Nouvelles Workplace Mafia & Romans

Donna Sofia Marino's birthday is held on Valentine's Day. When Francesco Rossi, the Underboss of the Costa family, announces the news on behalf of Don Enzo Costa, everyone in the family is very happy. Well, everyone but me. As expected, Francesco is quick to add, "Someone needs to guard the headquarters. Camilla, you'll be the one in charge of this task." "What the Underboss means is that you don't really carry out any missions in your daily life. Besides, you have tons of spare time anyway. This time, you are to guard the headquarters so that you can deal with any emergencies that might arise." I just smirk sarcastically. The truth is, I'm always the one dealing with the most dangerous matters concerning the Costa family. The transactions of the firearms worth hundreds of millions of dollars are successfully carried out thanks to the plan I've spent countless sleepless nights perfecting. When a crossfire breaks out, I'm always on the frontlines, fighting for the family's glory despite getting injured. While I'm given the title as the executive director, I'm never given any actual power. In truth, my standing is lower than that of a soldato. I'm always the one carrying out the hardest, the most menial, not to mention the most dangerous tasks. But every time credit is given, it's never given to me. I've been enduring this injustice for five long years. This time, I no longer want to keep enduring anymore. With a smile on my face, I stand up from my seat. "Alright then, Underboss Rossi. I shall guard the headquarters. But this will be the last time I ever do this. After this task is completed, I will officially leave the Costa family once and for all."

On the day of my coming-of-age ceremony, all three of my fiancés showed up with the worst reports from their family-run businesses. My father had declared that I would marry the one who could bring the greatest benefit to our family. However, all three of them had already fallen for a penniless scholarship girl named Amelia Jones, and none of them wanted me. In my previous life, I kept them close, mentored them, and poured my resources into helping them rise. By the time they had each become powerful men in my family, they repaid me by framing my father, getting him arrested, and making him age more than 10 years overnight. He was dragged to prison. Me? They hired a crew of street thugs to brutalize me, leaving me to die while my private photos spread across the internet. As life slipped away, I heard their sneering voices: "Did you really think we ever liked you? Everything we did was for Amelia." "If you hadn't chained us to your side, we'd have married her long ago, we'd have a house full of kids by now!" "You and your father ruined her future. She couldn't afford college because of you. She had no choice but to jump!" Then I opened my eyes: reborn on the very day of my coming-of-age ceremony. I pulled my father aside, looked him in the eye, and said, "I'm an adult now. Throw them out. Strip them of every business and every asset we gave them." "I'm not choosing any of them. I chose Bruce Sullivan, the Don of the Sullivan family."

My family is part of New York's Mafia, and we live by one rule: anyone still unmarried at 30 must accept a match arranged by the family. When I told my boyfriend of ten years, Klaus Brenner, about the rule, he finally agreed to a public engagement. I thought the man who had once taken a beating to protect me was about to become my husband. I thought my life was in my own hands at last. But when it was time for us to kiss at the engagement party, everything changed. In front of every guest, Klaus pulled Linda Moreau, the new designer, into his arms and kissed her without hesitation. Linda blushed bright red. The room erupted. "What kind of backward family in New York still arranges marriages? What century are we in?" He sneered. "Rebecca, I'll marry you someday. But not now, and certainly not because you cornered me into it." I stared at the smug look on his face and felt the last of my love turn cold. I slid the ring off my finger and tossed it to Linda. "Keep it. I don't want him anymore. He's all yours." What he didn't know was that the so-called old rule came from Vittorio Rota, the most ruthless of the five Dons who led New York's Mafia families. And the man I was being forced to marry was Ian Castellano, the heir apparent to New York's underworld.

For three years, I used my family's mob ties and my own money to pave the way for Declan's crew. He was the boy I survived the streets with as a kid. But at this month's sit-down, his newly hired secretary, Roxy, tossed my casino ledgers and club records onto the table in front of all the guys. She accused me of skimming profits and slacking off. "These underground banks, these smuggling docks," she read the numbers out loud, her voice full of fake outrage. "Every time she bribes someone, she skims thousands of dollars! She's lining her own pockets." "I say the Boss strips her of her club manager title right now to save our cash flow." I glanced at Declan, the boss of the crew. He knew better than anyone what that missing money actually paid for. He knew how much dock security it covered. He knew how many nods of approval it bought from politicians and cops. He also knew what I was doing when I wasn't at the club. I was making deals with dangerous gun runners. I was drinking hard liquor to secure guns and ammo for his boys. But he just stared at me coldly. "Katerina, do you have anything to say about these ledgers and the proof Roxy just showed us?" I smiled. "I have nothing to explain." Very soon, all of them would find out exactly what happens when you pull a stunt like this on a Principessa's turf.

I'm Serena Sorrento, the sole daughter of Don Salvatore Sorrento. After seeing the news of a female employee getting stalked and assaulted by a stalker on her way home from work, I spend millions of dollars arranging specialized cars for every female employee in my company when they get off work at night. At first, I thought I'd receive a "thank you" from them. But those employees have the gall to criticize me on various major social media platforms. "Our boss is practically forcing us to work overtime!" "Why must employees hand over the information of their home addresses to the company, anyway?" "Since our boss has money to buy those luxury cars, she might as well give us the money right away!" The entire Internet bashes me for capitalizing on my charity, gloating about my wealth, and not knowing what my employees actually want. After receiving a bombardment of insulting and humiliating text messages, I decide to take the Internet's advice and call for a mandatory company meeting. "After receiving the sincere feedback from all the employees, I shall terminate the specialized pick-up service from today onward. Instead, I shall have it reclassified as a transportation allowance. Those who are eligible shall receive 100 dollars per month." As soon as the announcement is made, the entire company goes crazy.

Three years after marrying the Don, he died in a shootout. As second-in-command, I took the throne and ignored the whisperers. I needed my men focused on the streets. So I paid two hundred grand a month out of my own pocket. I built a bulletproof Long Island compound for their widows and kids, complete with top doctors and guaranteed trust payouts. Their leader Bianca bit my hand anyway. At our annual family summit, she ripped the ledger to shreds right in my face. She claimed I locked them in a cage, stole their money, and worked them like slaves. The old capos smelled blood. The crews cut side deals behind my back. They thought a woman on the throne made an easy target. They wanted to use those crying widows to carve up my East Side turf. Fine. They mistook my mercy for weakness. That same night, sirens wailed. My armed guards locked the gates. We tossed their designer luggage straight into the mud and turned that luxury compound into a military armory. Every perk was wiped clean. I threw three grand at each woman and severed all ties. As for the traitors leaking our intel, their names went straight to the hit squad for a blood debt. Those arrogant widows ended up in the dirt, sobbing on their knees and begging for shelter. I simply pressed cold steel against Bianca's temple. "Stop crying. You begged for freedom, didn't you? Now get off my land. Go enjoy your freedom in the slums."

I'm the only daughter of the Genovese family in New York. To test my husband Jayden Henderson's competence, my Dad had me stage a surprise inspection at the company he runs. The moment I walked in, some bleach-blonde in a tight dress was staring at the shredder like she'd just discovered fire. "Oh my God, this thing is so cool. Can it literally shred anything?" She said that as she grabbed a contract off someone's desk and started feeding it in. A coworker dove across three desks to stop her: "Hazel, no! That's a million-dollar account!" "Oopsie! My bad!" She giggled, then her hand holding the cup gave a little tremor, and the whole drink splashed right onto the power switch. Sparks flew. The lights died. Twenty computers crashed simultaneously. The entire office sat in stunned, furious silence. I grabbed the nearest intern and asked who hired her. He whispered back in terror: "That's Mrs. Henderson—the CEO's wife. Word is she actually owns this company." Mr. Henderson? I speed-dialed Dad right there: "Dad, forget the inspection. Get the divorce papers ready. Jayden and I have a bone to pick."

I gave Julian Kane everything: my family’s connections, my clients, my lawyers, my money, and even the Manhattan office his company called home. For five years, I let him build his empire on my back. Then his new intern accused me of skipping work and stealing company money. She wanted my title, my clients, my office, and the black card that opened the most powerful doors in New York. Julian knew the truth, but he still let the whole company shame me. So I handed over the card. They thought I was finished, but they forgot one thing: the card was mine, the building was mine, the clients were mine, and the name they mocked was Moretti. If they wanted to call me a thief, I would show them exactly what they had stolen. If they wanted to drag me into the spotlight, I would let the whole city watch them fall. I didn’t come back to beg. I came back to collect.

Our company was having a team building event in the Huka Islands, where every employee would get their own room. As I prepared to check in, my colleague from the same department, Yvonne Caruso, suddenly snatched my ID from my hand. "The rooms are full. The rest of you should find another hotel." I did not say anything much but took my ID back to hand it to the employee working behind the front desk. "One room, please. Thank you." However, Yvonne pushed me away viciously and berated me, "I told you to get lost. Are you deaf?!" I was not prepared for it, and I hit the corner of the front desk hard. I felt a sharp pain in my waist and immediately lost my temper. Yvonne was infuriated when I pushed her back, and she roared at me, "How dare you push me! My dad is the real boss behind this company. He's the Don of the Carusos. Cross me and you won't even see it coming when you die!" I was taken aback and broke out with laughter a second later. The Don of the Carusos, Ian Caruso, was my father. Why did I have no idea that he had another daughter apart from me?

As the family's Chief Counsel, I busted my ass for four years. When the family's new rackets launched, my promised twenty-five percent cut was slashed to three. Christian, the Don, patted my shoulder. "It's all for the family." I didn't cause a scene. From the next day on, I clocked in on time, clocked out on time, and refused to do a single thing outside my contract. Two weeks later, the family's core rackets ground to a halt. Our partners threatened a turf war. Christian cornered me at my desk. His eyes were bloodshot. "Vittoria, what exactly do you want?" I glanced at my watch. It was five thirty. "Christian, I'm off the clock."

At Cross Meridian’s pre-closing celebration, Mia Foster, an investment manager who had joined the company three months earlier, took the stage and announced that she was about to expose its biggest fraud. Photographs filled the screen behind her. There I was playing golf during office hours, drinking champagne on a private yacht, and attending a jewelry launch while the deal team worked through the night. Then came my attendance record. Twenty-three days in six months. Yet my name stood at the top of the financing round’s contribution report. “Seventy-eight employees have worked themselves into the ground, but she gets the credit because she’s the CEO’s fiancée,” Mia said. “Why should a corporate parasite who does nothing but party rank first?” Employees began applauding after glancing at Adrian Cross, our CEO and my fiancé. Mia ripped the access card from my neck and dropped it into a champagne bucket. “Admit that you stole the team’s credit and resign, or I’ll make sure all of Chicago knows how you earned that position.” What she didn’t know was that every photograph documented a negotiation behind the deal. The golf meeting expanded our credit line. The yacht meeting kept a major partner from leaving. The jewelry launch brought in our lead investor. She also didn’t know Bellini was my mother’s last name. In Chicago, I had another one. Moretti. But Mia wasn’t the person who disappointed me most. Adrian studied the cropped photographs and my access card floating in the ice water. He knew exactly what those meetings had accomplished. Still, he didn’t defend me. “Elena, do you really have to steal Mia’s credit tonight?”

Last Christmas—in my past life—I was on vacation when the call came. It was Lucy, the family’s new pet capo, and she was in a panic. She’d blown the deal with the Colombians, she said, and now they were threatening to make us pay. I had to rush back and clean up the mess. I saved the deal, but it still cost us a shipment of hardware. And then Lucy, the one who caused the whole mess, pointed the finger straight at me. “It was Madeline! She gave me bad intel! She must’ve set me up!” The truth? The deal went south because she mouthed off to the Colombians and pissed them off. But Henry, the Godfather I’d served loyally for years, didn't want to hear my side. He just branded me a traitor. He kicked me out of the family and put the word out to every outfit that I was a rat. I had a price on my head. I died in some gutter, my body left for the dogs. When I opened my eyes again, it was just before that Christmas. This time, I walked straight into Henry's study and handed over my family signet. "I want out." This time, I can’t wait to see who’s left holding the bag with the pissed-off Colombians.

Six months later, Carlo, who once terrorized Port San Vito and forced us to pay protection money, knelt in the muddy water and blocked my path. Red-eyed, he begged me to bring the Moretti convoys back. "Ms. Moretti, if you come back, there'll be no protection money and no parking fees... I'll even pay you." I regarded him coldly and remembered how, six months earlier, he had flicked ash onto my financial statements and looked down at me as he said, "Pay, or get out of Port San Vito."

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.

As the Donna of the Moretti Family, I paid out of my own pocket to build a high-security school for the children of our fallen members. But the widows repaid me by dragging my name through the media. Worse, they leaked the locations of three safe houses, dealing the Family a devastating blow. They claimed the school was never a benefit at all, but a “hostage camp” where I kept their children to force them to remain loyal to the Family. While Don Lorenzo Moretti was away, they even filed an impeachment motion with the Family Council, demanding that I shut down the school and hand its operating funds directly to them. Fine. I signed the closure order that very day. But the moment the notice went out, the widows swarmed the estate gates, crying and begging me to reopen the school. Only then did they understand— What waited for their children beyond the school gates was never freedom. It was a rival Family’s hit list.

It was three days before the Turner family council announced its list of new members. I'd taken my boyfriend Colton Pierce's paperwork to three different crews for signatures, and his application was finally ready. Every application to the council needed signatures from three capos. The council made the family's biggest decisions. Its members could even decide who got to run a crew. Colton and I had spent six months preparing to join the council. But when I finished work that night, the application on the table was soaked in red wine, and the signatures had been deliberately rubbed away. The signatures were completely illegible. Before I could say anything, Colton's adoptive sister, Beth Pierce, walked over with the wine bottle in her hand, her eyes red. "I didn't mean to, Monica. I accidentally spilled red wine on your application." Colton lit a cigar and said flatly, "Don't scare Beth. She scares easily. Just submit a new application next year." "This is an application to the Turner family council!" I said. "I know. Didn't I just tell you? Resubmit next year. What else do you want? Beth's crying. Are you going to hound her to death over something this small? Stop making a scene." A knot tightened in my chest. Looking at the ruined application on the table, I didn't say anything. My application had already been submitted. This one was Colton's. I wondered how he'd react when he found out it was his future Beth had ruined.

On our seventh wedding anniversary, my husband—Don Enzo Cavina—suddenly put a motion before the family council: The Donna would be barred from taking part in family affairs. “One vote in favor.” “Two.” “Three.” The motion passed unanimously. Being forced off the council just as I completed seven years meant the family no longer had to honor its promise to grant me the twenty-percent stake that was about to vest. I had been reduced to nothing more than an appendage to the Don. My fingertips turned cold, but my gaze remained steady as it swept over every face around the long table. “Why?” Jack was the first to stand. “You’re nothing but an outsider who married into this family, yet you’ve controlled the port, the banks, and the union for seven years. Who knows how much you’ve skimmed for yourself?” James sneered. “If we let you take twenty percent, sooner or later, the Cavina family will become the Medici family.” I turned to my husband, Don Enzo, seated at the head of the table. “Is that really what you think?” Enzo came to me and pulled me into his arms. “You’ve given seven years of your life to this family. I just can’t bear to watch the council drain you any longer.” “You won’t have to sit through these pointless meetings anymore. But you will always be my wife.” Without a seat on the council, I had no say in any decision. But the Cavinas couldn’t manage their dealings with the Five Families without me. So that was it. They still expected me to bear every risk—they just didn’t want to give me the share I had earned. I smiled, slipped off my wedding ring and family badge, and slapped them both onto the long table. Three days later, Enzo came to me with every elder who had voted for the motion. Together, they knelt before me, begging the “outsider who did nothing but steal everyone else’s credit” to come back and save them.

At a family dinner, Don Vincenzo’s new pet, a dancer named Ava, came for me. She puffed out her chest and slammed a ledger on the long table. “Vincenzo, I accuse her! Skimming from the family business, our club ‘The Siren’s Song.’ Betraying the family!” Every eye in the room turned on me, sharp as knives. But Vincenzo, my boss… his face went hard. I almost pitied the little dancer who’d crawled her way out of Brooklyn. The “family business” she was talking about? It was my private club. A gift from my father. I just lent it to Vincenzo when he was starting out, to give him a respectable front. I lent it to him for two years, and now it’s family property?

My father started out hauling cargo on the docks. By the end, he'd carved out seven city blocks, three harbor warehouses, and two casinos along the East Coast. I was six when he died. His will was a single line: “The family belongs to Luca. Let them choose who runs it.” The Family Council appointed Isabella Conti, my father's most trusted lieutenant, to run the family in my place. Isabella was good at it. She pulled the Vitale name back from the edge of ruin and made it the most respectable crime family on the East Coast. And me? I only came back to the estate for two weeks each summer, to soak up the sun, drink red wine, and do absolutely nothing. Then Isabella married an outsider named Riccardo Falco. On their wedding day, he cut off my access to the estate. “We're turning this place into a reception hall. Find yourself somewhere else to live.” After that, he set up a holding company in my name, with Isabella running it. Last night, in front of everyone, he had the nerve to say, “Luca, you're not a kid anymore. Time to learn to stand on your own two feet.” “Your distributions are over. From now on, you get three thousand dollars a month.” “Learn to manage your money. Stop wasting it.” Isabella raised her glass and nodded. “Riccardo's only looking out for you.” I looked at them and almost laughed. Three million dollars a month in payouts, slashed to three thousand? All thirty-seven of the family's businesses ultimately belonged to me.

On the National Working Women's Day, the company gave perfume to every female employee as a gift, except me. Just as I was about to ask HR, I overheard my colleagues whispering in the breakroom. "After all, Gianna is the CTO. Isn't it a bit too obvious to leave her out so publicly?" "That’s Mr. Caro's order. We’re just following it." "Who doesn't know Serena is Mr. Caro's real love? But Gianna shamelessly spends half her day running into his office!" I froze in place. Married for three years, I accompany Matthias Caro in building this company from the ground up. To avoid office gossip, I never asked him to make our relationship public over those these years. In return, when my colleagues maliciously speculated about me, I got his indifferent, evasive silence and his blatant favoritism toward an intern. Taking a deep breath, I picked up my phone and dialed the number of my father, who was the most feared Mafia Don of the East Coast. "Father, I plan to return to the family." "And... please change the company's bidding slot to someone else." For three years, to protect Matthias's pride, I hid my identity as the Mafia Princess, leveraged my network and technology to bring hundreds of millions of dollars into his company, and even secured a spot in this bid. But now, I’m taking it all back.