The Mafia's Forbidden Bride

The rain won't stop falling. It poured over the cemetery like the sky was crying harder than anyone else standing here. The earth was soaked, dark mud swallowing up the flowers that had fallen from trembling hands.

I was only seven years old, staring at the two coffins being lowered into the ground, and for the first time in my life, I understood what it meant to be empty. My whole world came crashing down as both my favorite people were lowered into the earth.

My mother. My father. They were gone. Far away.

My small hands clutched the damp hem of my black dress. My shoes were sinking in the mud, but I couldn't move. I couldn't blink. I couldn't breathe without feeling the sting of water-rain or tears, I didn't know anymore.

Why won't they wake up? The thought kept circling inside me, broken, like a child's prayer. If I scream loud enough, maybe they'll hear me. If I run to them, maybe they'll sit up. If I say sorry-sorry for all the times I didn't listen, sorry for leaving toys on the stairs-maybe they'll come back.

But the coffins only sank deeper.

Around me, people whispered, voices buzzing like insects. Too soft to understand, yet sharp enough to cut. "How tragic." "So young." "An accident, they say." "The girl... poor thing. Losing both parents like that."

Poor thing. The words made bile rise in my throat. Their eyes weren't kind. They were curious, hungry, waiting for a spectacle. A mafia funeral is more than grief.

Aunt Rosa crouched beside me, her umbrella doing little to shield either of us from the storm. Her perfume was strong, choking in the damp air. She tucked a strand of wet hair behind my ear and whispered, "Isla, darling, don't cry. You have me now. I'll take care of you."

Her voice shook. Not just from grief but also from fear. Rosa had never wanted me. I was an unexpected plan in her mix. All she wanted was freedom, Paris, silk dresses, and champagne-not guardianship of her dead sister's daughter. I had overheard her complaining bitterly to her boyfriend over the phone a few days back. I could see her fear and worries in her glassy smile, in the way her hand trembled on my shoulder. She was already calculating what this meant. The burden of raising a mafia child. The shadow of my parents' enemies. I was a burden to her.

I pulled away, and her lips pressed tight.

Then the murmurs stilled. Like the storm itself had stopped to listen.

Don Alessandro had arrived.

He didn't walk so much as command the ground beneath him. A tall man in an immaculate black suit, his presence cut through the rain, sharp as a blade. Men flanked him, silent and watchful. Nobody dared to breathe too loudly; one look from him was enough to silence the crowd, and when his eyes swept over us, I hid behind Aunt Rosa, feeling my