Cerita Pendek & Novel After Death Mafia

My husband, the Don, never acknowledged me as anything more than his political bride. From the day we married, I knew there was someone else in his heart, a woman from the slums named Elena. But for the sake of my family's honor, and for that small, pathetic scrap of love I still held onto, I endured everything in silence. Until two months ago. He came home drunk and reckless and lost all control. He kicked open my bedroom door and took me like a man possessed, and the whole time, the name he breathed into my ear wasn't mine. It was hers. But that night left something behind. I was pregnant. I thought maybe this child could be the thing that finally turned us around. So I walked to his study door, pregnancy report in hand, heart full of something dangerously close to hope. That's when I heard his voice through the door, soft and tender, speaking in a tone I had never once heard him use with me. "Don't worry, Elena. Once you have the baby, I'll bring him into the family personally. He'll be the only heir I recognize. As for Jessica..." His voice turned cold and contemptuous. "She'll never have children. For the past seven years, I've had someone slip the highest dose of birth control into the warm milk she drinks every night before bed. She's nothing but a political arrangement. Why would I let her carry my bloodline?" The door opened. He stepped out and saw me standing there, frozen. He assumed I'd do what I always did, scream and cry and demand answers. He had no idea this time was different. This time, I was really leaving.

The day I got my terminal cancer diagnosis, I stumbled upon a hidden album on my mafia husband’s phone. One thousand eight hundred and twenty-six intimate photos. All of the same woman. None of me. Three years into our marriage, all of New York still feared Damian Moretti. Even as his only legal wife, I never dared ask about the blood on his cuffs—or the stranger’s perfume clinging to his skin late at night. I used to think he was simply born cold-blooded. Until I saw her on his screen, wearing his shirt in a secret penthouse I didn’t know existed, smiling freely in his arms. The cruelest part? The timestamp on the last photo was from two hours ago—the exact moment I was sitting alone at the hospital, signing my own Do-Not-Resuscitate form. When Damian walked out of the bathroom, he caught me staring at the screen. No guilt. No panic. He just walked over, took the phone from my frozen hand, and hit delete without a flicker of emotion. “Stay out of things that don’t concern you,” he said flatly. “Forget what you saw.” Before the screen could even go dark, it lit up again with a text message: Damian, you left your shirt in my bed again. Whatever was left inside me finally shattered. I pushed the prepared divorce papers toward him. “Sign them,” I said quietly. “I’m setting you free.” Damian’s gaze turned lethal. In one swift motion, he pinned my wrist against the headboard, the heavy Moretti signet ring on his right hand digging brutally into my bone. “Don’t test my limits, Vivian,” he murmured, leaning over me, his voice low and merciless. “Moretti marriages only end with a funeral.” I met his icy stare and didn’t say another word. He had no idea I only had three months left to live. The funeral he asked for was already on its way.

When I was having a heart attack, my parents, my brother, and my fiancé were all at our family casino—celebrating Eva, our adopted daughter, at her twenty-first birthday, her official debut into the mafia world. The doctor refused to operate without a legal guardian’s signature. So I called them. My father’s assistant answered. “Sorry, Miss. The Don is in the middle of a toast.” My brother and mother let it ring until it went silent. Finally, my fiancé, Adam, picked up. Music roared behind him. I could hear laughter, glasses clinking. “Cecilia,” he said, impatient. “If you can’t even show up for Eva’s party, stop causing trouble. Today is Eva’s debut. Every Don from three territories is here. Whatever drama you’re playing can wait.” I lost count of how many times they chose her over me. So after this call, I stopped calling. I signed my own name. My family thought I’d finally learned to be obedient. But they should’ve known that in our world, silence only means one thing—I was preparing to disappear for good.

Dad always said a mafia don's daughter had to be strong, even in the middle of a gunfight. Our family had just been ambushed by a rival crime family. A stray bullet grazed my little sister's arm. Mom cradled her protectively while Dad frantically called for an ambulance. I was the one who'd stood at the front, covering their escape. Now I lay on the ground with three bullets in my body, and nobody even looked at me. "Dad, I... it hurts so much." "You've always been strong. They're just a few bullets, and nothing vital was hit. Stop making such a scene!" Mom glanced back at me, then quickly turned away. "If you can still cry and shout, you can't be hurt that badly. Your sister's already lost so much blood. Are you really going to put her life at risk just to compete for our attention?" Dad patted my head to comfort me. "Rest here for a bit. The ambulance can't take all of us. We'll get your sister to the hospital and come back for you." Then they climbed into the ambulance with my sister and left without another glance. If they'd only looked closely, they would have seen that one of the bullets had also hit the left side of my chest. When I was six, I fell during family training and broke my forearm. All Dad offered was a few words of encouragement. "It's only a small injury. You'll heal soon. Learn to be strong." Later, after they adopted my little sister, she scraped her knee and Mom summoned the family's finest medical team and didn't leave her side for days. I'd spent fifteen years learning to be strong on my own. I was used to it. I lay quietly on the ground, watching the ambulance disappear. Mom, Dad, this time I'm being strong too. But I don't think I'll still be here when you come back.

I loved Adriano Ferraro—yeah, that Don—for five freaking years. He wasn't just my fiancé; he was my anchor in a world where loyalty got tested, and weakness got you killed. We had it all mapped out—dreams, plans, a future we actually thought we owned. Until I lost our baby. I reached for him, shaking, desperate for anything. But comfort never came. Instead, it was her. His stepsister, propped up. "Don't buy her act. She's just fishing for attention—again." That snake smiled like she just won a prize for emotional torture, dripping venom while fanning the flames. And Adriano? He bought it. He turned away. In that moment, it hit me—I wasn't just grieving. I was completely alone. The kid I carried, the future I built in my head? Gone. And so was I. I walked out. On him. On the Ferraro Family I was stupid enough to think I could belong to. All I left behind was silence. Empty space where we used to be. Now Adriano's drowning in regret, but it's too damn late. The life we should've had, the love we should've built? Dust. And her? The stepsister who ruined it all? She's paying for every lie.

When Damian was eighteen, he could barely afford a decent dinner. Still, he spent half his first commission on the cheapest silver ring in the store for me. He slid it onto my finger, his expression stern. "Wear this for now. When I have a real name, I'll get you a better one." I laughed at how cheap it was, then hid my hand behind my back and refused to give it back. Later, he did get a name. He was the Moretti family's long-lost heir, the man destined to lead its vast empire. But I never got that better ring. Five years ago, on the night a gang war broke out, I dragged a badly wounded Damian out of the fire. I never made it out myself. When he woke, huge pieces of his memory of me were gone. Cecilia Russo sat beside his hospital bed and told him I had despised him for being poor, betrayed him, and even sold the location of our old safe house to the enemy. She also told him she was the one who had saved him. Five years later, my ghost appeared in the final family trial he had to face. By then, another wedding ring sat on his hand. Cecilia was his wife. When his memories returned, he lost his mind.

After days of torture at the hands of my family’s rival gang, they offered me one last phone call. I called my brother, Matteo. I just wanted to say goodbye—while I still had the chance. “What is it now?” he snapped. “Matteo, I—” He didn’t let me finish. “Fix your own mistakes. Until then, don’t call me again.” Death didn’t hurt as much as those words did. I felt my heart slow to a stop as my brother’s words echoed in my ears. I guess you’re finally at peace now, Matteo. I won’t bother you again. And you’ll never have to see me again.

My mother-in-law’s final wish was simple—she wanted one last trip to Hawaii, to bask in the warmth of the sun before her time ran out. But her son, Vincent, didn’t see it that way. He thought I was manipulating her, using her as an excuse to drag him on a vacation he didn’t want. So, out of spite, he refused to grant her dying wish. I begged him. Pleaded. Swallowed my pride and all the hurt his accusations brought. After relentless persuasion, he finally relented. I thought, at last, I could give Lucy the happiness she deserved. But on the day we were set to leave, Vincent was nowhere to be found. And that same day, Lucy suffered a heart attack. She passed away with only me by her side—never getting to feel the warmth of the sun on her skin one last time. And then I saw it. A picture. Vincent, tagged at a luxury resort with his ex. The caption from her read: Thank you for abandoning your job to take me on this trip. You’re the best. I didn’t scream. I didn’t cry. I didn’t even confront him. I just packed my bags and left. And this time? Vincent found out about the truth and begged me to stay.

When I was eighteen, my brothers, the bosses of our mafia family, brought home an adopted sister. And so, naive as I was, I became the biggest nuisance in the family. When Vivian's dress was torn, they blamed me. When Vivian was frightened by the gang violence, they still blamed me. Later, our turf was attacked, and Vivian was kidnapped by our rivals. My brothers, who used to adore me, looked at me with desperate, tearful eyes and broke down. "Piper, we are begging you. Please take Vivian's place, okay?" I quietly looked up at them and softly said, "Okay." So, on that stormy night, I walked alone into the enemy camp and took the place of their beloved princess. As for me, I was thrown off a cliff into the raging sea. I thought I would die just like that, but I didn't. I met Hunter. At that time, he was just a street soldier chased into a dead alley by his enemies. I pressed my last piece of food into his hands. Later, he became the Don. He treated me like a queen and spoiled me for six whole years. I thought he was different from my brothers. But on a rainy night in our seventh year together, Hunter walked through the pouring rain and brought back a woman covered in blood. I heard she was his first love, Sadie. She was the woman who set him up, sending him to prison to be tortured before skipping town.

Vito and I had been giving each other the silent treatment for three days, and he never once reached out. With the Family’s enemies hunting me, I hid under a bridge and called him. “Vito, the Colombos are after me. Can you come save me?” Vito said coldly, “Antonia, are you playing the victim again? “I’m in the middle of a Family meeting. Don’t bother me!” The footsteps outside the bridge came closer. I said quietly, “I’m not lying.” He scoffed. “Fine. Wait for me, then.” I curled up under the bridge. The Colombos’ men shot me in the chest. Right up until my breathing stopped, Vito never came...

The day Guglielmo Raimondi takes over as the Don, I receive a final notice from the hospital because I can no longer afford my dialysis treatments. On the TV, Guglielmo sits at the head of a long table in a black suit. He is giving an interview on a live broadcast. The host asks, "Don Raimondi, if you could say one thing to the person you regret losing most in the past, what would you say?" Guglielmo hesitates for a moment before picking up his phone and making a call. My phone starts vibrating on the hospital bed. I hear him ask, "You left me because you thought I was broke. Do you regret it now?" I look at the enormous bill for my kidney transplant. The fees show a string of zeros I can never afford. "Guglielmo, for old times' sake, can you lend me one million dollars?" The call ends abruptly. On the live broadcast, Guglielmo blocks my number in front of the camera. He says, "I have no regrets anymore." What he doesn't know is that when he was poisoned in the past, his kidneys failed. When he is on the verge of death, I secretly donate one of my kidneys to him.

The day I was diagnosed with leukemia, my first reaction wasn't fear. It was relief. I wasn't really a Moretti anyway. If I died, I wouldn't owe anyone anything. When I was six, Bianca and I fought over a stuffed bear. My mother dragged me into a corner and said each word slowly enough to make sure I understood. “You are not our biological child. Everything in this house is something we've given you out of kindness.” After that, I never asked for anything again. Bianca got new dresses. I wore her old school uniforms. Bianca took piano lessons. I washed dishes in the kitchen to earn money for breakfast the next morning. I lived like a piece of luggage someone had left in the Moretti house, always ready to be claimed and taken away. After my diagnosis, Dr. Patel told me a stem-cell transplant was my best chance. A parent or biological sibling might be a match. I didn't tell the Morettis. Instead, I searched for my birth family in secret and used seven years of savings to prepay for the cheapest cremation in Chicago. Then, last night, I heard my parents talking inside my father's study. “Do you ever think we went too far?” my mother asked. “Serena acts more like a stranger every year.” My father sighed. “What choice did we have? Bianca is the adopted one. After her father died saving my life, I had to make sure she never felt like she came second. If Serena knew she was our biological daughter, why would she ever keep stepping aside for Bianca?” The cup slipped from my hand and rolled across the floor. I was their biological daughter. The girl they had raised as their real child was the one they had adopted. For eighteen years, my parents had erased me from their family so Bianca would never have to feel insecure. Standing outside that door, I started laughing. But the truth had come too late. My leukemia was already high-risk. My bone marrow was failing.

I am the woman who stays the longest by the side of mafia Don Jasper Shaw. I believe I hold a unique place in his heart. But when his beloved Rosie Hurley suffers violation and falls pregnant, everything changes. Accused of orchestrating Rosie's downfall, I become the venomous villain in their eyes. To shield Rosie from gossip, Jasper publicly claims her unborn child as his own. Meanwhile, I am branded a depraved woman, defiled and discarded. Desperate, I reveal my own pregnancy to Jasper, pleading for our child’s future. He dismisses it as a ploy for attention. When I confront him, his words cut deep. "This is the sin you must atone for. Rosie has always been raised like a princess, and she can't endure the whispers—not like you." For the first time, I realize I am nothing to Jasper but a tool for his desires. Rosie locks me in a cramped cellar, where I suffocate and die. My body lies undiscovered for a month. When Jasper receives the call to identify my corpse, he brushes it off, prioritizing Rosie's prenatal checkup. "Amara's lies are piling up. So what if she's dead? Cremate her and then talk to me." My body enters the furnace and is reduced to a handful of ashes. Later, the mighty Jasper Shaw kneels and sobs uncontrollably. He begs for just one glimpse of me.

Every time I texted my husband, Dominic, the rising Mafia Don, all I got in return was a bank transfer. This time, my brain cancer had reached its final stage. The doctor asked if I wanted to go ahead with the surgery. Gasping for air, I clutched my phone. I hesitated before finally sending Dominic a text. [The doctor says surgery could buy me another year. Should I do it?] Right before they wheeled me into the operating room, my screen finally lit up. [Deposit Alert: $50,000] Just like every other time over the last three years. He answered me with money. I put my phone down. I had nothing left to say. On our wedding night, I asked to borrow three hundred thousand dollars. From then on, he was convinced I was a gold digger. His brothers said I only wanted his name and money. He believed them. I even took a bullet for him once during a shootout. He just had his accountant wire me money. I begged him to attend my father's funeral. All I got was another massive transfer. Six months ago, I was diagnosed with terminal brain cancer. It was hereditary. Soon, I would be just like my dad. Covered in tubes. Rotting away in a hospital bed. I broke down and left him ninety-nine voicemails. I only got ninety-nine deposit notifications in return. Now they were about to crack my skull open just to keep me alive. Then my phone buzzed. A news alert popped up on a dark web gossip site. He was with Vivian, the Mafia princess. They had been up all night drinking and playing pool in her penthouse. I stared at his gentle profile in the photo. I smiled bitterly and pulled the IV needle from my vein. Dominic once asked me where we went wrong. His voice was full of disappointment. He asked what our marriage even meant. Well, Dominic. This time, I will give you the answer with my death. I will finally set you free.

The moment the acid hit my skin, I heard my own flesh sizzle. In the last moments before my consciousness faded, my trembling fingers managed to dial my brother, the new Don of the Steele family. To my relief, Farrow finally answered. The sounds of expensive jazz and clinking glasses bled through the receiver. His voice was cold as ice. "What is it this time, Grace?" "Farrow... help me..." He cut me off before I could finish. "Listen, Betty's book launch is tomorrow night. If you dare cause a scene or embarrass the Family, I'll disown you. I'll ship you off to a convent in Sicily." The line went dead. A moment later, a second splash of acid hit my face, and the searing agony consumed me. My eyes were gone, leaving nothing but hollow, bloody sockets. You don't need to exile me, Farrow. I'm already gone. Forever.

My mother, Vivienne Freeman, was the Donna of Freeman Family. She had her senior engineers develop an advanced lie detector. It looked like a bracelet, and my sister and I each wore one. Whenever I lied, my band flashed red. It could supposedly catch me even when I merely thought about lying. From then on, the band seemed able to read my mind. Even when I kept my mouth shut, it still flashed red. Then Mom would find some way to punish me. I told her countless times that I had never lied, but she refused to believe me. She would not let me question technology she had personally approved. Pointing to my sister's dark band, she demanded to know why it never flashed and why I never told the truth. The day the Family caught a traitor, Mom took my sister and me to watch his execution. A gunshot rang out, and blood spread across the ground. The sight of it made me feel faint, so I begged Mom to let me leave. My band flashed red. My sister picked up a gun and smiled at me. "Mom, Sophie's band is flashing again. She must be figuring out how to deceive you!" Mom glared at me and forced the gun into my hand. "You're the Don's daughter, yet you're a coward, you're frail, and you lie. You don't deserve to be my daughter. Take the gun and shoot him!" The blood made it hard to breathe. My heart raced, strength drained from my body, and I began to suffocate. Even as I started to collapse, Mom kept accusing me of being a coward compared with my sister and a shameless liar. The world spun. Tears ran down my face as pain racked my body. Mom, I never once lied to you, not aloud and not in my thoughts. I never will.

A body was pulled from the sea, waterlogged and swollen. The woman was two months pregnant. Her face was unrecognizable, but I recognized the ring I had given her immediately. The dead woman was my daughter, Cecily Moretti. I had once been the most powerful Mafia Donna on the West Coast, with enemies everywhere. To protect Cecily, I staged a shipwreck ten years ago. I jumped into the sea clutching a doll and faked my own death. I left her in the care of the Griffiths family, whose son I had chosen to be her husband. I gave them money, power, and every advantage so my daughter could live a peaceful, happy life. But my investigation uncovered the truth. Five years after I disappeared, Cecily's intended husband, Selwyn Griffiths, fell in love with Iliana Valmont, the daughter of a noble family. "Donna, Selwyn broke his promise to marry Ms. Cecily. He also believed Iliana's lies and had Ms. Cecily tied to a reef as punishment. The abrasions on her wrists and ankles suggest she struggled to free herself as the tide came in. Then... then a wave swept her out to sea." As my lieutenant gave his report, my fingernails dug into my palms. I had lifted the Griffiths family to the top, yet my beloved daughter had been treated worse than a slave! Fighting back my grief, I slowly wrapped my hand around Cecily's scarred fingers. "Rest now, Cecily. I swear I'll avenge you."

For as long as I could remember, I knew my mother, Isabella, hated me. She once threw me into the basement, leaving me to rot in the dark or crawl out on my own. But I was hard to kill. Even after nine days of starvation, I still clawed at the bottom of the door until all ten of my fingers were bloody. At seven, I taught myself how to fight back against her. When she locked me out, I shattered the champagne tower at a family dinner. If I couldn't be happy, no one could. When she had her guards pin me to the ground to teach me a lesson, I secretly locked her precious son, Leo, in the attic. I listened to him cry until his voice went hoarse. I stubbornly fought against her like this until I was twelve. Until they brought my newborn sister, Rosie, home. I stood by the crib, clumsily changing the soiled cashmere blanket for the tiny pink bundle. Isabella barged in and slammed me hard against the wall. Behind the disgust in her eyes was fear. "What are you trying to do to my daughter?" "I knew it! You're the spawn of that Barone bastard. You're up to no good!" "Why don't you just die and do this family a favor!" In that moment, I finally understood. Clutching the back of my bleeding head, for the first time, I didn't fight back. It was also the first time I actually agreed with her. My birth, from start to finish, was a dirty mistake. I really did deserve to die.

While my corpse was rotting in the morgue, my fiancé, Ron Corleone, was comforting my murderer. Lisa Corleone sobbed as she said, “After we were kidnapped and brought here, Wendy disappeared. We don’t know if she managed to escape. It was all my fault. If I hadn’t insisted on going out with Wendy…” Ron’s face was ice cold. “The future mistress of the Corleone family actually abandoned my sister and fled on her own. If she dares to come back, I’ll break her arms and legs and turn her into a maggot that only deserves to live in the dark!” In fact, I did die in some random corner with my limbs broken. The truth about my death made Ron, who had vowed to make me regret my existence, crazy.

The day my father's enemies kidnapped and tortured me, my family was celebrating my sister Isa's eighteenth birthday. The next day, she would be handed over to the Cammarata family, our rivals, to seal an alliance through marriage. My father is a Don with more enemies than he can count. When I was ten, the two families arranged a marriage alliance to keep the peace. If the two families ever went to war again, the one who'd been married off would be killed first to send a message. On the day they chose the bride, my sister grabbed the token first: a signet ring. From that day on, she was the one this family loved. My mother always said Isa was suffering in my place. So I had to give way to her in everything and protect her. Whatever my sister wanted, I had to hand it over. When we were little, an assassination attempt forced our car off the road. I clutched her to me during the crash and broke my own leg. When my mother arrived, she pulled Isa into her arms first, then turned on me. "Your sister's arm is all scraped up. Couldn't you have protected her better?" I pretended it didn't matter and went to the hospital alone. But I cried anyway while they set my leg. This time, when they kidnapped me, I dropped to my knees and begged for one call for help. I didn't hesitate for a second. I called my parents. My mother had already lost her patience. "Do you have to compete for attention even on your sister's birthday? After today, you can do whatever you want. I'm hanging up." But there wasn't going to be an after today, Mom. As I took my last breath while they tortured me, one thought filled my mind. If I died in my sister's place, would that finally make them happy?