

At our engagement party, my fiancé, James Pierce, and my best friend, Rachel Bellini, slipped into Italian again. Years ago, the two of them had gone off to college in Milan together, leaving me to study alone in America. Right before our engagement speeches, James leaned close to Rachel's ear and murmured in low, husky Italian, "If you were the one standing here beside me today, I'd be so much happier." I turned to stare at him in disbelief, every ounce of joy draining out of me in an instant. But James just smiled at me, all innocence, and switched to English. "What's wrong, sweetheart? Nerves getting to you?" I had lost count of how many times James and Rachel had talked in Italian right in front of my face. At dinner, they critiqued the dishes in Italian. At the movies, they joked about the plot in Italian. Over afternoon tea, they traded old stories and private jokes in Italian, things only the two of them understood. I had protested. We had even fought about it. But James would only say impatiently, "Isabella, this is how we lived for four years of college. Can you stop making a scene over nothing? If you can't understand Italian, go learn it yourself!" Rachel glanced at me, smothered a laugh, and went on in Italian, "Look at that shocked little face. She clearly has no idea how hard you went at it with me the night before your engagement party." James answered with utter contempt and absolute certainty. "So what if she found out? You think she could survive without me?" The note card with my speech slipped from my fingers and landed without a sound, but the weight of it hit me like a blow to the chest. They had no idea. My father is Italian. I was born in Italy. After my parents divorced, I moved to America with my mother, Eleanor Bennett, when I was ten. I understood every word they said in Italian.

I have never been good at pretending not to notice when someone is manipulating me. When I was fourteen, a girl in my math class slipped a cheat sheet onto my desk as the teacher walked down our row. “Hold this for me,” she whispered. “Just until the test is over.” She expected me to hide it. Instead, I raised my hand. “Ms. Carter, Jenna put her cheat sheet on my desk and asked me to keep it for her.” No one at school ever asked me to “hold” something for them again. Then Lorenzo Moretti, Don of one of New York’s oldest families, found me and told me I was the daughter he’d lost twenty-five years ago. He held a dinner to introduce me to the family. Before I arrived, Sofia—the daughter they had raised—hid my place card and took the seat between my parents. “I’ve sat here for twenty-one years,” she said sweetly. “You don’t mind, do you?” Everyone expected me to smile, sit somewhere else, and prove I wasn’t a threat. I put my place card back on the table. “If this seat means nothing, why did you need mine?” Sofia cried. My mother rushed to comfort her, my three brothers followed her out, and my father lectured me about keeping the peace. It wasn’t the first time. They had missed three of my birthdays for Sofia, given her the bracelet engraved with my name, and turned the rooms promised to me into her private studio. Every broken promise came with a reasonable excuse, but every excuse ended the same way: Sofia came first, and I was expected to understand. They all believed I would tolerate anything for the Moretti name, their money, and their protection. The next morning, they abandoned me at the courthouse during my name-change appointment because Sofia claimed she couldn’t breathe. So I withdrew the petition, kept the name my adoptive mother gave me, and moved out with one suitcase. But after I left, why did every one of them regret it?

Three days before my due date, my husband came home and told me he was marrying Bianca Voss. “Her baby is due any day now,” Luca said. “If I marry her, I get the Don’s seat.” I stood there carrying his child and asked, “So you want me to spend the rest of my life as your hidden mistress? He promised me doctors, guards, money, and a guarded house outside Chicago. He said I would still be his wife in private, as long as I never appeared in front of Bianca. When I refused, he looked at me with pity, as if I was too ordinary to understand the world he truly came from. He thought I was just Aria, the quiet woman who grew tomatoes by the lake. He had no idea I was Aria Castellano, the only daughter of the Chairman of the High Mafia Commission. I looked at him and whispered, “What if I told you Bianca’s family was nothing compared to mine?”

On our seventh wedding anniversary, I was straddling my Mafia husband, Lucian, kissing him deeply. My fingers fumbled in the pocket of my expensive silk dress, searching for the pregnancy test I'd hidden there. I wanted to save the news of my unexpected pregnancy for the end of the evening. Lucian's right-hand man, Marco, asked with a suggestive smile in Italian: "Don, your new little canary, Sophia. How does she taste?" Lucian's mocking laughter vibrated through my chest, sending a chill down my spine. He replied, also in Italian: "Like an unripe peach. Fresh and tender." His hand was still caressing my waist, but his gaze was distant. "Just keep this between us. If my Donna finds out, I'm a dead man." His men chuckled knowingly, raising their glasses and swearing their silence. The warmth in my blood turned to ice, inch by inch. The one thing they didn’t know was that my grandmother was from Sicily, so I understood every word. I forced myself to remain calm, keeping the perfect smile of a Donna fixed in place, but the hand holding my champagne flute trembled. Instead of making a scene, I opened my phone, found the invitation I had received a few days ago for a private international medical research project, and tapped "Accept." In three days, I would disappear from Lucian's world completely.

It is said that Marco Colombo, the heir of the Colombo family of Chiron, is holding a wedding for his mistress, Gina Bilotti, today. The scale is ten times grander than when he marries Isabella Pratico in a political union. I lean against the ebony railing on the second floor. Sipping my red wine, I watch the lively scene of clinking glasses and mingling guests below with quiet amusement. Gina is definitely favored—she is even wearing a ruby necklace. One should know that set of ruby jewelry is an heirloom of the Colombo family. It is something only the Donna and the wife of the heir are allowed to wear. "You must be Isabella, the one Marco who does not love." A voice suddenly comes from beside me. I turn my head and see the woman wearing the ruby necklace before me. Gina has come up to the second floor at some point and is now looking at me with a cunning smile on her face. I freeze for a moment, not yet able to respond. She suddenly grabs my hand and yanks it hard toward herself. There is a sharp tearing sound, and the hem of her wedding dress rips open with a long tear. Gina lets out a cry, and tears immediately stream down her face. "Mrs. Colombo, why did you tear my wedding dress? Marco specially commissioned this from an independent designer just for our wedding! "If you really cannot tolerate my presence, then I will break up with Marco today and leave Chiron…" The surrounding guests all lift their heads and glare at me angrily. I am stunned because I am not Isabella. I am the new wife of Marco's father, the woman of the current Don, and the Donna of the Colombo family.

Luciano Romano never knew that his last name was associated with the richest family in all of Italy. He grew up as a gardener in the Verga Family home. When the master of the house smelled his special relationship with his daughter, he was insulted and expelled from Verona. When Luciano became Romano's rightful heir, he intended to take revenge. The man destroyed the family of the lady, Lucrezia Verga, so that the lady lived in poverty. But Lucrezia can rise to become an actress. Not satisfied with his revenge, Luciano bought Lucrezia to sleep with him. As a result of his actions, Lucrezia became pregnant. How's the story going? Let's read!

The night I lost the promotion I had worked for years to earn, I sent my boyfriend, Arthur, a text message. [I'm a little tired today, but the hot dog at the corner actually tastes pretty good.] My screen stayed dark. Half an hour later, I couldn't stop myself from typing again: [Are you busy? I just want to hear your voice.] A reply finally lit up my screen: [Are you trying to guilt me into sending you money?] I stared at the text, frozen. When Arthur had first started his company, his mother had drained every account and disappeared with all the funds, leaving him with billions in debt overnight. After that, he hated one thing above all else. Women who loved him for his money. For seven years, I had done everything I could to prove I wasn't one of them. We went Dutch on meals, I returned his gifts, and the results of every corporate project I handled were laid out in the open for anyone to scrutinize. And now, as I mindlessly scrolled through social media, I saw a selfie posted by Jessica, the intern who had just stolen my promotion. She was wearing a plunging V-neck gown, pinned with a pigeon-blood ruby brooch. The caption read: [Thank you to Mr. Whitmore for the congratulations. I look forward to learning from you in the future.] That brooch was a top-tier custom piece. I'd seen it in a catalog from an auction house. Tears blurred my screen into a messy haze. I suddenly understood. The innocence I'd spent seven years proving was worth less to him than the hot dog I'd just choked down. Since that was the case, I dialed a number I hadn't called in a very long time. "Papa, I want to come home. I'm ready to be the heiress."

On our seventh wedding anniversary, I was straddling my Mafia husband, Lucian, kissing him deeply. My fingers fumbled in the pocket of my expensive silk dress, searching for the pregnancy test I'd hidden there. I wanted to save the news of my unexpected pregnancy for the end of the evening. Lucian's right-hand man, Marco, asked with a suggestive smile in Italian: "Don, your new little canary, Sophia. How does she taste?" Lucian's mocking laughter vibrated through my chest, sending a chill down my spine. He replied, also in Italian: "Like an unripe peach. Fresh and tender." His hand was still caressing my waist, but his gaze was distant. "Just keep this between us. If my Donna finds out, I'm a dead man." His men chuckled knowingly, raising their glasses and swearing their silence. The warmth in my blood turned to ice, inch by inch. The one thing they didn’t know was that my grandmother was from Sicily, so I understood every word. I forced myself to remain calm, keeping the perfect smile of a Donna fixed in place, but the hand holding my champagne flute trembled. Instead of making a scene, I opened my phone, found the invitation I had received a few days ago for a private international medical research project, and tapped "Accept." In three days, I would disappear from Lucian's world completely.

On our seventh wedding anniversary, I was straddling my Mafia husband, Lucian, kissing him deeply. My fingers fumbled in the pocket of my expensive silk dress, searching for the pregnancy test I'd hidden there. I wanted to save the news of my unexpected pregnancy for the end of the evening. Lucian's right-hand man, Marco, asked with a suggestive smile in Italian: "Don, your new little canary, Sophia. How does she taste?" Lucian's mocking laughter vibrated through my chest, sending a chill down my spine. He replied, also in Italian: "Like an unripe peach. Fresh and tender." His hand was still caressing my waist, but his gaze was distant. "Just keep this between us. If my Donna finds out, I'm a dead man." His men chuckled knowingly, raising their glasses and swearing their silence. The warmth in my blood turned to ice, inch by inch. The one thing they didn’t know was that my grandmother was from Sicily, so I understood every word. I forced myself to remain calm, keeping the perfect smile of a Donna fixed in place, but the hand holding my champagne flute trembled. Instead of making a scene, I opened my phone, found the invitation I had received a few days ago for a private international medical research project, and tapped "Accept." In three days, I would disappear from Lucian's world completely.

On our seventh wedding anniversary, I was straddling my Mafia husband, Lucian, kissing him deeply. My fingers fumbled in the pocket of my expensive silk dress, searching for the pregnancy test I'd hidden there. I wanted to save the news of my unexpected pregnancy for the end of the evening. Lucian's right-hand man, Marco, asked with a suggestive smile in Italian: "Don, your new little canary, Sophia. How does she taste?" Lucian's mocking laughter vibrated through my chest, sending a chill down my spine. He replied, also in Italian: "Like an unripe peach. Fresh and tender." His hand was still caressing my waist, but his gaze was distant. "Just keep this between us. If my Donna finds out, I'm a dead man." His men chuckled knowingly, raising their glasses and swearing their silence. The warmth in my blood turned to ice, inch by inch. The one thing they didn’t know was that my grandmother was from Sicily, so I understood every word. I forced myself to remain calm, keeping the perfect smile of a Donna fixed in place, but the hand holding my champagne flute trembled. Instead of making a scene, I opened my phone, found the invitation I had received a few days ago for a private international medical research project, and tapped "Accept." In three days, I would disappear from Lucian's world completely.