Mafia Family Emotions Short Stories & Novels

After my adopted sister, Bella, borrowed my phone, she forgot to log out of our family's secure channel. I was about to log her out when an encrypted group chat message popped up at the top of the screen. "To celebrate Enzo, the Moretti heir, handling his first piece of business for the family, we're having dinner at the private club tonight." I tapped on it without a second thought. The member list in the channel was painfully clear, showing only four avatars: my father, my mother, my brother, and Bella. My brother, Enzo, replied a moment later, "Just the four of us. Don't call Aurora." "If she comes, she'll just find another excuse to bully Bella." I stared at the words, frozen. It dawned on me then. In this family, I had been the outsider all along.

Tonight Daddy said he was going out with Auntie Benita, and Mommy didn’t fight him about it. She had a handkerchief balled up in her hand, soaked through with the blood she kept coughing up. I knew Mommy was going to heaven soon. That was how Grandpa told me it would be, back when Grandma coughed up blood like this. Daddy looked at Mommy, narrowed his eyes, and his voice went cold. “Isa needs a whole family. A smart woman learns to look the other way.” Mommy didn’t shield me and argue back the way she used to. She just said, softly, “Fine. I’ll charge by the visit. Every night you spend with her is one million.” Daddy laughed and wired her the money. After that night, Daddy went out a lot, and every time, Mommy reminded him to send the money. Mommy got so thin that her cheeks caved in, but her eyes were still bright. She took me lots of places, introduced me to lots of people, and made me write my own name over and over. She said she was going to leave everything to me. I held her tight. “I don’t want your things, Mommy. I just want you.”

In my past life, Killian cut off all his mistresses and spoiled me rotten, doing everything to win my hand in marriage. But the day before our wedding, I overheard him boasting to his friends. "Killian, that orphan girl you supported is still clinging to you. She's younger and prettier than your fiancée. Are you really not tempted?" Killian curled his lip in disdain, "What is she even? She isn't even fit to lick my wife's toes. Tell her to get lost." His words sent a rush of euphoria through me. He had told me himself that financing Vivienne Moore was merely a strategic move to bolster my charity foundation. At that moment, I truly believed I had found my happily ever after. But on the wedding day, the orphan girl drove her car straight into me. She sobbed and pulled out a terminal diagnosis. "Killian, I don't have much time left. I beg you. Don't abandon me, please!" I got injured in a collision and pleaded with Killian to take me to the hospital first, but he scooped her up in his arms without a second glance. "Sierra, I need to take Vivienne abroad for medical treatment. If I were her husband, it would be way easier for me to get stuff done. We have to get a divorce first. I’m sorry.” I stared at him, my eyes widening in sheer shock. He kept going, his voice stead, “I promise I'll come back and marry you in five years. Just wait for me.” Five years turned into ten, and I waited for him in vain, nothing more than a fool. It wasn't until I was on my deathbed that I received his letter, "I'm sorry, Sierra. I'll marry you in the next life." I tore the letter to shreds and died of sheer rage. Yet, when I opened my eyes again, I was back on my wedding day. I calmly gazed after Killian as they faded into the throng. Then, without hesitation, I turned around and boarded a plane to Switzerland.

On the day I signed the divorce papers, I was ordered to leave with nothing. When I walked out of the Crane estate, I had twenty-six dollars in my wallet and nowhere safe to go. My phone was nearly dead when a message from an old classmate appeared on the screen, linking to a discreet placement notice. 【Seeking a live-in maternal figure for three children. Room, board, salary, and protection provided.】 I stopped at the word protection. A roof, a meal, and a place the Cranes could not reach me were already more than I had that night. The address led me to the iron gates of an old mansion on Chicago’s Gold Coast. Only after the butler opened the door did I learn who had placed the notice. Dante Bellandi. The Don of Chicago’s oldest Italian crime family. I had only wanted a place to stay. Somehow, I became the legal mother of the three Bellandi children and the contract wife of Dante Bellandi himself. Later, my ex-husband, Sebastian Crane, stood before me with the same careless arrogance and asked, “Do you realize you were wrong now?” Before I could answer, the triplets stepped in front of me. Little Livia clung to my leg, her eyes red. “My mom wasn’t wrong!” Her two brothers stood on either side of her, staring Sebastian down. Dante placed one hand at my waist, his voice calm enough to make the air turn cold. “Mr. Crane, my wife owes no explanation to a man who lost the right to speak to her.”

"Your love makes me sick." Those were the final words my husband, Vittorio De Luca, left me in my past life. On our wedding day, Elara Hale had crashed my ceremony, begging Vittorio to run away with her. But he chose to stay by my side. Yet, when Elara died of an illness shortly after, he harbored nothing but hatred for me. He detested that I had clung to him for over a decade, forcing him into a marriage he never wanted. More than that, he loathed himself for not running away with Elara. When I opened my eyes again, I was reborn before everything went wrong. I looked at him, "Vittorio, I'm getting married." He looked a bit troubled. "You know I’m busy with a critical territorial expansion. My mind is entirely elsewhere…" “Never mind.” I offered a faint, indifferent smile. Relieved, Vittorio leaned in and pressed a kiss to my forehead. "Don't worry. We've been together for twelve years. I'll do the right thing and take responsibility." He didn’t know what I meant, but I knew what I’d do in this lifetime. I would never choose him again, let alone marry him.

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.

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.

Through seven years of secret marriage, I was nothing more than an obedient, tirelessly devoted assistant to Don Nathan Harrison. He walked the red carpet at high-profile galas with Susan Ferell, his business partner’s daughter. He booked an entire castle just to host an exclusive rose-themed banquet for her and spent millions at an auction to buy her a crown-jewel diamond necklace once owned by royalty. Their names dominated the headlines daily, dubbed by the Siciamira media as the ultimate power couple of high society. For the first time, I didn't make a scene or shed a single tear. Even when I found that royal diamond necklace intended for Susan tucked away in Nathan’s suit pocket, I simply pulled it out and quietly set it on the vanity. Nathan convinced himself that I had finally grown sensible and understood the overwhelming sacrifices he was making for our future. What he didn't know was that the world's top global syndicate had just tracked me down, crowning me as the sole heir to a century-old empire. And the signed divorce papers were already stamped, processed, and on their way from the courthouse straight to his front door.

In my first life, I pulled Dante Romano from the Hudson. My father rewarded me with a slap. Carlo said no respectable man would marry a Bellini daughter found soaked beside a stranger after midnight. When the Romano family came looking for Dante’s rescuer, he locked me away and presented my half sister, Bianca, in my place. Bianca took Dante’s gratitude. Carlo sold me into a brutal marriage. When I threatened to expose them, Bianca poisoned me. I woke beside the Hudson on the same winter night. This time, I saved Dante and took the obsidian crest from his neck. Carlo still silenced me. Bianca still drugged me and stole the crest. By the next afternoon, she had my proof, my father’s oath, and every Bellini guard behind her. She thought history was repeating itself. She was wrong. The crest wasn’t the only thing I had brought back from the Hudson. And when Dante discovered the rest, Bianca and Carlo would lose everything.

My husband Julian Mercer had been gone from Seattle for nearly a year, following his ex-girlfriend and first love's family across Europe while her father was treated. When he came back, he made me breakfast, waited for me after work, showed off our relationship in public, and took care of everything, as though nothing had happened. But I kept pulling away. Friends asked why I wouldn't give us another chance. For me, love had no room for cracks. During the days when his indecision left me neglected and hurt, what we had between us had already begun to fade. What no one else knew was that we'd had a child. When my accident happened, he was still busy taking care of his ex. I lost the baby. But when I set the divorce papers in front of him, he fought to keep me like a man losing his mind.

My boyfriend had a border collie named Milo that he treated like his own child. No matter how broke we were, Milo never went without. We waited outside the warehouse club for its 10 p.m. bread markdowns, then bought Milo fresh seafood flown in that morning. We worked until conjunctivitis left our eyes bloodshot and still didn't dare take a day off, all so we could send Milo to a summer camp that cost more than three thousand dollars. I always thought Lucian simply loved animals too much, that people could tough it out but Milo shouldn't have to suffer. Until the Calloway heir threw a lavish banquet in the north end of town for his beloved pet's birthday. I snuck in hoping to take home some food for Milo, only to discover that the host was my boyfriend, Lucian Calloway, and the birthday pet was Milo. A single napkin at their table was worth more than my entire year's salary. A guest tossing off a casual compliment about how silky the coat looked walked away with a generous reward. That was when it hit me: with a snap of his fingers, Lucian could have paid to treat the stomach and eye problems I'd developed from overwork. And there I was, the fool who'd hidden my medical reports to save money, gutting it out year after year. Maybe in his mind, spending money on strangers and the dog was a better investment than spending it on me. So it was time for me to leave. I pulled out my phone and dialed a number I hadn't called in a long time. "The marriage alliance with the Bennetts. I accept."

After class, my half sister sent a driver to pick me up for the family dinner. But he parked outside the estate of the Besa family, the most dangerous mafia clan in England. My half sister, Sophie Hawthorne, was practically dripping with smugness on the other end. "Got you! The driver's gone. Let's see how you get out of this one!" I stood frozen. My father sighed on the other end of the line. "You fell for a trick that simple? You're a disgrace to the Hawthorne blood in your veins!" My stepmother laughed. "How can you be this stupid? Find your own way out. We have a dinner to attend." Shaking with fear, I sank to the ground and, with my last shred of hope, called my fiance, Ethan Mercer. The call connected, but it was Sophie's voice that answered. "Iris, Mom and Dad said you have to come back on your own. No cheating!" Ethan took the phone. His tone was breezy. "Come on. Don't disappoint your sister after all the thought she put into this. Good luck." The line went dead. Before, I would have cried and called them over and over until someone agreed to come get me. But this time, staring at the forest stretching endlessly before me, I was just tired. Sophie loved her pranks, and the whole family played along. Last year, she kissed my fiance in front of everyone at my engagement party. Last month, she swapped my heart medication for sugar pills and landed me in the ICU. This time, they all knew the Besa family' reputation for cruelty, yet they still helped her dump me on their doorstep. I spotted the red glow of a surveillance camera in the distance. I knew there was no escaping. I wiped my tears and stood up. I walked toward the Besa estate. If my own family wouldn't have me, I would find one that would.

The year my daughter was born, I buried my identity as the queen of the Italian Mafia, stepped into the legitimate business world, and gave Emily the safe, ordinary childhood I had never been able to have. Along the way, I took in four boys who had nowhere else to go. I raised Jack, Alex, Daniel, and Ryan as my own sons. I gave them my home, my name, my connections, and eventually enough authority to become the four most powerful men inside Carter Group. Senior executives praised them constantly, calling them the future of the company. Even I thought their growing confidence was a good thing. After all, I had planned to give them far more than Carter Group someday. Then my daughter called me from a locked school bathroom. The four sons I had raised were standing outside, defending another girl while Emily cried for help. They told me Emily was spoiled. That she had grown too used to getting everything simply because she was my daughter. That sometimes, she needed to learn that not everything bearing the Carter name automatically belonged to her. At first, I thought they were only trying to teach their sister a lesson. Then I realized they had started making those decisions everywhere. Who deserved the house. Who deserved the opportunities. Who controlled the company. Even the security guards wearing my family name told me they took orders from my sons now. That was when I understood. They thought they had finally outgrown the woman who raised them. I smiled. Because Carter Group was only the life I had built after I gave up my real throne.

I was Liliana Moretti, daughter of one of Black Harbor's mafia families. I had always been gentle, soft-spoken, and afraid of almost everything. I would not even touch a gun. My sister was the exact opposite. Alessandra Moretti was everything I wasn't—smart, capable, bloodthirsty, and ruthless. Once she drew a gun, she never missed. Every mafia family in Black Harbor feared Alessandra. At 22, she took 12 men and seized back Pier Seven, a territory half the city had been fighting over. Three years later, our family's territory had doubled. Even our father knew when to shut up around her. One look from Alessandra was enough. Then she died. Four years later, my father's illegitimate daughter, Gianna Russo, moved into Alessandra's rooms and began taking what was mine. My two daughters had been killed. My father was already forcing me to give up my charity fund, my seat on the family council, and the east-wing suite. My husband, Vincent Bellini, didn't care. There was nothing left for me in that house. Alessandra's portrait was gone from the wall. Gianna sat in her chair, dressed in my daughters' favorite color. Tomorrow, she would officially become a Moretti. My father wanted everything I owned. My brother, Luca Moretti, accused me of betraying the peace Alessandra had died for. And when I finally found evidence about my daughters' deaths, Vincent looked at it and put my phone away. When I had lost all hope, Alessandra came back.

Because my little sister Sofia loved playing games of chance, everything in our family was decided by drawing lots. Dinner. School events. New clothes. Even Mom and Dad’s hugs and kisses. Mother kept colored wooden sticks inside a small box. Draw gold, and you won. Draw black, and Sofia got whatever we were competing for. For ten years, I drew black every single time. Mother said she created the game to treat us equally. Whenever I cried or said it wasn’t fair, she told me to stop blaming everyone else for my bad luck. So I practiced every night, shaking the box and listening to the sticks move inside, convinced that one day I would finally draw gold and earn my parents’ love. I never did. On my thirteenth birthday, Sofia wanted the whole family to go to an amusement park. Terrified they would leave me behind again, I secretly painted one of the black sticks gold. Mother caught me. She slapped me, called me a cheat, and left with Sofia. I fell, and one of the wooden sticks pierced my throat. I’m sorry, Mom. If there’s a next life, I’ll try harder to draw the gold stick.

When an attacker threw acid at my face, Mom was attending my cousin Celeste's family induction ceremony. But that day was my eighteenth birthday too. As I lay dying, I used the last of my strength to send her a voice message. [Mom, help me... I'm on the West Side. Someone is trying to kill me.] Her reply came almost immediately. [Stop using these tricks to compete with Celeste for attention, Emilia. I know exactly what you're like.] That same night, the Don summoned Mom back to the Romano estate to investigate an unidentified body found on family territory. The victim's face had been destroyed. Chemicals had eaten away the fingerprints on both hands. Mom led the security team through three days and nights of investigation. From the evidence, she concluded that the victim had been tortured for hours and had died fighting, terrified and utterly without hope. She cursed the killer's cruelty and swore she would make him pay. But she never recognized the body lying in front of her as the biological daughter she hated to mention. Me.

Back home in Sicily, every daughter of a Don had to follow one rule before marriage: Her fiancé had to enter the Moretti estate’s underground family chapel and undergo one final loyalty test. If he came out still willing to go through with the wedding, it meant the marriage had earned the Family’s approval. Both of my younger sisters married the men they loved at twenty, after their fiancés passed the ritual without incident. But I was already thirty, and I had never married. Because over the years, every man who claimed to love me would follow my father into that underground chapel. The moment he came out, he would break up with me. Some looked at me with disgust. Some hated me. One even pulled a gun on me the moment he stepped out of the chapel. I asked my father countless times what was inside. He would only tell me that it was a loyalty test every man who wished to marry a Don’s daughter had to pass. Then my new boyfriend went in. An hour later, he came charging out, slammed me to the ground, and wrapped both hands around my throat. His eyes held nothing but fear and hatred. Just before I lost consciousness, I heard him roar at my father, “Why didn’t you tell me sooner what she really is?”