I Left The Jester For The King

"Little Siren: I miss the way you used to touch my hand." The wedding was about to happen, but that message lit up my fiancé's phone screen while he was in the shower. Franco Moretti. The rising star of the Vitielo crime family. He treated me like a fragile glass doll, claiming he wanted to 'save himself' for our wedding night out of 'respect'. The message on his phone told a different story. I unlocked it and discovered three years of them betraying me. Her name was Camilla. A girl I'd befriended in high school out of pity. Then I saw the receipt. He'd bought two identical pink diamond engagement rings. One for me. One for her. He'd stolen my grandmother's heirloom jade bracelet and given it to his mistress. He'd texted Camilla: I need her name to get the chair. You're my real queen. I didn't cry. I didn't scream. Leaving him would be too easy. I wanted to punish him. I walked to my laptop and opened a new document. I wasn't just going to cancel the wedding. I was going to expose his scandal to the entire underworld. And our wedding was going to be the stage. Then, I picked up the phone and dialed the number my father had forbidden me to call. "I accept," I said into the low, deep voice on the other end. "Giana, do you understand what you're agreeing to?" Enzo Falcone asked. "I understand." It meant I'd marry the most feared man in the mafia world. You want an alliance. I want a weapon. Chapter 1 Giana The words came out, raw and scraping against my throat. I spoke them, and felt the click of destiny's gears. "Giana, do you understand what you're agreeing to?" The voice on the other end was low, deep. Lorenzo 'Enzo' Falcone. Head of the Falcone crime family. The man my father called The Butcher. A figure of rumor and shadow throughout my entire childhood. "I understand," I said. "You want an alliance. I want a weapon." "I'm not a weapon you can just put away when you're done using me," Enzo replied. It wasn't a threat. It was a promise. "If I come back to New York, I'm staying. And I'm coming to collect." "Then come get me," I said, my voice flat, hollow. "But remember, Enzo. My engagement to Franco Moretti is over." Silence on the other end. I could almost hear the smile in his voice, the predator scenting blood in the water. "No backing out once I'm on that plane," he warned, voice low. "I'll be in New York in a month. Be ready." The line went dead. I put the phone down, my hand trembling slightly. Not from fear of Enzo. But from the sheer, irrevocable act of destroying the eight-year life I had built. I walked to my laptop and opened an encrypted browser. The "Mafia Gossip" forum was buzzing. A thread titled "The Wedding of the Century" had thousands of comments speculating about my engagement party to the rising star of the mafia, Franco Moretti. They look so perfect together, one user wrote. A match made in heaven, said another. I let out a bitter laugh. A match made in heaven? I slammed the laptop shut with a dull thud and opened my desk drawer. Inside was a phone. It wasn't mine. It was Franco's. I'd found it three nights ago. It had vibrated in his jacket pocket while he was showering. I'd reached for it, thinking it was his work phone, intending to silence it. But the screen lit up with a message that stopped my heart. Little Siren: I miss the way you used to touch my hand. The world tilted on its axis. Franco. The man who treated me like fragile glass, who claimed he was 'saving himself' for our wedding night out of 'respect', had a Little Siren. I unlocked the phone. And I scrolled. It wasn't a fling. It was a three-year entanglement. I saw the number. Camilla. The girl from high school. The one I'd befriended because no one else would talk to her, the charity case I'd felt sorry for. I sat in that chair for hours, reading three years of betrayal line by line. I watched their texts. At first, Franco was dismissive. Then, intrigued. Then, obsessed. He complained about me to her. She's so cold, doesn't understand a man's needs, unlike you. Then, a text that sealed my resolve to destroy everything. It was from last week. Franco: If there was another life, Camilla, I'd make you my queen. But I need her name to get the throne. He didn't love me. I was a stepping stone. A means to an end, his path to the top of the mafia hierarchy. I picked up the disposable phone. It felt heavy in my hand. Like a lead weight. I wasn't just going to leave him. Leaving was too easy. I'd let him walk me all the way to the altar. And then I'd leave him standing there, alone, a fool in front of the world. I was part of the Vitielo family. We didn't grieve. We retaliated. Let him play with his little siren. I was going to introduce him to a shark.