Dying To Escape The Obsessive Mafia Don

I spent three excruciating years building an underworld empire for Cassius, only for him to give the ultimate symbol of his protection to a fragile girl named Serena on the very day he proposed to me.

My biological brother Julian, my protector Enzo, and my ally Lucian all followed suit, prioritizing Serena's fake tears over my life.

They forced me into a lethal bone marrow extraction to save her. When I welcomed the agony-using it to trigger my system's extraction protocol, my only way home to the real world-they violently aborted the procedure. They accused me of twisted manipulation and locked me in a high-security medical prison. There, they handed my care over to Serena, who tortured me in secret, calibrating my pain to hover just below the medical alarms.

"You will live," she whispered, "so that you may watch them choose me-until the act itself becomes a prayer."

I didn't understand. Why was my physical agony never enough to make them stop, yet a single tear from Serena became their absolute law? Why wouldn't they just let me die so I could go home?

Then I saw my real brother Arthur, exhausted by my hospital bed, through the system feed-and I realized I couldn't die. Not yet.

I wiped all emotion from my face and calmly signed the papers for their live public reconciliation broadcast.

Before I leave this world for good, I will tear Serena's perfect facade to pieces.

Chapter 1

Aria POV

As the West Coast's most formidable Don slipped a diamond circlet onto my finger, a voice like grinding gears whispered a sentence into the auditory device concealed beneath my hair:

"The target's allegiance has arrested at ninety-nine percent. You are ordered to initiate the lethal extraction protocol and return to your origin world, or forfeit the life of your brother." The voice was cold, clinical-but beneath its grinding cadence, I caught a frequency I'd heard only once before: the hum of the life-support machine in Arthur's hospital room, recorded and compressed into code.

I stared down at Cassius.

His knuckles told the whole story. Thickened, bone-white scar tissue. The kind you get from beating men to death with bare hands. And yet his hands were cradling mine like I was made of glass.

We stood on the manicured green of his legitimate baseball stadium, set perilously near the edge of the coastal cliffs. The ocean wind whipped my hair into a stinging veil across my face.

The Commission's mechanical voice echoed in my ear again.

"The infiltration mission has failed."

I refused to believe it.

Three years. Three excruciating years as the shadow architect for this man and his leviathan empire. Every sleepless night, every bloody ledger I balanced, every rival I helped him outmaneuver-it was all supposed to end here, with total allegiance.

The Commission spoke one last time.

"The failure is attributable to a single missing blossom."

I looked down at the roses in my arms. Ninety-eight white ones. Their thorns pricked my forearms through the paper wrappings, the weight forcing a curve into my spine. I had counted them myself.

Then I lifted my gaze past Cassius's broad shoulders.

Serena stood a few yards away, sequestered by his heavily armed soldiers. Pinned to the center of her white dress was a single red rose.

Not just any rose. The Family's heirloom rose.

In our world, that crimson bloom meant one thing: untouchable. The Don's absolute protection. His fortress.

And he had given it to her.

My sudden stillness drew his attention. Cassius followed my line of sight. For a fraction of a second, a vein pulsed at his temple before his expression went blank.

He rose from his knee and brushed a stray lock of hair behind my ear.

"I gave it to her to calm her nerves," he said, voice pitched low. Placating. "She had a violent panic attack after that cartel scare last week."

My throat felt lined with ground glass.

"Why did it have to be that specific rose?"

Cassius frowned. A shadow of impatience moved behind his eyes.

"Aria, I am giving you the marriage and the entire empire." He swept his arm toward the stadium. "You shouldn't fight Serena over a single flower when she has absolutely nothing else."

Ice water. That's what it felt like. A full bucket, dumped over my head, stealing the air from my lungs.

In that cold instant, I understood what ninety-nine percent meant.

Cassius operated on the logic that throwing money at a woman equaled love. He didn't understand the exclusionary nature of true fealty-the kind that leaves no room for another. He would always reserve that vital one percent for someone else.

The Commission's voice crackled.

"Are you ready to forfeit the medical reward for your brother and initiate the lethal extraction protocol to leave this underworld?"

I looked directly into Cassius's expectant eyes.

"Yes."

Cassius smiled. The tension dissolved from his shoulders. He looked so relieved. So certain I had accepted his proposal.

I reached over and worked the heavy diamond ring from my finger. Placed it gently back in his scarred palm.

"I am going home."

His smile vanished.

"You can give the ring to Serena, too."

I turned toward the precipice, where the ocean threw itself against the cliffs. The salt spray stung my face.

Behind me, the heavy thrum of a smuggling chopper tore through the bruised storm clouds. Enzo. Always circling. Always watching.

Cassius lunged. His grip locked around my arm like a steel shackle.

"Aria, stop."

He looked genuinely confused. Furrowed brow. Frustrated knot between his eyes. Like I was a math problem that wouldn't solve.

"I can buy another safehouse. We can delay the wedding until you calm down."

Before I could wrench free, soft footsteps approached.

Serena walked up, her delicate hands wrapped around Cassius's prized wooden baseball bat-the relic he never let another soul touch. Her eyes were red and puffy.

"I can return the rose, Aria. I will have the lawyers transfer the safehouse back to you tomorrow."

But her knuckles were white against the aged ash wood. And in the briefest flicker before she lowered her gaze, I caught it-something cold. Calculating. There and gone, like a shark's fin breaking still water.

My own brother, Julian, stood somewhere behind her. Watching with that clinical detachment he'd perfected-the same look he gave me when he developed the Aria Protocol from my genetics to save Serena, then refused to call me sister in public.

Enzo, circling above, ready to extract anyone who needed saving.

And Lucian-calculating the angles, like he calculated everything, including the day he gave my priority extraction code to Serena.

They had all made their choices long before this moment. I just hadn't been willing to see it.

The Commission's voice returned, colder.

"Lethal extraction protocol initiated. Proceed to isolation to avoid external stabilization."

External stabilization. The system had warned me from the beginning-any intervention that stabilized my vitals would abort the extraction. I had to die alone. Or not at all.

I turned toward the cliffs. The tide was coming in, and I knew exactly which cave would be underwater within the hour.

Aria POV

Serena reached for the red rose pinned to her chest, her fingers affecting a tremor as she made a show of unfastening it.

Cassius immediately released my arm and stepped between us, placing a large, prohibitive hand over Serena's.

"What a Don gives cannot be taken back," he declared, his voice pitched to carry the absolute authority of the underworld.

His dark gaze returned to me, and he reached out again, gesturing toward the safety of the stadium.

"Step away from the edge, Aria."

His tone was a brittle warning now.

"Do not make a scene in front of the Family's associates and the press."

I did not move.

I just nodded slowly, repeating his words in my head-what he gives cannot be taken back.

I looked at the baseball bat in Serena's hand-the very length of ash wood Cassius had used to survive his first street war.

"I do not want it anymore," I said.

Cassius narrowed his eyes.

"I do not want you, the rose, the bat, or the safehouse."

A memory surfaced, sharp as a shard of glass, of the terms The Commission had set down for me when I was eighteen.

If my brother or one of the targets chose me without hesitation, I could take the cure and return to the civilian world.

Cassius let out a harsh breath, folding his arms over his broad chest.

"You are using a breakup threat to force me to strip Serena of her protection."

He shook his head, looking so profoundly disappointed.

"It will not work."

I smiled at him, though it was a mere twitch of the lips that held no warmth.

"I promise I will not take anything back."

Cassius slowly uncrossed his arms, his confusion returning.

"Where are you going?"

"Home."

I looked at the massive stadium behind him.

"A place you can never enter."

I walked over to home plate and dropped the ninety-eight white roses onto the dirt.

I pulled my burner phone out of my pocket and placed it on top of the flowers to pin them down.

Cassius barked an order to his soldiers.

"Cut the live feed. Block the journalists from the field."

The heavily armed men immediately moved to form a solid wall around the perimeter.

Cassius stood still, watching me.

He assumed I was playing a byzantine mafia mind game, fully expecting that I would wait for him to coax me back.

I kicked off my high heels, leaving them like abandoned sentinels on the concrete steps leading down to the treacherous coastal cliffs.

I did not look back as I descended the jagged rocks.

The freezing ocean water soaked the hem of my dress as I stepped into the dark tidal cave that was known to flood completely at high tide.

Behind me, I heard Cassius's voice-strained now, stripped of its earlier command. "Aria, the tide turns in twenty minutes. This is not a negotiation tactic that ends well."

He still thought I was bargaining.

I kept walking. The water rose to my calves, then my knees, the cold stealing sensation from my limbs as the cave's darkness swallowed me whole.

I pressed deeper into the cave, feeling the walls narrow around me. The roar of the ocean became muffled, distant. Good. The more isolated I was, the less chance of interruption.

The system's countdown began-a soft, rhythmic pulse in the back of my skull, like a second heartbeat slowing toward stillness.

Somewhere above me, I heard the distant thrum of helicopter rotors.

Enzo.

I closed my eyes and pressed my back against the wet stone.

"Not this time," I whispered. "Please, not this time."

Aria POV

The damp air of the tidal cave was a palpable weight against my skin, thick with the sharp odor of salt and rotting seaweed.

I leaned my head against the cold stone wall, letting its rough surface anchor me in the present.

I remembered Cassius bringing me to this exact cave when I was but eighteen.

He had wrapped his heavy jacket around my shivering shoulders and promised me a home in a world that had left me without one.

Now, there was no jacket-only the freezing tide washing over my bare feet.

With a faint chime, the Commission's interface projected a secure holographic feed directly into my line of sight.

It showed a bright, sterile civilian hospital room that seemed a world away from my current reality.

My brother, Arthur, was asleep in an angular plastic chair by a hospital bed.

A familiar thermos of homemade noodles rested on the small table next to him, a quiet testament to his daily vigil.

On the wall behind him, I could see a calendar with days crossed off-three years' worth of marks. A stack of billing statements sat on the windowsill, stamped with the logo of the clinical trial program that was keeping my body alive. Arthur must have fought to get me enrolled. He must have fought for everything.

"Three years have passed in the real world," the Commission's automated voice stated, hollow and impassive. "Without the medical reward, your survival upon extraction is not guaranteed."

I stared at the threads of silver forming at Arthur's temples, each one a testament to the time I had stolen from him.

My chest tightened with a heavy, constricting ache.

"I accept the risk," I whispered into the echoing dark of the cave.

I just wanted to see my brother again, if only for a fleeting second.

The freezing seawater rose to my ankles, but the cold was a distant thing.

A strange sense of relief washed over me, a quietus to my racing heart.

I closed my eyes and waited for the lethal extraction protocol to trigger.

Outside the cave, carried faintly over the crash of the waves, I could hear Cassius shouting orders.

He was locking down the stadium and ordering his men to sweep the coastline.

But he did not come down into the cave.

He still believed I was just hiding to test his limits, blind to the fact that I was already saying my farewells.

The water reached my knees, numbing my legs completely as the system's countdown began to hum through my bones.

Suddenly, the deafening roar of a chopper engine echoed off the serrated cliff walls, shattering the morbid peace.

A blinding white searchlight hit my face, forcing my eyes open against the sudden, painful glare.

I looked up through the jagged mouth of the cave.

A figure was descending rapidly on a rescue line, a dark shape cutting straight through the violent storm.

It was Enzo.

He was the Syndicate's elite smuggling pilot and a made Soldier-a man whose dominion was the sky, not the treacherous depths of a rising tide.

A crushing weight of disappointment slammed into my stomach, driving the breath from my lungs.

I was only seconds away from extraction, only seconds away from Arthur.

Enzo's heavy boots hit the water next to me, sending an ice-cold spray against my skin.

He instantly read the profound disappointment in my eyes, and a muscle in his jaw jumped in response.

The storm violently shook his rescue line, threatening to smash us against the unforgiving rocks.

Without a word, Enzo grabbed my waist with brutal force.

He secured me to his harness in one fluid, economical motion.

As the wind threw us toward the stone, he used his own body to shield me from the jagged cave walls, absorbing the brutal impact himself.

I saw blood dripping from his bare hands where the friction of the rope had burned the skin from his palms.

Ignoring the pain, he checked the metal rigging three times with a frantic precision.

Then, he grabbed my chin, forcing me to look at his intense, storm-gray eyes.

"I came to get you," he yelled, his voice nearly lost in the roaring wind. "I promised I would always extract you. Every time. No matter the cost."

I remembered his old promise to always extract me from any danger, no matter the cost.

Hearing those words now only brought a bitter, acrid taste to my mouth, for this was the one time I had not wanted to be saved.

The winch pulled us up violently, yanking me away from my escape.

Once we were dragged into the shuddering cabin of the chopper, Enzo's knees buckled, and he fell heavily onto the metal floor.

He barked rapid orders at his syndicate medics for oxygen and thermal blankets, his voice sharp enough to cut glass.

He frantically checked my pulse, his bloodied fingers trembling against my ice-cold skin.

I coughed up a lungful of harsh seawater, choking on the very fact of my survival.

My entire body shivered uncontrollably as the adrenaline fled my system.

Enzo wrapped a thick thermal blanket tightly around my shoulders, hauling me flush against his chest.

He held it there, a steadying weight in the chaos, until the heart monitors in the cabin finally stopped their shrill blaring.

The Commission's voice echoed coldly in my mind, a final judgment.

"External stabilization detected. Extraction failed. You must reach the brink without intervention."

The words were new-a clarification I had never received before. The system was learning from each failure, refining its protocols, or perhaps simply growing impatient. Either way, the message was clear: they couldn't just let me almost die. They had to let me cross the threshold entirely.

I looked up at Enzo through the clear plastic of the oxygen mask, my vision blurred by a film of unshed tears.

He ripped off his bloodied communication headset, his chest heaving as he stared down at me.

"Are you disappointed I am not Cassius?" he asked, a raw vulnerability in his tone cutting through the noise of the rotors.

I looked at him honestly, acknowledging the twisted, broken truth of it, and nodded.

His face crumpled for just a moment-a fracture in the hardened Soldier's mask-before he rebuilt it into something harder, angrier.

"Then you should have picked a better place to hide," he said, his voice dropping to a dangerous whisper. "Because I will always find you, Aria. Always."

His words were a promise and a threat wrapped into one. And as the chopper banked toward his underground hospital, I realized with sick certainty that Enzo would never stop extracting me-even when extraction was the very thing killing my only chance to go home.