Lies of the Mafia Husband

Shortly after we said "I do," the Family sent my husband, Dario, down to the Mexican border.

He told me it was a meat grinder down there—cartel territory. where guys were zipped into body bags every day. He said he had to go—to expand the territory, for the glory of the Family.

He claimed it was too dangerous and that his enemies would paint a target on my back, so he wouldn't take me with him.

I believed him. I stayed behind in his old, rot-infested house in New Jersey, taking care of his bitter, spiteful parents. I spent my days and nights in the Family's moldy laundromat, washing bills stained with blood.

He told me he sent every dime he made down there to the widow of a brother who took a bullet for him. He asked me to be understanding.

I never complained. Day after day, I pressed expensive suits in that humid laundromat, waiting for him to come home.

It wasn't until the eighth year that a mobster came back drunk.

When I asked about Dario, he froze, then sneered at me through a haze of alcohol.

"Dario? Are you kidding? He’s been a King in Manhattan for years. He’s the youngest Underboss of the Corleone family."

I stood frozen, the iron in my hand burning a hole right through a shirt.

"And he got married seven years ago. Biggest cathedral in New Jersey. Half the mob was there to toast the groom..."

He pulled a crumpled photo from his leather jacket.

Snuggled up against my husband was a woman in a high-end couture gown—the very same "poor, widowed sister-in-law" he had told me about.

The next day, I contacted a fixer who specialized in fake IDs.

On the application for a one-way ticket to Europe—a ticket to vanish off the face of the earth—I filled in the fake name I had prepared long ago.

He trapped me for seven years with a sham marriage.

From now on, I’d be done with this damn loyalty.

I had just gotten back to the dilapidated red brick house and hadn't even hidden my passport yet.

The front door was kicked open. A woman dripping in jewels and wearing a vintage Chanel suit stormed in and slapped me hard across the face.

"You look like a beggar, yet you still try to play the mistress? You deserve to die!"

I crashed to the floor, taking the table with me. A bottle of cheap whiskey shattered, and glass shards sliced into my hands, covering them in blood.

Only then did I see clearly. This crazy woman was Sofia—the "widowed sister-in-law" who had been playing house with Dario in Manhattan for seven years.

Seeing she was about to kick me with her red-bottomed heels, I ignored the pain, scrambled up, and shoved her away.

The door opened again, and the figure I had dreamed of for years walked in.

Dario, dressed in a bespoke handmade suit, rushed forward and caught Sofia as