The Mafia Don's Regret: Torturing His True Savior
My husband crushed the metacarpals of my left hand—my drawing hand—with a heavy leather-bound book.
This was Punishment Ninety-Six.
The offense? I had missed a single phone call from my stepsister, Joyce.
According to Don Austen Ballard, ignoring the woman who allegedly saved his life fifteen years ago was akin to high treason.
"Discipline is the highest form of love, Alana," he whispered, watching the violet bruise spread across my skin.
He calls shattering an architect's hand "love."
He believes Joyce dragged him from a burning building when he was a boy. He treats her like a living saint and me like a punching bag to pay his life debt.
But it is all a lie.
Fifteen years ago, Joyce was at a cheerleading camp three towns away.
I was the one in that crawlspace.
I was the one who found the bleeding boy in the dark.
I was the one who called him "Stellen" because he was too terrified to tell me his real name.
He has spent our entire marriage torturing his true savior to please a fraud.
Tonight, the pain finally burned away my fear, leaving only cold resolve.
I didn't cry.
I waited until the house was silent, then I retrieved a burner phone hidden in a false bottom of a box in the bathroom.
I dialed the number of his sworn enemy, Don Dalton Underwood.
"I have the blueprints," I said, my voice steady despite the agony in my hand. "And I have the controlling shares of Ballard Industries. I'm ready to burn his kingdom to ash."
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Chapter 4
Alana POV
"Where is it?"
Austen's voice was a low, subterranean growl.
He was looming over my hospital bed, gripping my right hand with bruising force.
The ring finger was bare.
"I lost it," I said, keeping my gaze fixed on the sterile white tiles of the ceiling. "Must have fallen off when they changed the bandages."
"Liar."
He dug into his pocket and extracted the ring.
He had retrieved it directly from the biohazard bin.
"You do not discard me, Alana."
He shoveled the ring back onto my finger.
He forced the cold metal past the knuckle, hard enough to grind bone against bone.
"Get dressed," he commanded, stepping back as if the intimacy disgusted him. "We are going out. You need to be seen."
"I can't walk," I said, my voice raspy.
"Then crawl."
An hour later, we were on Rodeo Drive.
Austen had cleared the flagship store for a private viewing.
He paraded me around like a prize poodle that had been kicked too many times-bandaged, limping, and on display.
My arm was in a black silk sling.
I wore oversized sunglasses to hide the dark circles carved under my eyes.
Joyce was there, of course.
She was flitting around the space, pointing at bags she wanted with manic energy.
"Oh, look!" Joyce squealed.
She was pointing at a display case in the auction house next door, visible through the glass partition.
"Antique silver. Boring."
I looked.
My breath caught in my throat, turning into a sharp pain.
It was a silver locket.
My mother's locket.
Robert, my father, had pawned it to pay a gambling debt barely a week after her funeral.
It was the only thing I had left of her.
"I want to go in there," I said, my voice trembling despite my best efforts.
Austen looked at the locket, then at me, his eyes cold.
"Fine. Whatever keeps you quiet."
We entered the auction house.
The bidding was already underway, the air thick with tension and expensive perfume.
"Five hundred dollars," I said, lifting my chin.
"One thousand," a voice chirped.
It was Joyce.
She grinned at me, predatory and bright.
"Two thousand," I said.
"Five thousand," Joyce countered instantly.
Austen sighed, checking his watch. "Joyce, stop playing."
"But I want it, Austen! It's vintage."
She didn't want it.
She knew I wanted it.
"Ten thousand," I said.
"Twenty," Joyce laughed, twirling a strand of hair.
"Alana, yield," Austen ordered, his patience thinning. "Let her have the trinket. I'll buy you a diamond necklace."
"No," I said.
"Excuse me?"
"No."
I raised my paddle, my heart hammering against my ribs.
"One million dollars."
The room went deathly silent.
The auctioneer choked on his own spit.
Austen stared at me, his jaw tight enough to snap.
"Sold," the auctioneer squeaked, recovering his composure. "To Mrs. Ballard."
I used Austen's account.
I had just incinerated a million dollars of his money for a piece of silver worth fifty bucks.
Joyce screamed.
She actually stomped her foot, like a petulant child denied candy.
"Austen! She's mocking you!"
Austen grabbed Joyce's arm, his fingers digging into her flesh.
"Calm down," he soothed her, though his eyes remained fixed on me with lethal promise. "I'll handle her."
He turned to me.
"Wait in the parking garage. Driver 2 is there."
He led a weeping Joyce out the front door to buy her ice cream or diamonds or whatever appeased the monster.
I walked to the garage alone, clutching the locket so hard the edges bit into my palm.
I reached the designated black SUV.
The driver wasn't there.
Three men detached themselves from behind a concrete pillar.
They weren't Ballard men.
They were street thugs, hired muscle with dead eyes.
"Miss Cummings sends her regards," one of them grinned, revealing a gold tooth.
He didn't hesitate.
He punched me in the ribs.
I heard the crack before I felt the pain.
I fell to the concrete, curling around the locket to shield it with my body.
They kicked me.
Once. Twice. Three times.
They didn't touch my face.
Joyce wanted me broken, not ugly.
They left me gasping for air on the oil-stained floor, tasting copper and dust.
My phone beeped.
A text from Joyce.
Don't be late for dinner at Daddy's house. We're celebrating my new necklace.
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7.5
The Duke was standing in the middle of the room, his hands in his pockets, his head tilted to one side. It was a relaxed, casual pose, and yet the way he looked at her was anything but casual. The deep midnight of his eyes burned and he radiated a subtle, sensual energy that made the air around him crackle.
He looked like a man who'd never heard the word 'no' in all his life. Unluckily for him, 'no' was the only word she had.
"There's no reason why I should stay," Anna clasped her shaking hands together in an effort to still them. "I'm not marrying you."
His gaze flickered, his mouth curving slightly, and she had the disturbing thought that far from putting him off, her insistence was only inciting him further.
"But you haven't heard my proposal yet," he said mildly. "Isn't that why you're here?"
"I don't need to hear it. I already know that my answer will be no."
"Of course. But you can hardly tell your father that you heard me out when you haven't, in fact, heard me out.... Anna."
8.0
I posted a photo of baby shoes to celebrate my pregnancy. Two hours later, my husband was holding jumper cables.
Kaeden, the Mafia Capo who swore to protect me, stood under the buzzing fluorescent lights of the basement.
He didn't look like the man who brought me vanilla lattes. He looked like a monster.
His "fragile" childhood friend, Clemmie, had convinced him that my innocent post was a signal to our enemies.
"Discipline," Kaeden muttered, refusing to look at my weeping face. "She needs to learn the cost of her voice."
He ordered low voltage—just enough to scare me.
But the moment he walked out the door, unable to watch, Clemmie smiled.
"He's not coming back for you," she whispered.
She cranked the dial all the way to the right.
She didn't just want to teach me a lesson. She wanted to stop my heart so she could harvest it for herself.
And my husband had already signed the release forms.
But they made one mistake. They left the cleanup to Alois, the family's most ruthless Enforcer.
He didn't bury me. He saved me.
Now, while Kaeden cries over a fake grave, consumed by guilt, I am watching from the shadows.
Daria Burris died in that chair.
The woman who survived is coming for blood.
9.2
I stood on the tarmac clutching white magnolias, watching the man I loved hand his loyalty to the woman born to destroy me.
Dante Cavallaro, the Ruthless Underboss, didn't just leave me for Sofia Moretti.
He revealed that for two years, I wasn't his lover. I was a human shield.
The heavy iron bangle he forced me to wear wasn't a gift for my protection.
"It's a Malocchio anchor," he sneered as I lay paralyzed on the floor. "It drains the wearer's luck to keep Sofia healthy. You are just the filter."
My body began to rot from the inside out, my nerves dying one by one.
When I was finally on my deathbed, unable to move or speak, Dante didn't cry for me.
He cried because his tool was broken.
He forced the cursed bangle onto his own wrist, begging the universe to keep me alive so I could continue to suffer in Sofia's place.
"Please," he sobbed into my sheets. "Don't leave me alone with the bad luck."
I used my last breath to make a wish—not for him, but for my freedom.
I closed my eyes and died.
Exactly one hour later, Dante's phone rang.
It was his father.
"Sofia just collapsed," he said. "Her heart just stopped."
I was the vessel.
And now that I was gone, the poison had come home to the King.
7.4
MAFIA DESIRE
7.4
In the city where power was inherited through bloodshed and silence, love was the most dangerous liability of all.
She emerged from the shadows like a secret the underworld had failed to bury-elegant, unreadable, and far more lethal than she appeared. Every step she took echoed with intention. Every smile concealed a calculation. Men underestimated her. They always did. And they always paid for it.
He was young, brilliant, and already feared. A rising king in a world that devoured the weak, carrying ambition like a loaded weapon. He didn't trust easily, didn't hesitate, and didn't believe in fate-until her presence began to unravel everything he thought he controlled.
Their connection wasn't born of innocence or chance. It was forged in danger, sealed by secrets, and fueled by a hunger neither of them dared to name. In a world ruled by betrayal, they found something far more terrifying than enemies-each other.
Because when desire collides with power, and love becomes a threat, survival is no longer guaranteed.
And in the mafia, nothing is more deadly than wanting what you're not supposed to have.
8.7
Synopsis:
She thought she could forget him by morning. She was wrong.
Catherine Moretti wanted to escape her past.
As the daughter of a powerful mafia boss, her life was full of danger, lies, and control. So she ran, hoping to start over, far from the world she was born into.
But one reckless night turned her life upside down, just to find out later she's pregnant with the hot Italian stranger's baby, the one she spent the night with!
Now, she's pulled back into the mafia world, only this time, into Nico's.
She ran from one mafia king... and ended up in the arms of his enemy
However, Nico isn't the kind of man you walk away from.
And in his world, one night can turn into forever.
7.8
Elena Voss was sold like a debt receipt.
Her greedy aunt and uncle handed her over to Damien Blackthorn-New York's untouchable billionaire tech mogul by day, ruthless Mafia Don and Alpha of the Blackthorn Pack by night-to settle a family debt they never asked her to pay.
The moment their eyes met in that rain-soaked alley, the fated mate bond ignited like wildfire. For one reckless night, he claimed her body and soul, whispering "mine" against her skin while the Moon Goddess sealed their destiny.
Then came the betrayal.
On their first anniversary, he paraded his pureblood fiancée through their penthouse, let her kneel for him in the study while Elena watched from the shadows, and divorced her in front of the entire pack.
"Wolfless trash," he snarled. "You were never more than payment."
Heart in pieces and two tiny heartbeats growing inside her, Elena fled. She vanished into Seattle's gray drizzle, changed her name, cut her hair, and built a quiet life as a single mother. She swore the Blackthorn name would never touch her twins-Leo and Luna, the secret heirs he didn't even know existed.
Five years later, the children's first uncontrolled shifts rip through their small apartment like lightning. The only place that can teach them control and keep them hidden from rival packs is back in New York-back under Damien's shadow.
The Alpha Don who once threw her away is now obsessed.
The fated bond never died; it only waited. He feels her every laugh, every tear, every protective growl she gives their children. He'll burn his empire, his alliances, and his pride to drag her back.
But Elena isn't the broken girl he discarded anymore.
She's a mother with claws.
A luna who learned to bite.
And this time, if he wants her forgiveness, he'll have to beg on his knees.
Pregnancy. Divorce. Secret babies. Billionaire alpha. Mafia power plays. Revenge that burns slow and sweet.
Some bonds can't be broken.
Some rejections come with claws.
And some second chances are paid for in blood.