Face Slapping Mafia Short Stories & Novels

"Consigliere, I want a divorce from Cassius. I’m handing back all the businesses under my name. Draft up the papers." The old Consigliere frowned. "Camilla, this marriage keeps the peace between our two families. Can you think this over?" I was the frontwoman for Cassius Marino’s dirty empire for three years. In the shadows, I was this cold-blooded Don's legal wife. A month ago, a Mexican cartel kidnapped me. That night, the cartels blew up my husband's secure line, demanding a thirty-million-dollar ransom. He let it ring. They ended up throwing me into an abandoned meat locker in freezing temperatures. I almost froze to death. Luckily, a butcher stumbled in and dragged me out just in time. And on that very night, while I was dying, Cassius was in a Vegas penthouse pool... fucking Bianca. The woman who stole my life. Right then, my years of love for him just vanished. This hopeless marriage was a mistake from day one. I finally woke up. And this time, I was ready to vanish from his dark empire for good. "My mind is made up," I gave the old Consigliere a cold nod. "And Cassius won't object." I always knew the truth—my Don husband never loved me for a single second. But I'd looked up to him like a fool since I was a little girl. Three years ago, when he casually asked if I wanted to marry him, I actually cried happy tears and said yes. Soon, the clock would strike midnight. It would be our third anniversary. I had the perfect final gift ready for the almighty Don—a divorce. Freedom for him, and for me.

On the day of the funeral, Marcus asked me to share him with his sisters-in-law. The moment the news broke, Selena, the eldest brother's wife, hurled her wine glass to the floor. Vivian, the second brother's wife, raised her voice and tore into Marcus for having no sense of decency. But the Hartley family's men dropped to their knees, begging the two widows to become Marcus’s mistresses, to carry on the bloodline in honor of their fallen husbands. I stood off to the side watching, and something in me snapped. I shoved through the crowd, slammed my hands on the long table, and demanded to know exactly what Marcus thought I was to him. I called him no better than a thug. Then I turned on the two sisters-in-law, called them frauds in widow's clothing, and by the end I'd said something unforgivable to just about everyone in that room. After that, I couldn't let it go. I hired a lawyer and sued them for fraud, for a staged marriage. They turned it around on me and said I was plotting to swallow the entire Hartley estate and drive what was left of the family into the ground. My father's business was sabotaged again and again. Three key shipping routes went dark. The dockyard was seized. I was thrown out of the estate and died in a damp basement in Sicily, with no doctor and no family. The landlord found me when he came to collect rent. I only learned the truth after I died. They'd been working together all along. His public reveal of the mistress was merely meant to drive me to snap, giving him a valid excuse to end our marriage. Then I opened my eyes. I was back in that living room, on that same day. The portraits of the two brothers sat on the long table. Selena stood in a black dress, eyes rimmed red. "Marcus, your brother's body is barely cold, and you want us to be your mistresses?" Vivian wore a pale blouse, her voice trembling. "I'd sooner die than betray your brother." This time around, I was going to give them exactly what they asked for.

I grew up fatherless, clawing my way through the Chicago underbelly with my mom. She always said he loved us. That he just had to go far, far away. Until she got terminally ill. I dropped out of design school and rushed back, ready to drain our life savings to treat her. But she put a pair of scissors to her own throat. She told me not to touch the cash. It was the only thing she had to leave me. I pretended to agree. But the second I turned around, I took our fifty grand and ran to Mr. Sal, the neighborhood's back-alley doctor. I begged him to save her. "Fifty grand? This buys her three months. Tops." He lit a cigarette. Through the smoke, his eyes bored into me. Like he was looking at a ghost. "Your mother... she was once the brightest jewel in Chicago. Gave it all up for a man. That man took her money and became the city's real estate king. He's Mob-connected. Maybe you should go ask him for help." I took that poison home with me. And I didn't breathe a word. When she found out I spent the money, she held me and cried. "My foolish girl, why are you so stubborn? I'm dying anyway. What about your school? How will you pay for it?" But while I took care of her, I tore through all her old things, looking for proof of that bastard's betrayal. On the night of his empire's 20th-anniversary gala, I crashed his party. I brought two things: a blood-stained marriage certificate, and a lawyer. "I'm looking for Nico Russo. He can either honor a twenty-year-old marriage... or he can sign these divorce papers."

On Christmas Eve, Adrian Moretti left my father and me on an icy lakeside road because Lucia Vale called and said she was sick. The defibrillator that could have saved my father was in his armored SUV, driven away by the man my father had trusted for seven years. I called Adrian until my fingers went numb. When he finally answered, Lucia was crying on the other end, and his voice held only impatience. “Elena, stop making this dramatic. Wait for the escort car. Lucia needs me right now.” By the time the Moretti men arrived, my father was already gone. An hour later, Lucia posted a photo from the Moretti estate. She stood beneath the Christmas tree in Adrian’s coat, pale and fragile, with his hand resting on her shoulder. The caption read: Christmas feels like home when he is here. I looked at that photo for a long time. Then I liked it and left a comment. Merry Christmas. I wish you both a lifetime together.

I was engaged to Silas, Don of the Vance Famiglia, yet in the annual family portrait, I was shoved into the back corner. Standing right beside him was Camilla, his most trusted Capo. He sighed impatiently. "We have plenty of photos together, Scarlett. Missing one won't kill you. You're the future Donna. Stop being so petty." I swallowed my pride and gave up my spot. But my compromise bought me nothing. The necklace meant for me ended up around Camilla's neck. His plus-one to galas became Camilla. His excuse was always the same: "She's a vital part of the syndicate. You shouldn't compete with her." So, I gave him exactly what he wanted. I stopped being petty. I shredded the wedding planner I had poured my heart into, trashed our photos, and left New York for good. And suddenly, the cold, calculating Don was tearing the city apart looking for me.

I was attending a mafia family wedding with my boyfriend when the bride tossed her bouquet, and it landed right in my arms. According to tradition, everyone in attendance was supposed to bless the lucky person who caught it. So, naturally, I looked over at my boyfriend, Matteo, thinking this was the moment he might finally propose to me. Instead, the groom let out an awkward cough. “Serena, Matteo and I already agreed beforehand that this bouquet is supposed to go to Livia. It’s really not right for you to just snatch it away like that.” Before I could even explain, Matteo stepped out from the crowd. His brows were furrowed, and he glared at me with pure annoyance. “Serena, I told you I have to make things up to Livia one hundred times. This bouquet is only the fifty-eighth time. Just give the flowers back to her and stop making things difficult for me.” It was Livia. Again. Years ago, when the two of them broke up after a massive fight, Livia ended up getting into a terrible car accident on a rainy night. Ever since then, Matteo convinced himself that he owed her for the rest of his life and claimed he had to make it up to her one hundred times. So, when she said she was afraid of the dark, he abandoned me at my apartment in the middle of the night just to be with her. When she said she loved roses, he took her up in a helicopter just to shower the sky with rose petals for her. Meanwhile, if I ever showed that I was upset, I was just being petty and unreasonable. In the past, I used to kick up a ruckus and cry about it. I even threw out a lunch he had personally cooked for Livia straight into the trash, and I smashed a birthday gift that he had meticulously picked out for her. Because of that, all of his family members and friends now looked down on me. They thought I was nothing but a toxic, dramatic shrew who didn’t deserve Matteo at all. To them, he and Livia were the ones who truly belonged together. Now, the entire crowd was staring at me, completely on edge. They were expecting me to throw another massive scene right here at the wedding, but this time, I didn’t. Instead, I just smiled, held out the bouquet, and handed it right over to Livia. "Here you go." Those flowers were filthy anyway, and I didn’t want them anymore. As for Matteo? I didn’t want him anymore, either.

My father was Enzo Moretti, the godfather of one of New York’s most powerful mafia families. And I was his princess—his most cherished treasure. He hid me from his world to protect me, but he didn’t want me left alone, so he arranged a marriage for me. The groom was Leon Scott—the son of New York’s richest man. Handsome, loaded, and a rising star in the business world. On paper, he was perfect. For our wedding, my father had a custom gown flown in from a designer in Milan. Today was my fitting appointment. When I walked into the bridal boutique, my heart stopped. Nicole Hill, Leon’s childhood sweetheart, was wearing my wedding dress. When she saw me, a smug little smile curled her lips. Then she grabbed a cheap white polyester bridesmaid’s dress from the table and shoved it into my arms. “Put this on,” she said, lifting her chin like she owned the place. “You can wear this for the ceremony.” I looked down at the flimsy fabric in my hands, then back up at her. My voice dropped low. “I’m the soon-to-be bride. And you’re telling me to wear this?” She let out a laugh, sharp and mean. “Just do what you’re told and don’t make this difficult. Leon already gave the word. I’m walking down the aisle in your place. And you? You just stand there like a good little bridesmaid and go through the motions.” For a few seconds, I couldn’t speak. Then I pulled out my phone and dialed Leon’s number. It rang twice before he picked up. “Leon, about Nicole taking my place at the altar. Don’t you think you owe me an explanation?”

During a dinner party hosted by the Cassano crime family, a lace garter stained with dried fluid dropped out of Matthew's pocket. He was the Don's son-in-law. When questioned, Matthew insisted I had tried to seduce him, failed, and planted my own underwear on him as a setup. In my past life, I was just a maid for the Cassano family. Simply because I had a killer body and a pretty face, the hot-tempered mafia princess, Caroline, refused to listen to a word I said. She had me fed alive to a venomous snake. My parents came seeking justice, only to end up at the bottom of the river. In this life, I faced Matthew's setup once again. "She sneaked into my booth and threw herself at me! When I rejected her, she planted this on me to ruin my marriage with Caroline!" But I was no longer a lowly maid. I held a Ph.D. in Economics from Yale and served as the Chief Advisor for the Visconti family, a global mafia empire.

My employees host a savage livestream cursing me out as a cold-blooded Scrooge just because I didn't hand out frozen turkeys for Thanksgiving. What the internet didn't know was that our company, rooted in a powerful mafia family, has one, single, unbreakable tradition for every major holiday: ten uncirculated American Eagle gold bullion coins hand-delivered directly from our private vault. No paper trails, no taxes, no exceptions. As the whole internet was calling for my head after watching her livestream, I decided to give them exactly what they wanted. I sent out a company-wide memo: "To honor our cherished holiday traditions, the family gold distribution program will be discontinued this year. In its place, to ensure everyone experiences a traditional Thanksgiving, all employees will receive a complimentary, grocery-tier frozen turkey." The memo dropped. The office exploded. A stampede of my employees swarmed my office door, practically on their knees begging me to bring back the gold.

The day I came back to the Bennett family as the real heiress, Romina, the fake one, looked at me with red-rimmed eyes and said she wanted to give the engagement back to me. "Don't bother. I'm already seeing someone." I rested a hand on my barely noticeable belly and said, half joking, "If you feel that bad about it, how about you just cash me out instead?" The words had barely left my mouth before a few lines of text drifted across my vision. [lmaooo the villainess is still scheming for money at a time like this. can we please skip ahead to the part where the male lead puts her in her place.] [I came for the sweet romance between the lead and the fake heiress heroine, not some side character throwing a fit because she's got a baby bump to wave around] [spoiler from me! the villainess gets thrown out of the family, the lead ends up hating her, and she dies in childbirth. throwing confetti!] I clicked my tongue. How could I possibly cling to a strange man? Then footsteps came from behind me. Romina walked over, crying, and introduced me. "Orlando, this is my sister, Ophelia. The engagement was supposed to be hers." I turned around, and my whole body went rigid. It was the patron who'd kept me for five years, the father of the child I was carrying.

My husband promised we would spend Thanksgiving with my parents this year. Right before we left, he looked down at his phone and frowned. "Damn it. I forgot to change the delivery address again. Your parents' gift basket went to Cassia's place." I stood in the entryway with my fingers frozen around my scarf. For three years of marriage, Roman DeLuca had never removed Cassia Vail's address from his shopping apps. Whenever I asked him why, he always said the same thing: "Cassia and I grew up together. She’s basically family." The Italian espresso machine I wanted went to her apartment. He said her old machine had broken anyway. The sapphire bracelet for our wedding anniversary was signed for by her. He said asking for it back after she opened it would look petty. The sunflowers and baby's breath he promised me on Valentine's Day ended up in her hands. He said she had already put them in a vase, and he couldn't give me secondhand flowers. This time, I had reminded him for two weeks. The Thanksgiving basket had a low-sugar pumpkin pie, nut-free cookies, and a custom low-sodium turkey roll for my father. I had chosen every item myself. It still went to Cassia. I kept my voice steady. "Drive over and get it back." Roman's face darkened. "She already signed for it. What do you want me to do? We'll pick up wine and pastries on the way. Same thing." "It isn't the same. Get it back." He pinched the bridge of his nose. "Elena, can you stop turning every little thing into a family trial? No one makes things awkward like you do." Every time something meant for me ended up with his childhood sweetheart, I asked him to get it back. Every time, I got some version of the same answer. I stopped arguing and watched him slam the door behind him. A few minutes later, I wiped my tears and texted my attorney. [Happy Thanksgiving. Please draft a divorce agreement for me. Thank you.]

In the fourth year of our marriage, and a few days for our bond to be deemed permanent by the Mafia council, I found out my babies' deaths were never just a miscarriage. My husband, the same man who swore to protect me, had murdered my babies to please my cousin. They didn't know I had found out, and so nothing could prepare them for the revenge I planned. Hurt me once, shame on me. Hurt me twice… I'd make you wish you were never born.

I had just climbed into the armored SUV leaving the Moretti estate when the gatekeeper hurried after me with a black encrypted phone in his hand. "Mrs. Westmore, Don Moretti asked me to give you this." I took it. One unread message glowed on the screen. [Selena only had a scare. I'll come home tomorrow. Don't overthink it.] I stared at it for two seconds, popped out the SIM card, snapped it in half, and tossed it into the rain outside the window. The next day, I had just reached the abandoned shipyard in North Harbor when encrypted messages started hitting my backup phone one after another. [Vivian, where are you?] [Why aren't you home? Where the hell did you go this late?] [Answer me. Don't make me send men all over the city looking for you.] The last one was exactly his style: soft on the surface, arrogant underneath. [Your family survives under my protection. Don't test my patience.] I didn't answer. After countless messages sank without a reply, my husband finally drove to the old Westmore grounds at North Harbor. He knew that if anything was left of my family, I would be there. But when Damon pushed through the broken iron gate, he found no guards, no household staff, and no Westmore men waiting for orders. The old house stood hollow in the rain. Its windows were blown out, the front steps were black with soot, and the air still carried the bitter smell of smoke and gunpowder. Damon grabbed a passing harbor guard by the sleeve. "Where are the Westmores?" The guard looked at him as if he should already know. "Gone. The family was hit two nights ago. Whoever came for them knew exactly when Moretti protection would be pulled from the harbor." "Miss Westmore came back before dawn," the guard added. "She took the black-gold signet, a few boxes of ledgers, and whatever papers survived the fire." "After that, she left. And no one has seen her since."

The first thing I did when I woke up in this life? I called my underboss and ordered fifty crates of the new Colt revolvers delivered to the estate. Let me rewind. In my past life, my stepmother Veronica and my fiancé Marco were sleeping together. She got pregnant with his bastard. To keep my father, Don Salvatore, from finding out, she deliberately sabotaged a family weapons deal. She let a rival crew intercept the shipment and used the chaos to lose the baby. Then she came home crying to the Don. "It's all Irene's fault. She was too greedy, too reckless. She insisted on that unsafe sea route. I was ambushed, I lost the child... our heir..." I tried to defend myself. But Marco stepped up and pointed right at me. "Irene Moretti, I am beyond disappointed in you. You've always been reckless, never caring who gets caught in the crossfire. But this, making your own mother miscarry just to chase a win? That's monstrous. I'm done with you. The engagement is over." My father lost it. In front of the entire family, he lashed me with a whip, a dozen strokes. Afterward, Veronica sweet‑talked him into shipping me off to marry into our rival family. They locked me in their basement and tortured me until I died. Only after death did I learn the truth: Marco was Veronica's lover all along. He only agreed to marry me so they'd have cover to meet in plain sight. Now I open my eyes. And I'm back. The very day Veronica "lost" her baby. Not this time, sweetheart. Not. This. Time.

I had lost my memory for three years. I'd been through hell and high water with Adrian Vance for the past three years. He told me we'd grown up together on the same block, two kids who'd fallen for each other young. He told me that once he had a real foothold in the Family, he'd marry me in front of all of Palermo and make the whole city come to watch. I believed him. With a steady trigger hand and a mean streak, I cleared every man who stood in his way. I dragged him up from a nobody bastard son into the inner circle of the Family, one body at a time. Then the day finally came, and what he said was, "I've already asked the Don for his daughter Camilla. It's settled. I'm marrying her." "Camilla's a mafia princess. The Don's pride and joy. Not some no-name orphan girl with nothing and no one behind her. She's the one who can actually lift me up." "Be good, Vera. As long as Camilla never finds out, we can go on the way we always have." "Be good. You mean play your mistress in the dark, is that it?" What Adrian didn't know was that my memory had already come back. My real name was Hale, heir to the Hale family, the one enemy the Marlowe outfit he'd sworn himself to feared most. Childhood sweethearts, princesses, Don. In the end they were all just one more debt I'd settle on my way to paying the Family back in full.

When I was three months pregnant, I walked straight into an ambush. A bullet tore through my arm, and they rushed me to the hospital. By the time it was over, the baby had been torn out of me alive. The surgeon, Mia, passed it off as a tragic mistake. I tore the hospital apart, and my husband, Leon, only looked annoyed. "It's one kid. We'll have another. Why put the doctor through hell over it?" Then I saw the smug woman standing behind him, and it all came together. I smiled at Leon. What he didn't know was that in the gang shootout three months ago, the bullet to his stomach had left him sterile for good. And that baby was the only blood he would ever have.

My sister Brenda fell in love with Don Joseph Genovese because he saved her life once. She thought a man that dangerous had chosen her. Then she learned the truth. Joseph had only pulled her out of that riot because she looked like his wife, Maria, when Maria was young. Any sane woman would have walked away. Brenda decided Maria had to die. She tracked Maria’s schedule, planned a hit-and-run, and meant to play the heroic bystander after putting Joseph’s wife in the ground. If Maria was gone, Brenda believed she could take her place. In my first life, I stopped her. I knocked her out before she could make her move. I begged her to understand that Joseph was not some lovesick man from her mafia novels. He was a Don. If he found out, he would not just punish her. He would burn our whole family with her. Brenda cried. She nodded. She promised she understood. That night, she poured paraquat into my water glass. As I died, she whispered, “You ruined my shot at the big life, Sharon. So I ruined yours.” Then I opened my eyes again. I was back on the day she made her move. This time, I stayed where I was.

The annual Vittorio family gala was in full swing when my brother, Don Marco Vittorio, decided to host a card game. The stakes were simple: the winner could make one demand of him. Everyone knew I had been brought back to the Vittorio estate three years ago but still hadn't been formally acknowledged as family. They stepped aside, murmuring that this was Marco's way of giving me a chance—a test I might finally pass. Only Gianna, the family's adopted princess, made sure I had none. She counted off her boasts on her fingers. "Marco gives me a black card with a fifty-thousand-euro monthly limit." "He bid on a lighthouse in the Bay of Naples for me." "I give the family toast at New Year's Mass." "My name is on the trust." Four statements. I had one card left. She smiled and delivered the killing blow: "This whole game? Marco threw it just to cheer me up." My heart sank. I looked at my brother. He smiled indulgently—that same smile he'd worn for three years, always taking her side, always asking me to wait. I folded. I laid down my last card. And suddenly, I didn't want to go home that badly anymore. I didn't need the Vittorio name. I was done.

I get approached for legal representation by my ex-boyfriend, Dante Romano, once I become the most prominent lawyer in the country. I am Dante's secret lover—the woman he could never openly claim—four years ago. I am unable to reveal our relationship, receive a ring, and am forbidden from ever setting foot inside the Romano Famiglia estate. It is because of the century-old tradition governing the Romano Famiglia—only a woman who rolls a 20 on the 20-sided gold die 20 consecutive times can become the Donna of the Romano Famiglia. I try countless times over the course of four years, yet every single roll lands on a "one". I eventually become the laughingstock of the entire eastern side of the country, with them claiming I don't have what it takes to become the Donna. However, the return of my foster sister, Sofia Conti, changes everything. She casually tosses the die and rolls a "20" 20 times in a row, securing her engagement to Dante that same night. It is only later that Dante confesses to me. "I tampered with your golden die so that it would always land on a 'one,' Elena. Sofia comes from an ordinary background and needs a legendary story to earn her place in this world. You understand why I did it, right?" It turns out that four years of my humility, struggles, and being a laughingstock are nothing more than a stepping stone he paves for another woman. I leave Kingsbay and head to Ravenport alone while they celebrate their wedding of the century, starting from scratch as a low-level intern. Four years later, I eventually become a legendary lawyer with an undefeated record. Dante suddenly arrives at my office to plead his case, pushing a half-million-dollar check toward me while saying, "You're the only one who can win this, Elena." I look at him and smile faintly. I then pull open a drawer and place the same 20-sided gold die from years ago right in front of him. "I'll represent you as long as you roll a '20' 20 times in a row."

My fiancé presented two engagement rings—one for me, one for my sister to choose first. The first was a three-carat fancy pink diamond, flown in from Antwerp, the kind that made dealers go quiet. The second was a plain platinum band, standard issue, the sort you buy off the tray as a backup. For the first time in my life, I pointed at the pink diamond. "I'll choose first this time." Dante Moretti ran his hand through my hair, the way you soothe a restless dog. "Eleanor, you know Grace has always been particular. If she can't have the best, she'd rather have nothing. You've never cared about any of this. The other one is fine." I didn't answer. My chest felt hollow. We'd grown up together—his father ran the West Coast territory, mine the East. But in Dante's eyes, I'd always been the second daughter, the one who got what Grace didn't want. Every summer, he'd cut watermelon and bring the first plate to Grace. She'd take the center slice—sweetest, seedless, deepest red. He'd push the rest toward me—the pale pink near the rind. "This part's still good. Just not as sweet." When he bought his first Maserati, Grace picked the front seat—less motion sickness. He gestured at the back. "A little tight, but you can pick either side." Even our love was secondhand. He'd loved Grace first. She chose her academic career over him. So Dante, wounded and restless, came to me. In his world, Grace was always the first choice. I looked at the platinum band and pushed it across the table. "Give them both to Grace. I don't want either."