Ava," he said, his voice devoid of any warmth. "Take the fall for the embezzlement. Or the funding for her ventilator stops in ten seconds." My heart hammered against my ribs. The crimes weren't mine. They belonged to Chloe, his mistress. But Liam Valenti, the Underboss of New York, was sacrificing me to save her. "She's fragile," he said casually, adjusting his silk cuffs. "She can't handle prison. You're strong. You'll survive." With tears blurring my vision, I signed the document. I signed away my career as a lawyer and my freedom to save my mother. Liam snatched the paper like a prize. He didn't offer comfort. He just smirked. "Good girl. The wedding is still on, of course. You'll look beautiful in the ankle monitor." He walked out to celebrate with his mistress, thinking he had won. Thinking he owned me. But he forgot one crucial detail. I wasn't just his fiancée. I was the one who laundered his money. I knew where every body was buried—literally and financially. The moment the door clicked shut, I stopped crying. I pulled out a burner phone and opened an encrypted app. I wasn't going to jail. I was going to war. I typed three words to the one man Liam feared most. "Execute Protocol Zero."

Chapters

Chapter 6

Ava POV

Ten seconds.

That was all the time I had left.

I stared at the blinking red light on the incendiary device. Plastic explosives, expertly rigged to the server core. Enough to melt the drives.

Enough to turn this glass cage into an incinerator.

"Liam!" I screamed, slamming my palms against the reinforced pane. "There's a bomb! Open the door!"

Liam was arguing with Chloe in the corridor, his back to me. He didn't look.

But Chloe did.

She saw me pointing at the device. She saw the terror in my eyes.

And then, she smiled.

It wasn't a panic response. It was a subtle, venomous quirk of her lips-a victory lap before the race had even finished.

She grabbed Liam's arm and yanked him away, pointing frantically toward the exit.

00:03.

I scrambled backward, curling into a ball in the furthest corner of the room, trying to make myself small.

00:02.

I covered my head with trembling arms.

00:01.

The world turned white.

The sound wasn't a boom. It was a physical blow, a sledgehammer of atmospheric pressure that crushed the air from my chest.

Heat, instantaneous and searing, washed over me.

The shockwave threw me against the glass wall like a ragdoll. My head cracked against the reinforced pane, and for a second, the universe dissolved.

Darkness swarmed my vision.

I slid down to the floor, gravity reclaiming my limp body.

Smoke.

Thick, black, acrid smoke filled the small room instantly. The fire suppression system should have triggered. Halon gas should be dumping from the ceiling to starve the flames.

Instead, there was only the roar of the fire.

Sabotage.

I coughed, my lungs burning as if I'd inhaled broken glass.

I looked up.

Through the toxic haze and the spiderweb cracks in the glass, I saw the corridor.

Liam was on the floor. He had been knocked down by the blast, but he was moving.

He pushed himself up, his eyes wild as he looked toward the server room.

He saw the fire.

He saw me.

I pressed my hand against the glass, leaving a bloody smear where my skin met the surface.

Help me.

I mouthed the words, my voice stolen by the smoke.

Liam took a step toward the door. His hand reached for the keypad.

"Liam!"

Chloe's voice cut through the ringing in my ears.

She was on the floor, coughing. It sounded dry. Forced.

"My leg!" she screamed, clutching a limb that looked perfectly fine. "Liam, help me!"

Liam froze.

He looked at me. Trapped in the fire. Bleeding. The architect of the destruction, in his eyes.

He looked at Chloe. The innocent bystander. The victim.

He hesitated.

That hesitation broke my heart more than the explosion ever could.

He pulled his hand back from the keypad.

He turned his back on me.

He scooped Chloe up into his arms, shielding her face from the smoke while leaving me to choke on it.

"You did this to yourself, Ava!" he yelled over the roar of the flames, his face twisted in disgust.

He kicked the outer door open.

And he walked away.

He left me to burn.

The heat was unbearable now, a physical weight pressing down on me. My clothes were smoking. I couldn't breathe.

I curled up on the floor, the metal grating searing my skin.

So this is how it ends.

Betrayed.

Alone.

No.

A spark of rage ignited in my chest, hotter than the fire around me. Rage was better than fear. Rage was fuel.

I will not die here.

I will not let them win.

I dragged myself toward the ventilation grate on the floor. It was small. Impossibly small.

But the blast had loosened the screws.

I clawed at it, my fingernails breaking, blood mixing with the soot on my hands. I kicked it with my good leg, screaming silently with the effort.

It gave way with a metallic clang.

I squeezed into the crawlspace below the floor, darkness swallowing me just as the servers above exploded into a fireball.

I woke up to the smell of bleach and burnt hair.

Pain was a living thing, pulsing in my head, my lungs, my skin. It had a rhythm, a heartbeat of its own.

I opened my eyes.

White ceiling.

I was in the private clinic. The one Liam controlled.

"She's awake."

Liam's voice. Flat. Devoid of warmth.

I turned my head. It felt like my neck was packed with broken glass.

He was standing by the window, looking immaculate in a fresh suit. Not a hair out of place. Not a smudge of soot on him.

"You're lucky," he said, not turning around. "The fire suppression kicked in eventually. Security pulled you out."

"You... left me," I rasped. My voice was a ruin, a jagged whisper.

He turned then.

His face was cold. Indifferent. Like he was looking at a stranger.

"I saved the civilian," he said smoothly. "Chloe was injured. You were the one who rigged the room."

"What?"

"Don't play dumb, Ava. The police report says it was arson. You tried to destroy the servers to hide your incompetence."

He walked over to the bed.

He didn't ask how I was.

He didn't touch me.

"Get up," he said.

"I... I can't."

He reached out and ripped the IV line from my arm.

Pain spiked, sharp and sudden. Blood spurted onto the pristine white sheets.

I gasped, clutching the wound.

"I said get up," he growled, his patience evaporating. "You have a meeting to attend. You need to apologize to Chloe."

"Apologize?" I stared at him, trying to reconcile the man before me with the one I thought I knew. "She tried to kill me."

"She is the victim here!" Liam shouted, his control slipping for the first time. "You almost killed her with your jealousy!"

He grabbed my arm-the burned one.

I screamed.

He dragged me out of the bed, ignoring my cry.

My hospital gown was flimsy. I was barefoot. Vulnerable.

He dragged me into the hallway. The floor was freezing against my soles.

"Walk," he commanded.

I stood there, swaying. Pain was everywhere, a chorus of agony.

But inside, the fire from the server room was still burning.

I looked at him.

Really looked at him.

I didn't see the Prince of New York.

I didn't see the love of my life.

I saw a small, frightened man who needed to break women to feel tall.

"No," I said.

Liam stopped. He looked shocked. The word was foreign to him.

"What did you say?"

I straightened my spine. It hurt, but it felt good. It felt like armor.

"I said no."

I took a step toward him, forcing my trembling legs to hold steady.

"You aren't a Don, Liam," I said, my voice gaining strength with every syllable. "A Don protects his own. You're just a coward in a tailored suit."

His eyes widened.

He raised his hand to hit me again.

I didn't flinch. I didn't blink.

"Do it," I challenged, staring straight into his soul. "Finish what you started."

He lowered his hand.

He looked unsettled. He wasn't used to defiance. He was used to fear.

"You're delirious," he sneered, backing away. "Go back to your room. Cool off. We'll discuss your punishment later."

He turned and walked away fast.

Retreating.

I watched him go.

I touched the bandage on my arm, feeling the heat radiating beneath it.

He thought he had broken me.

He was wrong.

He had just forged me into something sharp enough to cut his throat.

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I found out my husband of three years had cheated on me and his mistress is the one who told me-because he didn't have the balls to do it himself. I move out and get a new apartment, a job as a bartender, and try to move on with a broken heart. I wonder where it all went wrong, if I hadn't been enough for him, if I'd been stupid for marrying him in the first place. I'm at work one night when he walks inside-the most beautiful man I've ever seen. He sits at the bar and a forest fire burns between us. I was depressed the moment before he entered, but the second I look at his blue eyes, I forget the dumpster fire that my life has become. I invite him back to my place and it's the most passionate night of my life. I expect to never see him again. I just want him as an anti-depressant-but he wants me all to himself. I just got my heart ripped out of my chest so I want something easy and no-strings-attached, but he wants all the strings because he's hooked. I don't get much of a say in the matter, and that's not surprising when I learn why-because he's the Butcher. The crime lord of all crime lords, the boss that overshadows all of Paris, that makes everyone abide by his rules-or pay. And now I'm his.

Billionaire Mafia Modern

9.5

Discarded Wife: The Shadow Strategist Returns

9.5

I stood in the center of the ballroom, watching my husband accept credit for the massacre I had meticulously planned. To the underworld, Craig Snyder was the King, a strategic genius who had crippled the Russian mafia. To me, he was the man who had just re-gifted my anniversary present—a Patek Philippe watch—to match the diamond bracelet dangling from his mistress’s wrist. The Senator’s daughter, Chanel, laughed at a joke only he could hear, wearing a red dress and a look of naive adoration that used to be mine. When I confronted him, expecting an apology, Craig didn't just dismiss me. He slapped me across the face in front of the city's elite, the sound echoing like a gunshot. He yanked the wedding ring off my finger, drawing blood, and placed it into Chanel’s palm, calling me a hysterical, barren relic. Later, I found the forged documents. He had signed my name to transfer every asset we built together into his sole possession, leaving me with nothing but a hush-money check. He thought I was just a scorned wife. He forgot that I was the architect of his empire. So, I drove my car off a bridge. I let the world believe I was dead. I let him mourn the woman he destroyed while I watched from the shadows, erasing his existence from my accounts. Six months later, at the Global Crime Summit, Craig stood up with a diamond ring, ready to beg my memory for forgiveness. But the doors opened, and I didn't walk in alone. I walked onto the stage holding the hand of his deadliest rival, Felix Tyson. I wasn't there to take him back. I was there to take his kingdom.

Mafia Modern Romance

7.6

Divorce Unleashed Her: The Mafia Empress Awakens

7.6

She was the heir of a criminal syndicate, bred to command the underworld. For seven years she loved the wrong man, serving his family and building their fortune. Her payment was betrayal-his affair with her best friend. During her three-year coma, he hissed, "Don't wake up." They carried on at her bedside, then plotted her death to steal the company. She woke anyway and shattered them, rattling high society as a mafia heir and lethal fighter who ran the black-market economy. He begged. She kicked him aside and chose the man who'd waited a decade-the world's top arms dealer. "I'm yours."

Mafia Modern Romance

8.3

Fake Amnesia, Real Betrayal: I Left, He Crawled Back

8.3

In the fifth year of Irene Shaw's marriage to Ethan Hart, he was involved in a car accident and lost his memory. No matter how she tried to prove that they had once loved each other, Ethan still insisted on a divorce. His reasoning was hard to refute. "If I really loved you as much as you claim, how could I forget you?" The childhood sweetheart who had once cut him off without hesitation had now become his sole emotional anchor. He looked at Irene coldly. "Since you know this is a mistake, why not end it cleanly?" The hands that had once refused to let her go now recoiled from even her lightest touch. Disheartened and exhausted, Irene signed her name and pushed him completely out of her life. Not long after, Ethan stopped her in the rain, his eyes red from crying. "Irene, don't leave me. You said I'd never lose you." As the car window slid shut, the arm around her waist tightened instinctively, and someone spoke before she could. "Drive on. Irene said she doesn't know him." She lowered her gaze, feeling a serene detachment, "I really don't know him."

Mafia Modern Romance

7.6

He Faked Death, I Married The Don

7.6

I was arranging white lilies on the cold marble of my husband's grave when I saw a ghost. Walking through the cemetery gates was a man who looked exactly like my dead husband, Dante. Logic said it was his twin brother, Matteo. But a wife knows the slope of a man's shoulders. She knows the arrogant tilt of his chin. My husband hadn't been blown up in a car bomb three years ago. He had faked his death to steal his brother's rank, his fortune, and his mistress. For three years, I had forced our son, Leo, to kiss a photograph goodnight. We lived in a damp, peeling apartment, surviving on the "charity" of the Family. Meanwhile, Dante was living in a mansion, driving cars that cost more than my life, playing house with another woman. When he came to our cramped apartment to drop off the monthly "pension" money, pretending to be Uncle Matteo, he didn't look at me with love. He looked at his watch. When Leo ran to hug him, shouting "Papa," Dante peeled the boy's small arms off his expensive suit like he was removing a piece of lint. "Don't call me that," he snapped. "I am your Uncle." My grief turned into ice. He chose another woman's comfort over his own son's hunger. I grabbed Leo's hand and walked out the door. "You walk away, and you get nothing!" Dante shouted after me. "You'll be on the street!" I didn't stop. I walked straight to the black SUV idling at the curb. The window rolled down, revealing Salvatore Vitiello. The Don. The most lethal man in the city. "Get in, Elena," he commanded. I opened the door and slid onto the leather seat next to the devil himself. As we drove away, leaving my husband in the dust, I realized I had just traded a liar for a killer. And I didn't regret it for a second.

Mafia Modern Romance

8.3

Revenge Is Sweet: Marrying His Worst Enemy

8.3

I was staring at the two pink lines on the plastic stick, trembling with the terrifying joy of carrying the heir to the New York underworld’s most ruthless faction. Then the intercom buzzed, and a voice splintered my world. "The little art student actually thinks I'm going to marry her? It was just a game to pass the time while you were in Europe, Estella." I froze. My boyfriend, Holden, was in the next room, laughing with the daughter of his rival. He explained that I was just a "clean civilian image" he needed to secure a business deal. Now that the deal was signed, he was dumping the "stray" to marry the "Queen." I tried to run, but freedom only lasted forty-eight hours. Holden didn't just break my heart; he turned my terror into content. He kidnapped me, tied me to a chair at the edge of a cliff, and forced me to choose between my life and his new fiancée's. Then, he pushed me off the edge. As gravity snatched me, I heard him laughing. I landed on a stunt airbag. It was just a "social experiment." A sick prank for his amusement. "Don't be so dramatic, Kenia," he called down. "It's just a game." He thought I was broken. He thought I was just a prop in his life. But he forgot that I knew his secrets. I dragged my injured body to a payphone and dialed the one number Holden told me to fear—the rival Don, Gael Simpson. "It's Kenia," I whispered, clutching the receiver like a lifeline. "I'm calling in the debt."

Action Mafia Romance

From Mafia Pawn To The Don's Queen

Chapter 6

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