Shattered Vows: Marrying The Dark Don

For seven years, I have been the submissive commoner wife of Julian, the New York Mafia boss.

When he finally realized what he had ruined and stabbed himself with a dagger, begging for my forgiveness, I simply turned and walked away.

I endured his endless betrayals and cruelty for only one reason: he paid for my grandmother's life-sustaining treatment.

But while he was busy buying diamonds for his new mistress, the pressure of his emotional abuse caused me to lose our child.

His mistress broke into my grandmother's hospital room and threw explicit photos of her and Julian in my grandmother's face. My grandmother died from shock.

Julian knew nothing about this.

"Go home, Sienna. You're pregnant. Stop making a scene, or I'll cut off your grandmother's medical bills tomorrow."

When I found him, he arrogantly thought I was just throwing a tantrum.

He didn't know our child was gone.

He didn't know that my grandmother had passed away.

In front of all his men, I poured a glass of whiskey over his head, left the signed divorce papers on his table, and then boarded a one-way flight to Germany.

I will leave him forever.

Chapter 1

Sienna's POV:

The divorce papers lay on the desk.

A dull vibration hummed against the polished wood; his phone screen lit up with a new message from his mistress: "Room 402. Don't keep me waiting."

He was the head of the Falcone crime family, a man who made grown men in New York tremble.

"Divorce? You can't be serious. Sienna, if you keep acting irrational," Julian warned, his voice dripping with condescension, "I'll stop paying for your grandmother's medical bills."

He hadn't even read the legal documents that would dissolve our seven-year marriage.

He picked up his phone, thumbs moving across the screen. I watched him type his reply, confirming his afternoon plans.

"What is it this time, Sienna?" he asked, his tone laced with arrogant boredom. "The house? A car? Jewelry? A trust fund?"

"I don't want anything," I said, my voice flat. "No offshore accounts. No car. No family assets. A clean break."

Julian let out a sharp, mocking laugh, leaning back in his leather chair.

"You don't want anything. Right. Like you didn't want anything when you threw a fit about me missing your OB-GYN appointment."

My face remained impassive at the mention of it.

"I was busy acquiring a new hobby," he confessed casually, a cruel smirk twisting his lips. "Buying a diamond necklace. You should see how it looks against her skin."

I thought of this morning, of finding the black lace panties hidden beneath the jewelry box.

His phone buzzed again – a FaceTime call. Vivian's photo lit up the screen.

I stepped forward, placing my palm flat over the screen, blocking his view. "Julian. Sign the papers."

He looked up and laughed, a full, arrogant sound.

"So, you are jealous. Honey, I know you're crazy in love with me. And I love you too."

"But, baby, I told you long ago, loving only you is just too boring."

"Enough of this game. Withdraw that ridiculous divorce petition, Sienna."

He stood, his tall frame casting a shadow over me.

"Do you know what happens to you without my protection?" he sneered. "You'll have nothing. You're pregnant. You can't leave me."

I stared at his chest, listening to his steady breathing. He was using my deepest vulnerabilities as weapons, which was entirely in character.

A silent, brutal truth echoed in my mind.

The baby was already gone.

The stress-induced miscarriage had happened three days ago.

"Your grandmother is dying. Leaving the hospital is a death sentence for her. Can you afford her care?"

So, he still didn't know. My grandmother was already dead.

I found I didn't have the strength to say the words aloud.

His phone vibrated insistently against my palm. Annoyed by the persistent buzzing, Julian snatched a pen from the desk.

"Fine. You want to make a point by signing? Here."

He scrawled his name hastily at the bottom of the page.

He was convinced I didn't have the guts to leave the mafia's protection. In his mind, this was just a pathetic ploy for attention from his civilian wife.

"I don't believe you'd dare divorce me. If this is some little game between us, fine, I'll play along."

"I'll be back by midnight," he said, grabbing his suit jacket. "Have dinner ready."

The office door slammed shut behind him.

I gathered the signed papers and dialed a secure number on my phone.

"He signed. Julian and I are divorced," I said. "I'm formally requesting a transfer to the Valentis' German operation."

Sienna's POV:

On the other end of the line, the Matriarch was silent for a long moment.

Julian's mother, a cold, calculating woman who had never truly accepted me, was utterly opposed to my marriage to Julian. But she understood the brutal rules of the criminal underworld better than anyone.

"You're being hasty, Sienna," she said, a hint of surprise in her voice. "You could have at least stayed at the estate until the heir was born."

I looked down at my flat, empty stomach.

I said nothing.

The baby wouldn't be born.

The Matriarch, always a shrewd strategist, seemed to understand.

"Without a child," she said, "the link between you and Julian is completely severed."

"That's exactly what I want," I murmured.

The line went dead with a short click.

As I turned, a maid carrying a large stack of clean towels rushed into the hallway.

Startled by my sudden appearance, she collided with the wall, her shoulder striking the ornate, gilded wedding portrait hanging there.

The heavy gold frame slid from its mount and crashed onto the marble floor.

The glass didn't shatter. A single white crack ran through the center, splitting Julian's smiling face in two.

I stared motionlessly at the seven-year-old photograph.

Julian was smiling in it, his arm wrapped protectively around my waist, his dark eyes filled with love.

Looking at his flawlessly handsome face, a memory surfaced, pushing everything else aside.

I remembered him kneeling on the freezing concrete floor of the family compound, beaten bloody by the syndicate's enforcers.

He had willingly endured such brutal punishment, openly defying his own Godfather, just to marry me, an outsider.

"Without the family, I can still conquer the underworld," he'd said, spitting out blood. "But without you, the empire in my chest is just an empty shell."

He loved me then. At least, he had.

I had believed our love could conquer reality.

Another memory surfaced, cold and sharp.

It was the first time the Matriarch had shown me the photos.

Pictures of Julian with a blonde woman, intimate and explicit.

I refused to believe my dark prince had betrayed me.

So, with a pitying sneer, she'd dragged me to the underground VIP room of a mob-run club.

Through the tinted glass, I saw Julian sitting on a leather sofa, surrounded by his capos.

"Sienna is pure and innocent," he boasted, drawing slowly and arrogantly on a cigar. "She's the only pure thing in my life."

Before I could be moved by his words.

The next second, he pulled a half-naked woman onto his lap.

Grinning at his cheering men, he slid his hand up her bare thigh.

"But why limit yourself?" he laughed. "I love her, but I don't love only her."

Standing outside the VIP room, my illusion shattered in an instant.

Later that night, Julian returned to the estate.

Seeing my red-rimmed eyes, he feigned concern and reached for my face.

I pushed his hand away.

I handed him the first set of divorce papers the Matriarch had prepared.

Julian looked at the legal documents, then up at me, smirking.

He openly admitted to the affairs.

He invoked the twisted double standard of the mafia with sickening confidence.

"Physical release means nothing, Sienna," he'd argued, his tone infuriatingly gentle. "It's just business, stress relief. Coming back to your bed every night is proof of my loyalty to you."

He'd dismissively batted the papers from my hand.

He'd strutted upstairs to shower, confident that a weak civilian like me would eventually learn to shut up and play the role of the obedient mafia wife.

I snapped back to the present.

The terrified maid was babbling apologies, clumsily sweeping up the broken glass.

"Forget it," I told her, my voice dead, hollow.

I turned away from the ruined portrait, just as I had turned away from our marriage.

When Julian returned to the master bedroom in the dead of night, he expected to find me waiting.

Instead, he found my diamond wedding ring and syndicate keys on his nightstand. The officially signed divorce decree was already in the Matriarch's hands.

All my things were gone from the closet.

For the first time in his life, a chilling wave of panic washed over him.

Sienna's POV:

I sat in the back of a speeding taxi, city lights blurring past the window, heading to the airport terminal for my flight to Germany.

The shrill, insistent ring of my phone shattered my thoughts.

I glanced at the caller ID.

The screen flashed: Valenti Family Hospital.

A cold feeling washed over me.

That kind of dread took me back to the day I first brought my grandmother there.

I had rushed back to my rural hometown after learning she'd collapsed.

Local doctors diagnosed her with late-stage lung cancer.

I was sitting in that rundown county hospital, watching over her frail body.

Julian walked in.

His custom suit was soaked, his Italian leather shoes caked with mud from slipping down the rain-slicked embankment while desperately searching for me.

With unshakeable authority, he introduced himself to the doctors.

He put his arm around my shoulder, claiming to be my husband.

My grandmother, stirred by his voice, woke up.

She looked at me, asking weakly if we were still happy together.

I was too afraid any sign of distress might hurt her, so I didn't dare pull away from Julian's grip.

Julian smiled a tender smile.

He played the perfect husband, a picture of devotion, so easily it was sickening.

He insisted on transferring her to the family's state-of-the-art facility in the city.

For six months, my grandmother thrived in that luxurious hospital.

The mafia's top doctors assured us she had years left.

During that time, Julian acted like a family man. He was glued to my side, cooking for me every day, playing the part of a man deeply in love.

Then, one day, I brought homemade soup to his regular office.

I pushed the door open without knocking.

And I heard the sounds of Julian having sex with his secretary on his desk.

My hands trembled violently.

The thermos slipped from my grasp, spilling hot soup all over the carpet.

Caught red-handed, Julian's face twisted in rage.

He grabbed a heavy crystal ashtray and hurled it blindly at the wall.

It shattered on impact, and a sharp shard flew out, slicing my calf. A line of blood ran down my bare leg.

The secretary fled in terror.

I didn't scream.

Instead, I calmly slid the diamond wedding ring from my finger and placed it on the nearby end table.

Julian, utterly unconcerned about my bleeding leg, calmly lit a cigarette.

He coldly reminded me of my position.

"Grandma's life support is paid for and guaranteed by me," he exhaled a plume of smoke. "If you file for divorce, the payments stop. Grandma dies. You should understand that."

That night, I moved out of the master bedroom and locked myself in a guest room.

Two weeks later, visiting the hospital, I caught Julian cornering my grandmother's private nurse in a stairwell, kissing her hungrily.

Afterwards, I cornered him, begging him not to let my grandmother find out.

She was too weak; I feared any upsetting news would harm her.

Julian just leaned down, kissed the bitter tears from my eyes, and ordered me back to his bed.

From that moment on, our marriage became a living nightmare.

My sole purpose for existing was to keep my grandmother alive.

Now, sitting in the cold airport terminal, the relentless buzzing of my phone yanked me back.

I finally answered.

"Miss Sienna," a clipped voice said. "We're calling regarding the arrangement of your grandmother's personal effects."

I gripped the phone tightly.

I already knew she was gone.

"I need to come clear out the room," I said, my voice raspy.

I ordered the driver to turn around, my heart hammering against my ribs in a terrifying rhythm.

An hour later, I walked the sterile corridors of the private hospital.

Two nurses stood outside my grandmother's closed door, whispering.

So absorbed in their gossip, they didn't notice me approach.

"Horrible," one nurse shuddered, her voice low. "She died in such agony. Her face was streaked with tears, she couldn't breathe, clutching her chest... it wasn't peaceful at all."

I stopped dead.

Grandma was supposed to have passed peacefully in her sleep.

Why was the nurse saying she died in agony?

A sudden, panicked urgency drove me forward. I pushed past the startled nurses and threw open the heavy door.