My Mafia Boss Husband Chose His Mistress While I Was in Labor, but He Came Home to Discover His Empire Was Never Really His

By three o'clock that afternoon, the Romano family compound in Oyster Bay, Long Island, was in a state of absolute emergency.

Carmine Romano, the sixty-eight-year-old patriarch of the syndicate, sat in his leather armchair in the heavily guarded library. His face was flushed red with dangerous high blood pressure, his hands trembling as he stared at the mountain of legal notices, bank freezes, and asset seizure warrants piling up on his desk.

Around him stood six of his top syndicate captains—men who controlled dock workers, extortion rings, gambling dens, and union funds across the five boroughs.

The heavy oak doors of the library burst open.

Dante walked in, his suit rumpled, his hair messy, looking like a man who had walked through a hurricane.

Carmine stood up from his chair with a speed that shocked everyone in the room. He picked up a heavy crystal decanter of scotch and threw it directly at his son’s head.

The decanter shattered against the oak wall behind Dante, showering him with amber liquor and glass shards.

“You absolute, brainless idiot!” Carmine screamed, his voice cracking with fury. “You ruined us! You ruined thirty years of work for a blonde whore in Paris!”

“Dad, calm down!” Dante shouted, wiping a drop of scotch from his cheek. “We can fight this in court! Pendelton’s papers are a bluff! Serena doesn't have the stomach for a prolonged legal war!”

Carmine walked up to his son and struck him across the face with a backhanded slap that echoed through the library.

The room went dead silent. The syndicate captains lowered their eyes, stepping back toward the walls.

Dante held his cheek, staring at his father in total shock.

“A bluff?!” Carmine roared, pointing a shaking finger at the desk. “Do you know what my corporate lawyers just discovered twenty minutes ago, Dante? Do you have any idea who Serena Vale actually is?!”

Dante swallowed hard. “She’s Henry Vale’s daughter. Her father ran a real estate trust in Boston.”

“Henry Vale was a front!” Carmine screamed. “Henry Vale was the chief legal trustee for the Vale Financial Syndicate—the largest private offshore banking network in Western Europe! When Henry died four years ago, Serena inherited sole, unrestricted control of forty billion dollars in sovereign wealth funds!”

Dante’s eyes widened in pure, unadulterated horror. “Forty... forty billion?”

“When I arranged your marriage three years ago,” Carmine said, his voice dropping into a terrifying, raspy whisper, “I thought her father had left her fifty million dollars. I thought we were taking advantage of a rich, defenseless orphan to clean up our money laundering operations. I thought we were the predators, Dante!”

Carmine leaned down, resting his hands on his desk, his chest heaving.

“We weren't the predators,” Carmine whispered. “She was the foundation keeping our house from collapsing. Every contract we signed, every land deal we closed, every judge we bribed over the last three years was financed by her private network! She didn't marry you because she needed our protection! She married you because she wanted a peaceful, quiet family life away from her family’s corporate empire!”

Dante felt the floor beneath his feet tilt.

All those times he had come home late, bragging about his tough negotiations with bankers...

All those times he had made her wait for hours while he entertained clients or spent time with Claire...

All those times he had treated her like a fragile, simple domestic wife who should be grateful for his name...

She was holding forty billion dollars. She could have bought his entire syndicate ten times over with the spare change in her interest accounts.

“And you,” Carmine hissed, pointing his finger at Dante’s chest. “You left her on the floor while she was bleeding out with my grandson! You ignored fourteen calls to stay in a hotel room with a gold-digger!”

“I didn't know she was in labor!” Dante pleaded, his voice sounding desperate and hollow even to himself. “Dad, I swear to God, if I had known she was bleeding, I would have flown back immediately!”

“It doesn't matter what you knew!” Carmine barked. “What matters is what she knows! She knows that when she needed you most, you didn't answer!”

One of the senior captains, a grizzled man named Sal, stepped forward nervously. “Don Carmine... what are our options? The docks in Brooklyn are completely shut down. The union bosses are refusing to talk to us because their pension funds are managed by Vale Global. If we don't have cash by tomorrow, our guys on the street won't get paid.”

Carmine slowly sat back down in his leather chair, looking old, tired, and defeated.

“We only have one option,” Carmine said softly.

Dante looked at his father. “What option?”

Carmine looked up, his eyes cold as ice. “You are going to find your wife. You are going to drop to your knees in front of her. You are going to crawl, beg, weep, and kiss her feet until she agrees to talk to us. And if she demands that you cut your own hand off to prove your regret... you will do it without hesitation.”

Dante’s blood ran cold. “And if she refuses to talk to me?”