Escaping The Capo: Marrying The Undisputed Don

We were celebrating our ten-year anniversary at the Famiglia's most exclusive luxury restaurant.

Before we could even finish our champagne, my fiancé Lorenzo suddenly stood up.

"Gianna is panicking. The situation requires my presence."

He walked out, leaving me completely alone in a room full of dangerous made men. Ten minutes later, Gianna posted a photo of Lorenzo in her living room, calling him her protector.

For ten years, I had managed his blood money, scrubbed gunpowder from my nails, and isolated myself from my family to protect his Capo status. But he didn't even give me a seat at the table. Instead, he paraded Gianna around the underground banquet, letting her claim my place and mock my humiliation in front of the entire syndicate. When I finally snapped and confronted him, he grabbed my wrist hard enough to leave bruises.

"You are making a scene in front of my men."

I had twisted myself into an unrecognizable knot to survive in his world, silencing my own instincts to appease his paranoia. Why did my decade of absolute loyalty yield nothing but being treated like a discarded pawn?

As I fell to the concrete, bleeding and completely broken, a towering figure emerged from the shadows. It was Dante Romano, the undisputed Don of New York.

He pulled me into his arms and handed me the ultimate power to destroy the man who had ruined me.

But the Don's protection came with a price I never saw coming.

Chapter 1

Lucia POV

As the waiter tilted the bottle, the last of the thousand-dollar champagne hissed into the flutes to mark our ten-year anniversary. Before the bubbles could settle, my fiancé looked at his burner phone and the legs of his chair scraped against the marble as he stood.

"Gianna is panicking. The situation requires my presence," Lorenzo said, his gaze fixed on a point just over my shoulder as he spoke back into the phone. "I am en route."

He pushed the device back into his pocket and turned away from the table.

"Where are you going?" I asked, the words catching in my throat like a burr.

"I have to leave," he said, his eyes tracking the exit.

He walked away, leaving me completely alone in a dining room full of dangerous made men.

Ten minutes later, I opened my social media and saw Gianna's new post.

It was a photo of Lorenzo standing in her living room, surrounded by his soldiers.

The caption read: My protector, always.

My own phone buzzed with a text message from Lorenzo.

A Family driver will see you home. I must secure her estate.

I realized then that if I got into that car and went back to his house, I would die a slow, silent death as a mafia wife.

I sat in the dim light of the Famiglia's most exclusive luxury restaurant, watching the condensation trail down the side of my untouched champagne flute.

The men at the surrounding tables pretended not to notice my humiliation.

They were soldiers and associates of the syndicate.

They answered to Lorenzo because he was a high-ranking Capo.

But they all ultimately answered to one man.

Dante Romano.

They called him The Viper.

He was the undisputed Don of New York.

He was a corporate billionaire in the daylight and a ruthless monster in the shadows.

Three years ago, Dante slaughtered the entire leadership of a rival syndicate in a single night with his own hands.

His power was absolute.

When he entered a room, men forgot how to breathe.

Lorenzo was just a soldier playing at being a king.

Dante was the actual king.

"Would you like me to clear his plate, Miss?" the waiter asked quietly, his voice pulling me from my thoughts.

"Yes," I said. "Clear it all."

I pushed my cold meal away.

The paper shredder in his basement had devoured thirty-two of his blood-stained ledgers at my hand.

The smell of turpentine, from when I'd scrubbed gunpowder residue for him, still clung beneath my fingernails.

I had learned the art of silence to survive in his world.

And he left me on our anniversary for the widow of a fallen made man.

Gianna used her dead husband's memory and Family duty to keep Lorenzo on a leash.

I pulled out my phone and opened the secure messaging app.

I typed a message to Lorenzo.

My understanding has its limits.

I took a breath.

It was a shallow thing, as if my lungs were packed with damp earth.

I typed the final words.

Lorenzo, the betrothal is off.

I hit send.

I stood up and walked out the glass doors into the damp chill of the night.

A black armored car pulled up to the curb.

"Are you ready to go home, Miss Lucia?" the driver asked.

"Take me to the estate. I have things to pack," I said.

I stepped into the dark vehicle and let my head fall back against the leather seat, the first breath of relief I'd taken in hours.

Six blocks away, the headlights of Lorenzo's SUV cut through the rain.

Gianna was laughing in my seat.