Married to the mafia boss Series

Arabella

My father was born in Sicily, Italy to the biggest mob boss in the city of Palermo. His father was Don of La Cosa Nostra-The Sicilian Mafia. He ran a large crime syndicate with drugs, guns, and prostitutes. He was the most feared man in all of Sicily.

Is. Is the most feared man in Sicily.

My grandfather is still alive and Lazzaro is working under him in Sicily. My grandfather had two sons, Lorenzo and Francesco-my father. When the brothers were old enough, they set sail for the United States to expand their crime ring. Lorenzo took over Chicago and my father was Consigliere at his side.

I met my grandfather a handful of times, he isn’t the sweet old man to give you presents and kisses on the cheek. He is strict in every way possible. He, like all of the mafiosi, follow a code of conduct. The code of conduct is loyalty and you swear your entire life to La Cosa Nostra. My grandfather claimed sovereignty in his territory and fought off rival families. The Moretti family has been ruling over Palermo, Sicily since my grandfather was in his late twenties.

He came to America on a few occasions, he only spoke to us in Italian even though he did speak English. He wanted us to speak in the tongue of where our family is from. We learned Italian from a young age through tutors and our family spoke it fluently so he frequently talked to us in his native language.

I have always admired the language and found it breathtakingly beautiful, but when my grandfather speaks it, it sounds harsh and gives me goosebumps. The last time he visited Chicago was Lazzaro’s high school graduation, Nonno told my father he was thinking of Lazzaro taking over and wanted him to come back with him to Italy immediately.

Lazzaro was overjoyed at that. He couldn’t wait to leave the household. Father was proud of Lazzaro and felt radiating pride for his son-Future Don of La Cosa Nostra. My father was most proud of me when I married the Don of Boston. Now the only emotion lingering inside of him is disappointment in me.

Nonno’s favorite was always Lazzaro from the beginning. He was always the strongest, wisest, and most cunning of us all. Since his other pride-and-joy grandson was already taking after Lorenzo and becoming Don of Chicago, Nonno saw Lazzaro fit to run the crime syndicate in our home country.

This morning my mother invited me over for breakfast, what I thought would be pleasant, easily turned into a disaster.

Walking through the front door of my parents large mansion in the outskirts of Chicago with Carmelo at my side, I froze. Standing in the foyer is my father and Leonardo-my old bodyguard.

I am stuck in the threshold of the doorway shaking and terrified. I can’t move, can’t speak, can’t even run away. I stare straight ahead at the man who had molested me years ago.

Leonardo must be in is forties now, his hair is salt and pepper and his blue eyes are icy cold. He’s a big man, but Carmelo is taller and broader. His smile curls into something insidious and my body breaks out into a shiver.

“Arabella,” my father greets simply. “Don’t just stand there. You’re letting a draft in. Come inside,” he motions for me to take a step into the house of my childhood.

Carmelo places his hand on my back and gives me a little push so the maids are able to shut the door behind me. “W-w-what’s going on?”

“Your mother has been worried about you and she doesn’t know Carmelo well enough, so she figured a second bodyguard-who we trust-should look after you.”

“I don’t need a second bodyguard,” my heart beats fast out of my chest. I feel as though I’m going to faint or explode.

“Nonsense,” he waves his hand dismissively. “Leonardo will be assigned to you until you can find yourself another husband to take care of you. That is if anyone will want to marry you,” he begins to mutter to himself, “Two failed marriages. It’s going to take a lot of convincing to get a man of worth to take your hand.”

The hand on my back tenses as Carmelo goes stiff with rage beside me.

“Please, Papa. I don’t need another bodyguard. Carmelo is the best, just ask Antonio!”

“Arabella, what did I tell you about talking back to me?” His voice raises. “You don’t do it. Now, pull yourself together, get your damn emotions in check, and go meet your mother in the kitchen. She’s been waiting for you.”

I open my mouth to argue back, but the look in my father’s eyes tells me it’s best not to anger him further. Maybe I can somehow convince my mother that I don’t need an extra bodyguard.

Carmelo stays beside me as we stride through the massive house and into the back where the dining room is. Mother is waiting at the long wooden table, there are flowers in a vase in the middle of the table and the good china is set out for morning breakfast. The cooks are bringing in food that smells divine-eggs, bacon, fresh rolls, pancakes, fruit-literally every breakfast food imaginable.NôvelD(ram)a.ôrg owns this content.

My mouth waters and I’m glad for my empty stomach because I plan on having every piece of food. I know my mother will scold me and tell me to only eat small healthy portions to watch my figure, but I couldn’t care less.

I’ll never be stick skinny or the short petite I know some men are wildly attracted to. I have long legs and curves and Vinny always enjoyed my above-average sized breasts and ass. I’ve never been self-conscience about my body. I refuse to let others make me think less of my weight or shape just because it isn’t up to their standards.

“Arabella, darling!” My mother smooths out the nonexistent wrinkles in her pale yellow dress and fixes her hair. “You look pale, are you tired? Are you getting enough sleep? My poor baby, you’ve probably been terrified since the break-in.”

I sigh. “Mama, I’m fine. And you really didn’t need to assign Leonardo back to being my bodyguard. I have Carmelo now,” I point over to Carmelo leaning against the threshold with his arms crossed.

Carmelo always wore a black suit when going out. Although I enjoyed the casual wear he wore when we lived in Antonio’s penthouse, the dark washed jeans and tight crew neck T-shirt that makes his biceps bulge. When he wears his dark suit and shades that makes him look like a bodyguard from the secret service, I drool. I want to grab his tie and yank his lips down to mine. He radiates sex and my body heats up instantly. He’s a great lay. Better than great actually.

“This is just to be sure, Bella. I want you safe,” she walks over and places her hands on my shoulders.

“I am safe. Carmelo is the best, just ask Tony!” I whine.

“No more arguing. Now, let’s enjoy breakfast,” she takes her seat at the opposite end of the table. Her usual spot across from my father’s usual spot at the head of the table.

My mother has always played her part well. Her and my father don’t love each other, but to most you’d think so. In public they hold hands, smile at each other, and play pretend that everything is okay. At home it was always them screaming. Papa having affairs and Mama spending his money on whatever she wanted to make herself look at feel better.

Her hair, a naturally dark brown color, is now dyed blonde by the salon she goes to frequently. There, she also gets her nails done, long, acrylic, and pink. Her B-sized chest now a double-D. Her face-lifted. Her high heels making her six feet and her lips injected to have a more full look. Everything about her is fake. Every year there’s something different, last I heard she is meeting with her plastic surgeon to plan a rhinoplasty.

As my sister, Christina, and I got older, the more she started to go crazy. She couldn’t stand the thought of not being young anymore. It was hard for her to look at Christina and I as we entered our twenties, she envied us and wished she could go back to her prime. I’ve seen old photos of my mother and she was beautiful, she could still be beautiful if she let herself be natural. She always had thick, dark, curly hair and olive-toned skin that was the natural pigment of her skin and not from the tanning booths. She is now in her mid-forties and she despises it. Whenever her birthday comes up she refuses to celebrate, refuses to utter a word about her age or birth year.

My mother has never been happy in her arranged marriage but she doesn’t care as long as she has money. She was never present in my childhood, she always had Leonardo looking after me. She never even bothered to open her eyes wide enough to realize what was really going on.

Nico was the only one who seemed to notice when I began acting strange. My bubbly personality faltered and I hated the thought of being touched. The maids found bloody razors in my bathroom, if they told anyone it never showed because no one asked about the scars on my wrists. For years I wanted my family to see them and ask, but just before my marriage to Vinny I began wearing bracelets to cover them. I never took the bracelets off-so no one ever noticed.

My mother is a selfish woman. She may act like she cares about my happiness but the only thing she cares about is her beauty, and money.

“Do you like it?” My mother calls, startling me out of my train of thought. “I got the pastries at the bakery the D’Angelo’s own.”

I nod my head. “Yes, they’re delicious.”

“Now, don’t eat too many of them. You don’t want to gain too much weight, you know your father and I are still looking for another suitor for you.”

I pinch the bridge of my nose. Not this again.

“We need you looking as pretty and slim as possible. Everyone clearly knows you’re no longer a virgin, so your looks and obedience will just have to make up for it. You know, your father might have to pay a large sum to a family just for them to even consider you,” she chides, “Some or the families think you’re cursed with Vinny and Luca dying. I mean being a widow twice at age twenty-two-”

“I get it,” I slam my palms down on the table. I exhale deeply. “Sorry. I understand that it’ll be hard to find a third suitor for me. I know you and Papa really liked me being married to Luca, but he was abusive and corrupt-”

She rolls her eyes at that. “We will need to work on your submission and obedience, it seems I haven’t taught you well enough,” she sits up straight and clears her throat. “You are a man’s property once you are married. You give him whatever he desires, your body belongs to him and in exchange he will protect you, give your children, and take care of you financially. Understand?”

Without answering, I take a bite of the cheese danish on my plate. I can’t believe her-well, I can, but I don’t want to believe how insensitive and insufferable she can be. I’ve been jealous of my siblings moving away, they don’t have to deal with her meddling anymore. No, I’m the one she focuses all of her time on. She thinks she is fixing my life. She clings to me and treats me like I’m still a child-probably to make herself feel younger. She tries to control my life. When things don’t go as planned, she puts me down and brags about how successful all my other siblings are.

My father and Leonardo walk into the dining room wearing their usual cold, emotionless expressions. Leonardo’s eyes meet mine and I begin to tremble with fear. I can’t go through this again.

I won’t. I can’t.

“Your father and I going out,” my mother stands dabbing her mouth carefully with a cloth napkin. “I’m going to feel much better now that Leonardo is going to be staying with you.”

My palms are sweaty and my voice gets stuck in my throat. I have to clear it before saying, “Did you talk to Rocco about this? I don’t think it’s necessary to have Rocco, Carmelo, and Leonardo watching me. Can’t you put him to better use?”

“You will be respectful and grateful that we are willing to give you one of our best soldiers to protect you. Now, say goodbye to your mother, we’re leaving.”

“But I’ve barely finished my breakfast,” I mumble looking down at my unfinished plate.

“Fine, stay and finish. Carmelo, go tell the servants to pull the car around for our daughter.” With that he puts his hand on my mother’s lower back and escorts her out.

I’m left alone in the dining room with Leonardo. I can feel his presence behind me and I try to focus all my attention on my food, but I suddenly find I’m no longer hungry.

“There is another way you can put me to better use,” I feel his hot breath by my ear.

I jump and immediately stand from my chair backing away from him. “I don’t need you as my bodyguard. You can stay right here where you belong. I don’t need you following me home. You’re not welcome.”

“Bella,” he gives me a cruel smile. “Don’t you remember how much fun we used to have together. All those late nights we spent in your bed?”

“I never invited you into my bed. I was just a child.”

“You were a teenager,” he shrugs.

I give him a disgusted scoff. “It was molestation and if my father ever found out, he’d kill you.”

“But no one ever found out and you never told anyone. Surely if you wanted it to stop you would’ve told someone. I know you liked it. You loved what I did to you and that’s why you never told on me. You never wanted it to stop.”

I fight back tears in my eyes. “No, I did want it to stop! I never wanted it! Just stay the fuck away from me.”

He shakes his head. “You wouldn’t want to get me in trouble now. I have a job to do, and that job is you.”

“Well, you’re fired.”

“The car is out front,” Carmelo interrupts.

“Perfect,” I grab my purse and hold onto Carmelo’s bicep, dragging and rushing him along.

Leonardo trails behind us and I turn around violently to yell, “You are not welcome to come with us.”

“It is my job, Ms. Moretti,” he puts on a false charade in the presence of company. “Your father just wants what is best for you. It’s extra protection to keep you safe.”

“It wouldn’t hurt to have more eyes looking after you,” Carmelo gives me a brief soft smile.

I widen my eyes at his agreement. My eyes are screaming for him to protect me, to make Leonardo go away.

Leonardo sits up front with the driver while Carmelo takes the backseat beside me. I’m shaking so much that I have to sit on both of hands to make it non-apparent. I have the urge to cling to Carmelo, to slide into his strong arms and have him save me from this nightmare I’m reliving.

Tell someone, the little voice in my head rationalizes. Tell someone and this will go away. He will go away.

Rocco isn’t at the penthouse when we arrive. Leonardo looks around as if this is his new home, as if he’s already making himself comfortable. He settles into one of the guest rooms upstairs and I want to scream that he is too close to me. I want to cry out at how unfair it is that he will once again be sleeping under the same roof as me.

I’ve always considered myself strong for going through all that I have. When I married Vinny, I vowed to have a happy life. To no longer be a victim. I wasn’t going to be a victim of an arranged marriage, I was going to be happy and play pretend with my husband. I wasn’t going to play victim when Vinny died and I became a widow. I played the part of happy cousin when I met Liliana and helped her through her own troubles. Even when I was engaged to Luca and Lily was so worried about me. I never wanted to play the victim.

I know this life isn’t ideal, but it’s my life. I was born to the mafia and although I’m not a Man of Honor, I still follow the same code of conduct. The one that binds my life to the mafia. Our world comes first, the secrets of the mafia stay with me until the day I die, and I will be subservient to whichever husband comes next. I will do my duty.

Everyone knows me as Arabella, the cheerful, happy, unbothered-by-everything type of girl. While I can play that role really well and most of the time it isn’t faking, I can’t play it right now when the devil himself is so close to me. Living with Luca was bad enough, but in a way I accepted it because I was an adult and we were married. With Leonardo I was just a girl with no choice, no way to give consent even if I wanted to. My innocence was stripped from me. My bedroom at night which should’ve been a safe haven suddenly became the place and time of day I feared the most.

***

Rocco never returns home even when it’s well past midnight. Which isn’t uncommon, as Consigliere of the Outfit and Marco’s men still on the loose, he has his hands full. He’s probably still formulating plans or raids with Antonio now.

For a split second I think about calling Liliana and asking to stay with her. I know Carmelo and Leonardo will follow me there anyways and I would never allow Leonardo near my goddaughter. It isn’t safe anywhere, suddenly I’ve become one of those dogs in a psychology experiment I read about once in high school.

Learned helplessness. These dogs were put in these cages and shocked with no way out. At first they tried to escape but eventually they realized there was no way out and gave up. Thus, learned helplessness.

I can try to escape Leonardo but he will find me. With this new bodyguard excuse he has, he will follow me no matter where I go. There is no hiding. There is no help. There is no way out.

I watch television on the couch in the living room as late as I possibly can. I have Carmelo sit with me and put the blanket over us. I could sleep right here and feel secure all night, but there is an uneasiness in my stomach as Leonardo sits in the chair adjacent to the couch and stares at me. I can feel his burning gaze from my peripheral view. I try to ignore it but I can’t help the physiological response of my quickened heart rate, sweaty palms, and shaky breaths.

Much to my delight at around two in the morning Leonardo stands up and stretches, “I think I’m going to go to bed, you’ll watch her?” He raises an eyebrow at Carmelo.

Carmelo gives a curt nod. “Of course.”

Leonardo descends up the stairs and I fling myself on top of Carmelo. I hold his strong body close to mine and plant my face into the crook of his neck, inhaling the scent of Old Spice. I hold him tight fearing if I let go I’ll be taken away. He is my security. My safety.

“Arabella?” Carmelo whispers with concern.

“Take me upstairs. Take me upstairs and lock the door and never let me go,” I hold back a sob wanting to escape.

Carmelo doesn’t ask any further questions. He probably thinks I’m still rattled from the break-in. He carries me into my room and locks the door like I requested. He lays me on the bed but I still don’t let go of him. I pull him on top of my body and find comfort in the feel of his hard weight on me.

I kiss him with a fierceness that is destroying me inside out. Our tongues dance and mingle as we create our own new taste that is like the best dessert you can never get enough of. I arch my back and press my breasts against his chest. His large arms wrap around my body, holding me close to him. The kiss is shattering me, breaking down every wall, exposing every vulnerability.

Usually when I go to Carmelo it’s when I’m so horny out of my mind I can’t take it anymore. This is more than just wanting an itch scratched. It’s me missing what intimacy feels like, missing what it’s like to feel safe through the night.

I pull his shirt over his head and admire the bulk of muscles covered in black ink. My eyes glaze over when his lips suck on a sensitive area of my neck, causing my entire body to burst into flames. Lust is the only thing I can think about as we strip each other until we are both bare. Until both of our bodies are touching with no barrier between them. He keeps me warm and continues to add fuel to the fire.

When we are finished and well sated, we lay there together. I cuddle up to his side and rest my thigh over his. I put my palm directly on top of his heart feeling the steady beat there. I lay my head on his shoulder smelling him. I run my hands through his dark wavy hair that curls under his ears. I kiss his strong jawline and his grip on my ass tightens.

“Stay,” I mutter in a sleepy daze. “Don’t go.”

“I won’t,” he coos and pets my body. “I’ll protect you. Sleep.”

No longer able to fight the sandman, I fall into a deep dream-filled sleep.

***

I wake up with a pleasant soreness between my legs that reminds me exactly what Carmelo and I had done last night. I lift my head off his body to see him wide awake and staring at nothing. His fingertips trail mindlessly up and down my arm in a calming motion.

“You’re awake,” I state. “How long?”

“A couple hours now. I didn’t want to wake you. You looked so tired.”

As I sit up he moves to stretch out his body. He must be cramped from staying in that same position all night. He cracks his back and resumes his attention back to me. He crawls on top of me and stares into my eyes with his deep amber colored ones.

“Are you okay?”

It’s as if those three words were a command to make me cry. I’m not okay, but I know as long as Carmelo is here, things will be.

I nod biting my lip. “Don’t leave.”

“Why would I leave?” He smirks. “We haven’t had breakfast yet,” he moves lower down the bed and disappears under the covers until I can’t see him anymore.

I laugh. “What are you doi-oh,” I moan as his mouth kisses my most intimate area.

A knock of the door causes both of us to go deathly still. The doorknob giggles but doesn’t open. Thank God Carmelo locked it last night.

“Arabella?” Leonardo’s voice comes through. “Open the door. Are you alright in there?”

As if he really cares.

“I’m fine!” I yell back.

“Why is the door locked? It shouldn’t be locked.”

“I’m getting dressed. Go away!”

With that silence fills the room and Carmelo’s mouth continues to do wonders on my body that makes me explode into a million pieces, twice.

Carmelo and I exit my room looking slightly disheveled as we giggle like lovers. When we see Leonardo with his arms crossed waiting in the hallway our smiles falter into frowns.

Carmelo scratch’s the back of his neck and says, “I’m going to get some breakfast,” and rushes downstairs.

I want to scream at him to come back.

Leonardo raises an eyebrow and purses his lips. “You dirty little whore, I thought there was something between you two.”

I shake my head. “No. We’re just friends. I asked him to stay with me because I don’t like sleeping alone. I feel safer with someone else in the room.” Immediately I regret the words as they fall out of my mouth.

“Then I guess you won’t mind if it were my duty tonight. I’ll give Carmelo a break to sleep in his own bed and I’ll watch you sleep tonight.

“You’ll do no such thing,” I hiss. “Stay away from me.”

“I already was generous last night when I left you alone, but it seems you had someone else doing what I used to love to do to you.”

“N