Dobbergirl

"It won't be a straight death from where you're standing." I blink, turning around. "What?" But he doesn't give me a reply. At least not yet. Instead, he takes hold of my arms in his large, gloved hands, and pulls me to him so that we are standing toe to toe. "What are you doing?" I whisper. This new position has brought us closer. So close that if I stand on my toes, and he dips his head down a bit, I'd probably have the best kiss... "If you fall from here, the possibility of you dying immediately is 98% at the very least," He begins as I stare at him with my mouth slightly agape. "Falling from where you stood before is about 35% lesser. You'd die eventually, maybe after a night or two of trying to revive your shattered bones, but not immediately." Having made his point, he steps back from me and climbs down the somewhat elevated platform. "Did you just make way for me to kill myself?" I murmur, feeling like I'm losing my mind all over again. What kind of a man is this? *** Sonia's life is going great one minute and then takes a spin for the worse when she is betrayed, gets pregnant and worse, is told that she will be getting married to Italian mafia heir, Anthony Romero, who doesn't mind raising another man's child. She abhors the idea, but having also recently been disowned by her father, she has no choice but to accept the marriage proposal if she wants protection for herself and her child. But she has questions. Why would a sane man from her world want to raise a child that isn't his? Surely they're ulterior motives in play. *** Anthony Romano gave up on love a very long time ago and swore never to let another woman in. Then in comes this one woman he calls 'wife', breaking down walls he spent years building. But he's not about to let some flimsy feelings get in the way of his one need.

Lucia I'm thrown into a world of chaos when I hear that my family is part of the Italian mafia. No, scratch that - my family is the Italian mafia - and as tradition states, I'll be getting married to the bratva head. My world is in shambles when I see how cold and ruthless my husband is. Despite how handsome and attractive he is, I give myself one assignment; stay as far away from him as possible. But as neither my body nor my heart gets the message, I have to think of a way to conceal my emotions from him. Ivan My life's purpose has always been to take over from my father as the head of the bratva. That's practically what I was born for; to kill and destroy. But for that to happen, I must get married, which isn't a problem since an arranged marriage to the Italian mafia princess has long been formed for us. What becomes a problem is the strange feelings that begin to steer within me the moment I'm married to my wife. Now I have another purpose added to the list; kill, destroy and love.

When is the worst time to tell someone he's going to be a father? Probably the day of the wedding... When he is getting married to someone else. Well, that is exactly what I did. But my hands were tied. Literally. Matvey Groza is a dangerous man. And nine months ago, he strolled into my shop looking for a custom suit. But when I accidentally walked in on him in the changing room, *I* was the one that ended up needing a new set of clothes. It was a one-time mistake. After that... good riddance. But the pregnancy test I took a month later had other plans. I kept it a secret from everyone. Or so I thought. But when Matvey's enemies learned that I was pregnant with his child, they kidnapped me and held me hostage. Until I broke free and ran as fast as I could. And I had no one else to turn to but the devil himself. What better time for me to enter the church... ... than as the pastor says, "Speak now or forever hold your peace"?

I spent the night with a stranger... Who got me pregnant... And turned out to be my boss... Whoops, sorry, did I say "boss"? I meant a MOB boss. To be fair, I didn't know he was my boss when I slept with him. I thought he was just the kind stranger offering me a place to stay. But one night in Misha Orlov's hotel room got me way more than I bargained for. It got me champagne that tasted like starlight. Satin sheets as soft as a dream. And a man with silver eyes who showed me how it felt to come undone. And then, in the morning... He was gone. That's I needed to get my life together anyway. After all, my ex-not-quite-husband (it's a long story) just emptied all our bank accounts and disappeared, taking my home and my money and my job with him. So I'm starting from a blank slate. I find myself a new apartment. A new job. And I put both Misha and my husband behind me. At least, I thought I did. Until Day 1 of orientation. When I learn that Misha Orlov is my new boss. That's bad enough. What's worse is what came next. A car crash. A doctor's appointment. And two pieces of unsettling news. Congratulations, the doctor says. You're pregnant. Congratulations, Misha says. You and I are getting married.

I was discarded the moment my husband gained power. Divorced, Humiliated and left with nothing...while my mother lay dying. Serena Black believed loyalty and sacrifice would be enough to secure her place beside Antonio Romano. Instead, she discovers she was only ever a stepping stone. He replaces her with a pregnant woman claiming to be the legendary Black family heiress and erases Serena from his life without mercy. Broken and desperate, Serena's fall should have ended there. Instead, it places her directly in the path of Dante Romano,the ruthless Don of the Romano Mafia empire, and the father of the man who destroyed her. Cold, powerful, and untouchable, Dante recognizes something no one else does: the scar on Serena's neck, and the truth it might hide. A contract marriage binds them together. Protection for obedience. Revenge for her name. But as secrets surface and bloodlines are questioned, Serena realizes she may not be the powerless woman everyone believes her to be. And Dante finds himself risking his empire for a woman he was never meant to touch. In a world ruled by violence and betrayal, one wrong choice could cost her life... Or crown her the most dangerous queen the mafia has ever known.

I stood outside my husband's study, the perfect mafia wife, only to hear him mocking me as an "ice sculpture" while he entertained his mistress, Aria. But the betrayal went deeper than infidelity. A week later, my saddle snapped mid-jump, leaving me with a shattered leg. Lying in the hospital bed, I overheard the conversation that killed the last of my love. My husband, Alessandro, knew Aria had sabotaged my gear. He knew she could have killed me. Yet, he told his men to let it go. He called my near-death experience a "lesson" because I had bruised his mistress's ego. He humiliated me publicly, freezing my accounts to buy family heirlooms for her. He stood by while she threatened to leak our private tapes to the press. He destroyed my dignity to play the hero for a woman he thought was a helpless orphan. He had no idea she was a fraud. He didn't know I had installed micro-cameras throughout the estate while he was busy pampering her. He didn't know I had hours of footage showing his "innocent" Aria sleeping with his guards, his rivals, and even his staff, laughing about how easy he was to manipulate. At the annual charity gala, in front of the entire crime family, Alessandro demanded I apologize to her. I didn't beg. I didn't cry. I simply connected my drive to the main projector and pressed play.

"My world is a mess; you want nothing to do with this" "You don't have the right to decide that for me." Her chest was heaving, harsh breaths scraping the walls of her nose. "I am your wife, and I am choosing to be in your mess." He grabbed the back of her head and pulled her closer. "This is your last chance. Once you step in, I can never let go." "I'm not planning on it." ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Jade Saint, who was switched at birth, is coerced into an arranged marriage after returning to the Sterling home. That is, until Roman Volkov – the richest and most dangerous man in the city – claims her as his bride. Desperate to save her dying adoptive mother, she willingly enters into a contract marriage with the devil himself. But marriage to Roman is not what she thinks it is – not the enemies lurking in the shadows. Not the dangerous world he refuses to explain, and certainly not the way his cold touch begins to feel like a promise instead of a warning. Because the more she tries to understand him, the more she realises he didn't choose her by accident. And the truth behind it all may destroy her.

On my wedding day, my father sold me to the Chicago Outfit to pay his debts. I was supposed to marry Alex Moreno, the heir to the city's most powerful crime family. But he couldn't even be bothered to show up. As I stood alone at the altar, humiliated, my best friend delivered the final blow. Alex hadn't just stood me up; he had run off to California with his mistress. The whispers in the cathedral turned me into a joke. I was damaged goods, the rejected bride. His family knew the whole time and let me take the public fall, offering me his cousins as pathetic replacements-a brute who hated me or a coward who couldn't protect me. The humiliation burned away my fear, leaving only cold rage. My life was already over, so I decided to set the whole game on fire myself. The marriage pact only said a Carlson had to marry a Moreno; it never said which one. With nothing left to lose, I looked past the pathetic boys they offered. I chose the one man they never expected. I chose his father, the Don himself.

Seventeen years after going missing, Brooklyn was finally brought back to her ultra-wealthy biological family. But instead of a tearful reunion, her parents and sisters treated her like infectious garbage, mocking her cheap clothes and calling her a country bumpkin. They dumped her into a remedial class to hide her away, cut off her allowance, and threatened to lock down her trust fund to force her into absolute submission. One night, Brooklyn stood in the shadows of the estate and overheard a conversation that shattered everything. She hadn't wandered off as a child. Her parents had deliberately thrown her away because a fake fortune teller claimed her birth chart was a jinx to the family's wealth. They felt zero remorse, only plotting to banish her again the moment she turned eighteen. Her biological father thought he was putting a leash on a helpless, uneducated girl by cutting off her pocket change. He had no idea that Brooklyn was the anonymous VIP who casually dropped sixty million dollars on an emerald at the city's most exclusive auction. He didn't know she was the elusive medical genius that the world's most powerful billionaires were currently tearing the city apart to find. The last microscopic shred of hope for a family withered into cold ash in her chest. "Lock down my trust fund?" She pulled out her encrypted phone and activated her shadow networks, severing herself entirely from their pathetic surveillance. Since they believed she was a jinx, she was going to show them exactly what a real curse looked like.

My husband swallowed a ten-year prison sentence to save me from my abusive stepfather. When he got out, he built a mafia empire and made me his Queen. But last night, his encrypted tablet lit up with an ultrasound photo and a text from another woman. "Our little secret is growing." The mistress soon called to mock me. She was pregnant, while I had been barren for four years. When I confronted my husband, he didn't apologize. Instead, he assigned heavily armed guards to protect her and burned my divorce papers with his cigar. "The only exit from this Family is death," he warned. The nightmare deepened when I uncovered her true identity. The mistress was my half-sister, and her mastermind was the mother who had abandoned me at six. My husband knew. He even whispered our sacred vow to her-"I will shield you from the blood"-the exact words he used when I lost our child on a freezing concrete floor for his syndicate. I took bullets for him. I waited a decade outside those prison gates. Yet he used my absolute loyalty to lock me in a cage, handing my crown to the family that threw me to the wolves. He thought I was just a helpless wife, entirely dependent on his mercy. He didn't know I was Vanguard, the shadow billionaire controlling the very lifelines of his empire. I calmly picked up my phone and called my head operative. "Liquidate his supply chains. Let's see whose empire turns to ash first."

For eight years, I was the Falcone mafia's top fixer and the Don's secret fiancée, taking bullets to keep his syndicate alive. But when my mother was crashing from heart failure, he refused to authorize her lifesaving surgery. I dropped to my knees in the middle of the crowded ballroom, begging him to make the call. Instead, Kieran didn't even flinch. He sat there meticulously folding a paper bird for his new favorite, Elena. "You are causing a scene, Sienna," he scolded me coldly. "And you completely forgot to pick up Elena's custom gown today. I am not rewarding your tantrums." He then publicly stripped me of my executive rank, gave my hard-earned Underboss title to Elena, and made a show of praising her—while the vintage diamond ring he had chosen in her favorite style still sat on my finger. I had died on the operating table three times to build his empire, yet he was willing to let my mother die over a delayed dress. The desperation in my gut congealed into a block of ice, and my lingering love completely burned away. I took off the ring and walked straight out of the Falcone estate into the freezing night. Outside, the Matriarch of his deadliest rival was waiting in an armored SUV. "My clinic can save her," she said smoothly. "But you know the price." I didn't even hesitate. "I will marry your son."

I was three days away from marrying the Underboss of the Fazio crime family when I unlocked his burner phone. The screen glowed toxic bright in the dark next to my sleeping fiancé. A message from a contact saved as 'Little Trouble' read: "She is just a statue, Dante. Come back to bed." Attached was a photo of a woman lying in the sheets of his private office, wearing his shirt. My heart didn't break; it simply stopped. For eight years, I believed Dante was the hero who pulled me from a burning opera house. I played the perfect, loyal Mafia Princess for him. But heroes don't give their mistresses rare pink diamonds while giving their fiancées cubic zirconia replicas. He didn't just cheat. He humiliated me. He defended his mistress over his own soldiers in public. He even abandoned me on the side of the road on my birthday because she faked a pregnancy emergency. He thought I was weak. He thought I would accept the fake ring and the disrespect because I was just a political pawn. He was wrong. I didn't cry. Tears are for women who have options. I had a strategy. I walked into the bathroom and dialed a number I hadn't dared to call in a decade. "Speak," a voice like gravel growled on the other end. Lorenzo Moretti. The Capo of the rival family. The man my father called the Devil. "The wedding is off," I whispered, staring at my reflection. "I want an alliance with you, Enzo. And I want the Fazio family burned to the ground."