Too Late For Regret: The Mafia Princess

Three years ago, my biological brother, the ruthless Don of New York, dragged me back to his compound.

But he didn't bring me home to be the Mafia Princess; he brought me back to be a lowly maid for his manipulative adopted sister, Serafina.

On the anniversary of our parents' death, I only wanted to place a single white rose on their grave.

Cassio ordered his heavily armed soldiers to barricade the mausoleum, looking at me with profound irritation.

"If you do not drop to your knees and beg Serafina for permission, I will permanently erase your existence from this bloodline," he threatened.

To appease Serafina's fake tears, Cassio had locked me in a windowless basement, banned me from family banquets, and forced me to bow to her in front of his Capos.

When I finally refused to submit, he froze my bank accounts, threw me out of his armored SUV onto the highway, and decreed that no one in the city could hire me, trying to starve me into crawling back.

I couldn't understand why he bothered to extract me from my civilian life just to let a fake bloodline torture his real sister.

Standing in the dirt, my heart went completely dead, and any remaining hope for this family shattered.

I stripped off the heavy diamond necklace he gave me and threw it onto the gravel like industrial waste.

Then, I pulled out my hidden burner phone and texted my other brother, Leo, the deadliest rising boss in the underworld.

"Come pick me up," I sent. "I am abandoning this cursed surname forever."

Chapter 1

Gia POV

The heavily armed soldiers of the New York Syndicate crossed their assault rifles, forming an impenetrable barricade between me and the family mausoleum.

Standing before them was my biological brother, the most ruthless Mafia Don on the East Coast.

"You have to beg her," he told me, referring to his adopted sister, "if you want the right to mourn our dead parents."

"If you do not drop to your knees and submit to her right now," he threatened, his voice a lethal whisper, "I will permanently erase your existence from this bloodline."

At that exact moment, the burner phone hidden deep in my pocket pulsed with a distinct, rhythmic vibration-two short bursts followed by a long one. It was the secure signal I had established with the deadliest rising boss in the underworld. I didn't need to look at the screen to know what the code meant. "Three days until I land, Gia," the silent message conveyed to my racing heart. "Keep breathing, and I will burn their empire to the ground for you."

I stood rooted to the pristine gravel, my posture unyielding as a gust of wind, smelling of damp earth and distant decay, whipped a loose strand of hair across my mouth.

Cassio's shadow fell over me, a chilling eclipse.

He was the Don of the Family, a title that gave him dominion over every illegal port, every compromised official, and every drop of blood that stained the five boroughs. His suits of dark English wool were tailored to conceal the cold geometry of the weapons he carried, and his mere presence was an atmospheric pressure that bent the spines of lesser men. But now, the full weight of that authority was being leveraged against the very tissue and bone that bound us by birth.

He publicly maintained to his Capos that I was merely a maid in his compound. He did it all because Serafina-the adopted girl with no claim to our lineage-was prone to manipulative fits whenever I was afforded a shred of dignity.

Today was the anniversary of our biological parents' deaths. I only wanted to place a single white rose on their stone.

A single, warm tear traced a path through the grime on my cheek, a distillation of pure frustration and three years of airless isolation within his walls.

Cassio registered the glint of moisture on my skin, and the sound that escaped him was not a sigh, but the impatient exhalation of a man whose prize stallion refuses a jump. He regarded me not with pity, but with the profound irritation of a master for a disobedient creature.

"Go inside and ask Serafina," he said, and the cadence of his speech was a carefully constructed insult. "She might grant you leave to stand on the consecrated ground of this Family."

A void opened up beneath my ribs. The track of the tear on my cheek grew cold, and with that small shift in temperature, the wellspring of my grief ran dry.

I thought about the blood money left behind when my civilian guardians were assassinated. I thought about my adoptive brother, Leo, who took that money and disappeared not into shadows, but into the labyrinth of rusty fire escapes and windowless basements of the outer boroughs, forging his own dark enterprise. My phone had just told me he was coming back.

A strange lightness permeated my limbs, a current that displaced the chill of Cassio's dismissal. I took a deliberate step back from the armed guards, my movements measured and silent. I understood then that I could not spare another drop of saltwater for this name, this house, this blood.

Cassio read my stillness as consent. He stepped forward, and his large, calloused hand descended upon the crown of my head-a proprietary, almost agricultural gesture.

"Good girl," he said, the words a low rumble as his fingers tangled in my hair. "Finally learning the rules of my house."

As a gesture of his supposed magnanimity, he offered, "I will go inside and negotiate with Serafina on your behalf," a concession that churned like bile in my throat.

Cassio turned his broad back to me and entered the grand marble mausoleum. He left me standing outside with his Soldiers.

One of the guards caught the eye of another, a flicker of a smile playing on his lips before it was suppressed.

"A maid has no right to honor the late Don," one of them muttered, the insult pitched to carry on the wind.

My gaze fell, and I found myself studying the expensive leather shoes Cassio had bought for me, now scuffed with the dust of this place. Bringing me back to the Syndicate had been his decree; allowing him to do so was the gravest error of my life.

From deep inside the mausoleum, Serafina's voice, high and arrogant, ricocheted off the stone.

She shouted at the Don.

"Why should an unworthy peasant be allowed near the graves?" she demanded, her voice thin and sharp as a shard of glass.

The muscles around my lungs constricted, making each breath a deliberate, painful effort. In that moment, the abstract concept of mafia loyalty dissolved into a grim certainty: all the Family's protection was hoarded by the one who slept on 800-thread-count Egyptian cotton, the girl for whom the entire household held its breath when she so much as coughed. My true fealty belonged only to the civilian guardians who raised me, and to Leo.

"I will buy you that custom imported sports car," Cassio's deep voice promised, a desperate bid to appease Serafina's tantrum.

Only after securing the million-dollar bribe did Serafina loudly decree, "Fine! She can enter to bow exactly once!"

Cassio walked back out into the sunlight. He wore a placid, self-satisfied expression, wholly unaware of the delicate structures he had just demolished within me.

He reached for me, and the rough pads of his fingers locked onto the ulna of my wrist, the force great enough to cut off the return of blood; a numb tingling of oxygen deprivation quickly spread to my fingertips.

"Serafina has generously granted you access," he informed me.

With a violent twist of my torso, I tore my arm from his hold. The sudden movement made the guards flinch, their hands dropping to their holsters.

With a stillness in my blood I did not know I possessed, I refused to enter.

"I will wait outside the perimeter," I told him.

The masseter muscle in Cassio's jaw clenched, causing a vein on the side of his neck to pulse erratically; the foot he had been about to move hung suspended in mid-air.

His smile did not vanish; it was surgically removed, leaving behind something stark and dangerous.

"You are disrespecting my authority in front of my men," he accused, his voice losing its resonance, becoming flat and hard as packed earth. "You are throwing a tantrum."

I lifted my chin, a small, deliberate movement. My eyes were clear and empty as I met the gaze of the most dangerous man in New York.

"Do you believe," I asked him, my voice as steady and cool as the marble of the tomb, "that I am the one throwing a tantrum?"

A flicker of something unreadable passed through Cassio's eyes-a hairline crack in the granite facade of the Don. It vanished as quickly as it appeared, but I had seen it. For the first time, he was uncertain.

Gia POV

I remembered the day Cassio extracted me from my life three years ago.

He had found me in a Queens tenement that smelled of boiled cabbage and damp plaster, his eyes hard and his commands unyielding. He had warned me then that to preserve the peace in his empire, I was to submit to Serafina's reign.

Back then, I had sworn obedience to my brother's command. I had craved the idea of belonging so acutely that I accepted Serafina's psychological warfare.

It began with erasure: she forbade the Don from ever referring to me as his blood sister in public.

Then came the humiliation. Exercising her stolen authority, she had me moved to a windowless room in the sub-basement, near the groaning pipes of the kitchens. Meanwhile, she occupied the lavish penthouse suite with its view of the entire city skyline.

When the cloying, mildewed air of the basement made me sick, I broke. I begged Cassio for a proper room with a single window.

Serafina intervened.

She mocked me in front of the Capos, claiming my former safe house had been a worse hovel than the basement. Then, in a calculated fit of hysteria, she ran to the balcony ledge. She balanced there, a silhouette against the evening sky, and threatened to break the mafia code by defecting to a rival Syndicate if I was granted my request.

A tremor went through Cassio's frame. His forearm tensed, shoving me toward the rough flagstones as he rushed to restrain Serafina. Once she was back on solid ground, he turned his wrath on me.

He roared at me to apologize for upsetting her. The ordeal ended with me forced into a humiliating, deep curtsy before his chosen sister, my head bowed as if she were royalty, while the guards watched in a heavy, suffocating silence.

Since that day, Serafina's tyranny escalated.

She banned me from wearing designer gowns to the Syndicate galas. She threatened to blackmail Cassio into officially branding me as a mere Associate, a servant on the family payroll. During exclusive Family banquets, she ensured the guards kept me locked in my room. If Cassio dared to show me an ounce of mercy, Serafina would press a stolen mafia blade to her own throat.

Now, three years later, I bore the Don's surname, but I was nothing but a ghost in his halls.

My upbringing in the city's forgotten corners had forged a silent discipline in me. I refused to stoop to Serafina's hysterics. Instead, I remembered the words Leo whispered to me the night our guardians were murdered: "A true survivor honors her own worth."

The sharp click of a woman's heel against marble snapped me back to the present.

Serafina emerged from the mausoleum, her posture a study in irritation.

"Why haven't you entered yet?" she demanded.

"You ungrateful stray," she mocked, the words sharp and pointed.

Cassio clamped his hand on my arm again. His fingers dug into my skin, attempting to drag me into the sacred grounds to avoid another scene.

I planted my feet on the gravel.

"I want to go home," I stated. "I want to go back. Back to Leo's territory."

Cassio's forward momentum ceased. A network of fine lines appeared at the corners of his eyes, and his gaze acquired a dangerous, metallic quality.

"Why would you return to that world when your guardians are dead?" he demanded. "It is too dangerous for an unprotected woman."

His grip on my wrist tightened, a possessive, bruising hold. He stepped into my space, his chest brushing my shoulder. "What has possessed you to defy me today?"

A long, slow breath escaped my lips. I looked him in the eye. "I have another brother," I revealed. "Leo."

Serafina cut me off with a laugh like shattering glass.

"Then crawl back to the gutter where you belong!" she spat.

She looked at Cassio, a malicious glint in her eyes. "I wager my life she will come crawling back to the Syndicate gates in two days."

For the first time in three years, Cassio did not immediately side with Serafina. His jaw clenched.

"The civilian world is ruthless," he argued, a flicker of something other than certainty in his voice. "Do you intend to live like a starving peasant again?"

Serafina's expression curdled at his hesitation. She pointed a manicured finger at me.

"If you leave," she demanded, "you must strip yourself of everything funded by this Family's blood money!"

Cassio fell silent. He crossed his arms, assuming the threat of poverty would force my submission.

I held Serafina's challenging stare for a long moment.

Then, the designer bag slipped from my shoulder, its heavy buckle thudding softly against the crushed stones.

The heavy diamond necklace and bracelet were peeled from my skin, tracing a cold arc through the air before collapsing with the bag, like a pile of magnificent industrial waste, onto the gravel.

"This," I declared, my voice clear of any regret, "is everything the Syndicate ever gave me."

I turned and began walking down the gravel path, away from the mausoleum, away from the only blood I had ever known. I did not look back to see if Cassio would follow. Some part of me already knew he would.

Gia POV

Cassio's voice dropped to a low, freezing register as he stared at the diamonds in the dirt.

"Are you walking away?" he demanded. "Do you plan to leave my territory naked?"

A deep cold settled in my bones, but I refused to cower. Without a second of hesitation, I reached for my collar and undid the first button of my silk blouse.

Around us, the Soldiers standing guard turned their backs. They were terrified of witnessing the Don's blood sister expose herself.

Cassio's jaw worked as he watched my fingers move.

I unbuttoned the second button. Then, the third.

His control fractured. He lunged and clamped down on my wrists; under the immense tearing force, the silk cuff of my shirt emitted the faint sound of ripping fabric, a button popping off and striking the gravel.

"If you have no shame," he roared, his grip a cage of bone and sinew around my wrists, "I still do!"

Exerting his physical dominance, Cassio dragged me away from the mausoleum and shoved me into the back of his armored SUV. Behind us, the sharp, frantic clicking of high heels echoed against the pavement. Serafina scurried after the convoy, refusing to be left behind, and slid into the passenger seat as the engine roared to life.

He slammed the door shut, and the heavy convoy sped off down the private road.

Inside the vehicle, the air seemed to solidify, a mixture of Cassio's pungent bergamot cologne and the stuffy, animal scent of leather warmed by body heat, forcing one to take only shallow breaths. Serafina sat in the passenger seat, relentlessly complaining.

"This sacred memorial is ruined by your presence," she whined, berating Cassio for ever pulling a peasant out of the city's gutters.

Cassio stared straight ahead. His voice carried the terrifying, deadened calm of a Boss about to order a hit.

"Shut your mouth, Serafina," he ordered.

Serafina recoiled in her leather seat.

"Why are you turning your wrath on me?" she demanded, accusing him of broken loyalty.

I calmly interrupted the girl.

"I want nothing from the Syndicate," I stated. "I demand my freedom."

Cassio's face was a mask of fury in the rearview mirror. He accused me of mimicking Serafina's manipulation tactics, warning me that the Don's patience had a limit.

The atmosphere inside the SUV became dangerous, yet I unflinchingly repeated my demand to leave his car.

Enraged, Cassio issued a cold command to his driver. The convoy shuddered to a halt on a desolate stretch of road.

The automatic locks clicked, and the door beside me swung open. A storm raged in Cassio's eyes as he snatched the designer bag from the floorboards and held it out of my reach.

"Get out of my vehicle," he ordered. "Let's see how long you survive without the Family's protection and wealth."

His hand connected with my shoulder, and I stumbled out of the high cabin, my knees striking the rough asphalt.

The armored SUV accelerated away, leaving me in a cloud of exhaust.

As I regained my footing, I reached into my coat pocket and pulled out my Syndicate-issued smartphone. A banking alert flashed across the cracked screen: the Don had frozen the meager emergency funds attached to my name. Disgusted, I tossed the useless, traceable device into a nearby storm drain. I pulled out my hidden burner phone to check the time, the weight of the hundred dollars in crumpled bills in my other pocket a grim reminder of my circumstances.

Three days. I just had to survive three more days until Leo's signal had promised he would land. I clutched the phone tightly and began walking.

I walked for miles until I found a rundown motel in neutral territory. I paid the clerk and locked myself in a room that smelled of bleach and stale smoke.

I sat on the edge of the lumpy mattress, calculating my survival. I knew Leo would not return from his operations for three more days, and the meager cash in my pocket would not cover food and shelter.

The next morning, I walked the city streets, attempting to find legitimate work at civilian fronts.

I applied at diners, laundromats, and grocery stores, but I was turned away by every establishment. They denied me even the most menial labor.

At the final front-a small bakery on the corner-a clerk leaned over the counter and whispered a warning. A decree had come down from the Syndicate overnight, prohibiting anyone in the city from hiring a girl named Gia.

"You have offended the Don," he told me.

I walked out of the bakery, a dry, bitter laugh escaping my throat. I acknowledged Cassio's methods: he was orchestrating my starvation to guarantee my submission.

I pulled my jacket tighter, turned my back on the busy street, and walked toward the derelict warehouses and forgotten alleyways of the industrial district.

Somewhere out there, Leo was preparing. And when he landed, Cassio's entire empire would learn what happened when you pushed a survivor too far.