I Married You For Your Brother’s Face

I married the most ruthless Don in Chicago, but not for love, money, or power. I married Luca Falcone because he was the only man on earth who carried the same DNA as his dead identical twin, Dante—the love of my life. For three years, I played the role of the submissive, obsessed wife. I endured his coldness. I cooked for his mistress, Sofia. I even stayed silent when Sofia pushed me down a flight of stairs in a jealous rage, nearly killing me. Luca thought I stayed because I was weak. He thought the way I stared at his face was adoration. He never realized I was looking right through him, seeing the ghost of the brother he could never live up to. But the moment the second pink line appeared on the pregnancy test, my mission was complete. I had secured the heir. I had brought a piece of Dante back to the world. The vessel was no longer needed. I signed the divorce papers, packed my bags, and vanished into the night while Luca was busy with his mistress. When he finally tracked me down months later, broken and begging on his knees for me to come home, I didn't feel a thing. I looked down at the man who thought he was a King and delivered the final blow. "I never loved you, Luca. I married you for the sperm."

Chapters

Chapter 7

Elena POV

The auction house felt less like a gallery and more like a cathedral of greed.

Crystal chandeliers cascaded from the vaulted ceiling, casting fractured light over a crowd that smelled of old money and quiet desperation.

I sat in the back row, my hands clenched tightly in my lap.

I hadn't come for the Renaissance oils. I hadn't come for the diamond chokers.

I was here for one thing only: Lot 42.

A crystal ball.

Not a mystical trinket found in a fortune teller's tent. It was a solid sphere of pure, flawless quartz.

Dante had commissioned it for me. He had claimed it represented clarity.

"The only thing in this world clear enough to match your mind," he had told me.

It had been looted from his apartment in the chaotic vacuum left by his death.

Now, it sat on a velvet pillow on the stage, mocking me.

"Ladies and gentlemen, Lot 42."

My heart squeezed painfully against my ribs.

"Starting bid at fifty thousand."

I raised my paddle. "One hundred thousand."

Heads turned. It was an aggressive jump.

"One hundred and fifty!"

The voice came from the front row.

I froze.

Luca sat there, looking like a king in a bespoke suit, radiating a dark gravitational pull. Next to him, Sofia was whispering in his ear, pointing at the stage.

She didn't want the crystal ball. She likely didn't even know what it was.

She just saw me bid on it.

"Two hundred thousand," I said, my voice betraying none of the tremors in my hands.

Sofia tugged on Luca's sleeve. He raised his paddle without looking back.

"Three hundred."

"Four hundred," I countered.

"Five hundred."

It was a game to them. A cruel, blood sport.

I mentally tallied my bank account on my phone. I had liquidated my personal assets, but I needed cash for the escape. I had a hard ceiling.

"One million," I said.

The collective gasp sucked the air out of the room.

Sofia turned around in her seat. Her eyes met mine, glittering with malice. She said something to Luca.

Luca turned. His eyes were voids-cold and empty.

He didn't see a grieving widow. He saw an opponent to be crushed.

He raised his hand.

"Two million."

The floor dropped out from under me. That was my limit. If I went higher, I couldn't pay the pilot. I couldn't pay for the safe house.

I stared at him, begging silently. Please. It's all I have left of him.

He saw the desperation.

And he mistook it for weakness.

"Three million," Luca drawled. "And the lady in red wants it wrapped immediately."

The gavel banged down.

"Sold to Mr. Falcone for three million dollars."

To my ears, the sound of the gavel was like a bone snapping.

I sat there as the room erupted in polite applause.

I watched the staff package the crystal ball. I watched them hand the velvet box to Luca.

I watched Luca hand it to Sofia.

She held it up to the light, laughing. She tapped her long, acrylic nails against the flawless surface.

It wasn't just a purchase.

It was an erasure.

He had taken the symbol of his brother's love and gifted it to the woman who was helping him dismantle his brother's legacy.

I stood up. My legs felt like lead.

I walked out of the auction hall, the applause ringing in my ears like a funeral dirge.

Continue to next part

For ten years, I disguised myself as my dead twin brother, fighting bloody mob wars to build the Falcone family's bootlegging empire. When the war ended, I thought I could finally take off the men's suits and be Anya again. Instead, my parents stole my victories to secure my father's power, demanding I disappear forever. When I tried to expose the truth, my family dragged me into a soundproof basement. My younger brother forced a metal funnel past my teeth and poured corrosive chemicals down my throat, dissolving my vocal cords into a blistered ruin. They chained me to a freezing pier, whipped me bloody, and let the men I used to lead spit on me as a jealous traitor. Then, under the guise of a family reconciliation dinner, my mother drugged my wine. While I lay paralyzed but fully conscious on my bed, my brother took heavy iron pliers and crushed all ten of my fingers, bone by bone. They wanted to ensure I could never hold a gun or write the truth again. I had slaughtered for them, bled for them, and craved only their love. In return, they pulverized my body and painted me as a hysterical madwoman just to keep the crown I had won for them. The foolish girl who wanted a family died in that agonizing pain, leaving behind only a ghost. Dragging my mangled, bandaged body into the rival Romano family's charity gala, I collapsed at the feet of their ruthless matriarch. "I invoke the sacred code," I rasped through my chemically burned throat. "I demand a Vendetta."

Action Mafia Modern

9.3

Blooming Under His Shadow

9.3

He is power, control, and consequence. She is everything he never planned for. Lucien Blackwell rules his world through silence and precision, dismantling threats before they speak his name. When betrayal from his own family forces him to tighten his grip, the last thing he expects is her-a florist whose calm presence unsettles him more than any enemy ever has. As unseen eyes close in and his shadow stretches across her life, she refuses to be protected through ignorance or distance. Instead, she chooses awareness, agency, and a place beside the danger. Because some things don't survive darkness. They bloom within it. Blooming Under His Shadow is a slow-burn romantic suspense about power, choice, and the risk of loving a man whose world was never built for light.

Mafia Modern Romance

9.6

Desired By Two Mafias

9.6

Elena is trapped in a dangerous world where two powerful mafia leaders compete for her heart. Torn between a ruthless kingpin and his equally lethal rival, she must navigate a landscape of violence and betrayal. As their obsession intensifies, Elena becomes the prize in a deadly game of dominance. With bullets flying and loyalty tested, she struggles to survive while discovering that being desired by such men comes with a lethal price for everyone.

Action Mafia Romance

8.2

El padre de mis hijos

8.2

After a night of passion with a dangerous stranger, Elena’s life changes forever when she discovers she is pregnant. Years later, her past resurfaces as the powerful mafia leader returns to claim what is his. Caught in a world of violence and betrayal, Elena must protect her children from the shadows of their father's empire. As secrets emerge and enemies close in, she struggles to survive the lethal consequences of their shared history.

Action Mafia Romance

9.2

From Mafia Pawn To The Don's Queen

9.2

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."

Mafia Modern Romance

9.7

He Broke Her Heart, She Broke His Bank

9.7

I was the architect of my husband's legitimate empire, the queen to his throne as the Don of a powerful crime family. Our home was our sanctuary, our bed the one sacred place he always returned to. But in the middle of the night, I woke to a woman's moan coming from a guest room that was supposed to be empty. The space beside me was cold; my husband, Brendan, was gone. The woman's voice belonged to Kiya, my protégée—a girl I’d mentored like a sister. Through the door, I heard him call me "a piece of furniture that sleeps soundly." I heard him tell her she possessed something I didn't. Then, a video confirmed the ultimate betrayal: a four-year affair, a pregnancy, and his casual dismissal of me as a business arrangement. He called me a title, but he called another woman's child his heir. He had broken the one rule that held our world together, turning my life's work into ash. He thought I was just a fixture in his grand design, a brilliant mind he could control and discard. He was wrong. There was only one way to escape this agony. I would have every memory of him surgically cut from my mind, erase him from my soul like a cancer, and disappear so completely that not even a ghost of me remained.

Mafia Modern Romance

I Married You For Your Brother’s Face

Chapter 7

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