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My Rape Tape Crashed My Wedding. My Mafia Husband Made It.
Novelix
Completed
I was raped, and someone recorded it. On my wedding day, the video is played for everyone to see. My fiancé watches it, then marries my best friend. I lose my fiancé, my reputation, and everything I have. Then Roman Voss, the most feared Mafia Don in the city, walks onto the stage, destroys the screen, and drops to one knee. "Marry me." I say yes. For three years, I give him everything. Until I discover the truth: Roman was the one who planned it all. That night, I jump into the sea.
Chapters (6)
第1章
On my wedding day, a video appeared on the screen.
It showed the darkest day of my life, the day I was raped.
My fiancé Julian tears off my wedding ring and slips it onto my bridesmaid Delphine's finger.
"Yara, don't make that face. Everyone here just saw you with another man. You're ruined."
"How am I supposed to marry you now?"
Delphine laughs. She glances at me.
"Come on, Yara. We've been best friends for years. You know me better than anyone."
"If you can't be his wife, why not let me be? Trust me, I'll take care of the man you love."
Then Delphine pretends to lose her balance and shoves me hard into the crowd.
Someone paws at me. Another person deliberately steps on my wedding dress, while someone else splashes champagne on my dress.
Suddenly, a gunshot rings out. The giant screen explodes. The crowd recoils in panic.
Roman Voss, one of the city's most powerful Mafia dons, storms in and shields me.
Then he drops to one knee in front of me.
"Yara, will you marry me?"
"Yes." I nod with the tears in my eyes.
For three years, I was happy in my marriage. The day I find out I'm pregnant, I walk to Roman's study to share the news, and hear his voice through the door.
"The Fosters care about their reputation. Ruin Yara, and they'll never take her back. Delphine wanted to marry Julian. How could I say no?"
I froze, and he continued.
"Love Yara? Don't be ridiculous. I could never fall for a woman that filthy."
--
My fingers go numb.
Then the laughter coming from inside the study turns my stomach.
"Genius, boss. Swap her vitamins for abortion pills. She can't carry a baby naturally, so she goes straight to IVF."
"And she has no idea the embryo inside her already belongs to Julian and Delphine. If she ever found out, she'd lose her mind."
Roman grinds his cigarette into the ashtray and stands.
"Better if she does. When the baby comes, we tell her it didn't survive. She'll blame herself. Women like her always do."
His eyes sweep the room, flat and cold.
"Nothing from this room goes anywhere. I need her quiet and cooperative until that child is born."
Silas laughs.
"Relax, boss. That woman is so stupid it's almost funny. We let her think she runs this house, and she actually believes it. Even cooks for us every single day."
"If she knew I was the one who handpicked every man from that night, every single one, she'd die on the spot."
Someone across the room grins.
"Silas, that's not fair. Why didn't you pick me? I would've loved a turn..."
A fruit knife slams into the table between his legs before he can finish.
The room goes dead silent.
"She may be ruined," Roman says quietly, "but she's still my wife. Anyone brings that up again loses more than just a knife."
One of his men clears his throat.
"Boss, you don't feel anything for her? She's got more backbone than she looks. Aren't you worried she finds out one day and walks?"
Roman laughs like he just heard something pathetic.
"A ruined woman desperate for love? Two soft words and she crawls back like a dog. Every time."
The room breaks into laughter.
I'm pressed against the wall outside, and I can't feel my hands.
I clamp my palm over my mouth. I'm shaking, and I can't make it stop. I bite the inside of my cheek until I taste blood, and I still can't stop.
Footsteps move toward the door.
I turn and walk downstairs fast.
I grab a glass of wine off the side table and throw it back in one swallow.
It burns all the way down, and I let it.
I dig my nails into my palm and stand there while it all replays in my head.
A week before my wedding to Julian, Delphine called. Her car had broken down, and she needed a ride. I went.
What happened that night took everything from me.
My dignity. My reputation. The wedding I had spent months planning.
Julian wept and swore he still loved me. Then the video played in front of the entire church, and he slid my ring onto Delphine's finger without a single word.
Roman walked in. Roman held me while the room screamed.
He dropped to one knee, had ten crates of gold bars and diamonds brought before me, and told me he'd rather die than spend his life without me.
I looked into his eyes and believed every word.
Delphine was smiling at me from the front row that day.
I thought it was sympathy.
Turns out, it was mockery. Pity.
She knew before she even walked through those doors.
That wedding was never mine. It was hers.
And I spent three years loving the man who built it all for her.
I bite down until the pain is the only thing I can feel.
Then a pair of hands lands on my shoulders from behind.
Roman pulls me into him. He takes one look at my face, and his brow furrows.
"Who made my wife cry?" he says. "Step up."
第2章
Nobody moves. Every man in the room stares at the floor, not breathing.
Roman lets the silence sit for a second, then reaches for the gun at his hip and presses it into my hand.
He wraps his arm around me from behind, his hand over mine, and sweeps the barrel slowly across the room.
"Anyone who upset you, baby. Pick one. I'll handle the rest."
Every man the gun passes over flinches, but no one dares move.
They all know what happens to people who cross Roman Voss.
He runs the docks, controls the courts, and owns half the city's supply lines. The other half is controlled by a rival he's been circling for years.
The barrel lands on Silas.
I go still.
Silas's face drains, a muscle jumping in his jaw. He doesn't say a word. And all I can hear is his voice from earlier, easy and proud.
I was the one who handpicked every man from that night. Every single one.
My finger finds the trigger.
Roman's hand closes over mine and pushes the barrel down.
"The doctor just called. The IVF worked." He presses his lips to my temple and his voice goes soft.
"Let's not scare our son before he's even born."
He looks at me the way he always does. Like I'm the only thing in the room.
If I hadn't heard what I heard tonight, I might have believed it.
He glances at the empty wine glass on the side table. His thumb traces slow circles over my fingers.
"How long have you been down here? Did you come up looking for me?"
I keep my voice steady. "No. You know I hate the smoke. I stayed down here."
He watches me for two seconds. Then he smiles, pats my head once, and tells the housekeeper to bring me some juice.
She steps forward and holds it out.
Roman raises the gun and shoots her in the head.
The glass hits the floor. She doesn't. She stays upright for one terrible second, arm still extended, eyes wide open, then drops at my feet.
Blood spreads across the tile in a slow, dark line.
I can't move. My whole body is locked, stomach lurching hard, and I can't make any part of me work.
Roman pulls a handkerchief from his pocket and wipes my face clean. Then he picks up the juice, crouches in front of me, and feeds it to me sip by sip like nothing happened.
His soldiers line the walls and not one of them looks at the body.
Behind him, two of them drag the housekeeper out by her ankles.
"Giving alcohol to a pregnant woman. She had no business being in this house." He cups my face in his hands, thumbs brushing my cheeks.
"I'm sorry, baby. You've been through enough. We have a baby now. No more wine, okay? Promise me."
He pulls back and looks at me. "This baby is going to be born healthy. No matter what it takes. You understand?"
I smile. "Okay."
My heart feels like ice.
Three years. Eight pregnancies. Every single one lost, for no reason the doctors could ever explain.
Six months ago they told me my body was done, that I'd never carry naturally again.
Roman held me while I cried. He told me it didn't matter, that all he needed was me.
I was the one who couldn't accept it.
I was the one who pushed for IVF, who let them stick me with needles, who swallowed hormones that kept me up every night for months.
I thought I was fighting for us.
Delphine wanted the Foster name, so Roman destroyed mine instead.
Delphine didn't want the pain, so Roman gave her my body to carry it instead.
Roman touches my forehead, gentle as always.
"You look pale. Are you feeling sick?"
第3章
"Just morning sickness," I say. "I'm fine."
Roman pulls me closer, one hand rubbing slow circles on my back.
"You've been so patient with me, baby. We never got proper wedding photos. I already put a deposit on the dress you liked, the one you pointed out last month. Tomorrow I'm taking you to shoot them, before the bump gets too big."
I look at him.
Such a devoted face. Such careful, practiced eyes. He has been lying to me for three years, and he has never once slipped.
If he knew I had no intention of carrying this baby to term, I'd end up like the housekeeper.
"I'm going to rest," I say. "You finish up."
I make it to the bathroom before my stomach gives out. I stay on the floor beside the toilet until there's nothing left, tears running down my face, one hand pressed flat against the cold tile.
The pain means nothing. Not compared to what he did to me.
When I finally come out, Roman's phone is sitting on the coffee table. He forgot it.
Roman has a rule about his phone. Everyone in this house knows it. I have never touched it in three years.
Now I pick it up without thinking. I try my birthday. Wrong. I try his. Wrong.
I type in Delphine's birthday.
It unlocks.
The screen that comes up is a photo of her on tiptoe, laughing as she presses a kiss to his cheek.
It's a second system hidden inside the phone, separate from the main screen. The home screen holds nothing but a few photo albums and a messaging app.
Eight thousand photos. Every single one of Delphine.
Four folders. Each one labeled with a single word.
Together, they read: Delphine. My. One. Love.
Tears fall onto the screen, and I don't wipe them away.
It's not the betrayal that breaks me. It's the waste. Three years of my life, my body, my heart, all of it spent on a man who was keeping a shrine to another woman the whole time.
I'm about to put the phone down when something in one of the photos catches my eye.
Delphine's right shoulder.
A birthmark, small and rose-shaped.
I reach up and touch my own right shoulder.
Same place. Same shape. Identical.
We've known each other for years. She never once mentioned it. Neither did I, because I never knew she had one.
But I remember the last time things shifted between us.
I'd just come back from a medical exchange program abroad when I mentioned, almost casually, that I'd once pulled a man off the street, covered in nine stab wounds and left for dead on the docks.
After that, Delphine got cold.
She stopped calling. Stopped showing up.
A few weeks later, she was introduced as Roman's adopted sister.
Roman treated her like she had given him his life back. He told everyone she had once saved his life, and in his world, that was enough to make her untouchable.
Every soldier in his organization would die before letting anyone lay a hand on her.
And Delphine has never set foot in that city.
I know because she told me herself, more than once, with that particular curl of her lip, how much she despised everything about it.
My legs give out. I catch myself on the edge of the table and hold on.
The thought forming in my head is almost too big to face.
I cover my face with both hands.
I don't know whether I'm laughing or crying.
I think it might be both.
第4章
A long moment passes before I move.
I set Roman's phone back on the coffee table exactly where I found it. I dry my face.
Then I pull out my own phone and dial a number I've been holding onto for a long time. I never knew why I'd kept it until now.
"I have a deal for you. Guaranteed. One billion."
"What kind of deal?"
"In three days, I need you to kidnap me."
I look down at my stomach, and my voice comes out flat.
"Roman will pay whatever you ask. You have my word."
I hang up.
The door opens behind me.
Roman is drunk, unsteady on his feet, one hand catching the doorframe before he crosses to me and wraps his fingers around my wrist.
"Whatever I'll pay? What is it? What did I just hear?"
I don't blink. "I found a jewelry set I wanted. The shop requires a down payment."
He pulls his black card from his pocket and pushes it into my hand.
"Pay it. Pay all of it."
He leans in close, eyes glassy, voice dropping to something soft and slurred.
"Anything you want, baby. Anything at all. You're mine and I'm yours."
He pulls me closer, hands fumbling, voice going quieter.
"My Delphine. Come here."
I go still.
He doesn't notice. His eyes are closed, head dipping toward my shoulder.
I push him onto the couch and walk out of the room without looking back.
I lie in bed all night with my eyes open.
The next morning we're in the car on the way to the photo studio when Roman's phone goes off. He takes the call, listens for ten seconds, and pulls over hard.
"There's a problem at the docks. I have to go now."
He looks at me, something close to guilt moving across his face.
"I'll send Silas to take you home. Tomorrow, I promise. Just the two of us. We'll get the photos done."
I pull my hand back. "Go. It's fine."
He leans over to kiss me.
I open the door and step out before he reaches me.
He pauses, then starts to say something.
But his phone rings again.
I watch him make his choice in under a second, already pulling back onto the road before I've taken three steps.
Silas's car arrives in under ten minutes.
I get in.
My phone buzzes as the door closes.
A photo from a number I don't recognize.
Delphine is wearing my wedding dress, the custom one I spent weeks choosing, straddling Roman's lap.
His hand is at her waist, his mouth pressed to the rose-shaped birthmark on her right shoulder, and the look on his face is one I've never seen him give me.
Underneath it is a voice message. My thumb moves before I think to stop it.
"The only way I get through it is if I close my eyes and imagine you. My Delphine. I miss you. Come take care of me."
The car is completely silent.
Then Silas laughs. Short and cold.
I look up.
Outside the window, nothing is familiar.
This is not the way home.
"Silas. What are you doing?"
The car stops hard.
I lunge for the other door.
Silas is faster. His hand closes around my ankle and he drags me out onto the ground.
I hit the pavement, pain shooting through my entire body.
"I'm carrying Roman's child. Do you have any idea what he'll do to you?"
A laugh comes from behind me. High and sharp.
第5章
"Yara, you are so incredibly stupid." Delphine steps forward and plants her foot on my face, looking down at me the way you'd look at something you scraped off the ground.
"You think Roman would ever let someone like you carry his child?"
Silas pulls her into him and kisses her like I'm not lying two feet away. When he pulls back, he looks at me and grins.
"You heard everything outside that study, didn't you? Here's what you didn't catch."
"I found some homeless guy off the street and had him sleep with you. So that baby you're carrying? It's his, not Roman's."
Everything stops.
Delphine tips her head back and laughs.
"God, you're filthy inside and out now. A bastard's baby with a whore for a mother. What's the difference between you and the girls working the corner?"
"At least they get paid. You actually paid to carry some stranger's bastard."
"One not enough? Maybe next time I'll give you a whole litter. You'd make a damn good sow."
The blood rushes to my head so fast I can't see straight.
I grab a chunk of broken concrete off the ground and lunge.
Silas's boot connects with my stomach before I get there. I fly back and hit the pavement, the pain so intense I can't breathe, can't think, can't do anything but lie there with the ground pressing into my face.
Then Delphine screams.
Perfectly timed. She staggers backward, hands flying up, eyes stretched wide with terror that didn't exist two seconds ago.
Roman comes sprinting around the corner and his foot lands square on my outstretched hand as he passes, his full weight grinding into my fingers for one long second.
He doesn't look down.
He doesn't stop.
He wraps both arms around Delphine and pulls her in, one hand cradling the back of her head.
"Delphine. Talk to me. Are you hurt? Where does it hurt?"
She burrows into his chest and lets the tears fall.
"Yara, I know you're not over Julian. I know it's hard. But Roman treats you so well. I only wanted to talk, to ask you not to hurt him. I didn't think you'd react like this."
She pulls back just enough to look up at Roman, voice dropping to something small and wounded.
"I'm pregnant, Roman. I was scared to say anything. And she knew, and she still..."
She doesn't finish. She doesn't need to.
Silas steps forward right on cue.
"Boss, I have to speak up for Miss Cross. Your wife came at her out of nowhere. Called the baby a nobody's. Threatened to have you put me down. I tried to stop her. She grabbed a rock. Miss Cross has been nothing but patient."
Roman says nothing.
I know that silence. I've lived inside it for three years. It's the silence that comes right before he decides something, and once he decides, it's already done.
He looks at me once. Just once.
"Yara. Anyone who touches Delphine answers to me. I don't care who they are."
I laugh. It comes out broken.
"Roman. Tell me honestly. Is this baby yours?"
His jaw tightens. Something moves across his face, there and gone in under a second. Then his expression hardens into something colder than anger.
"Is that your way of saying you want it to be Julian's?"
He turns to Silas.
"Take her to the basement. Nothing until I say otherwise."
He doesn't look at me again. He walks away with Delphine tucked against his side, her face buried in his chest, one hand curled into his shirt.
I watch them until they disappear.
Silas crouches down in front of me, turning something slowly between two fingers. Two steel pins, narrow and sharp.
"House rules," he says pleasantly. "One of these in the right spot and you'll never walk straight again. Two, and you spend the rest of your life on the floor."
I open my mouth.
His knee comes down on my foot and he drives the first pin in.
The pain doesn't build. It detonates.
I don't hear myself scream. I don't hear anything at all.
The world goes dark before the second one lands.
第6章
I wake up two days later in my room.
Every part of my body hurts, but my ankles are something else entirely. Every time I try to move my ankles, pain shoots straight up both legs, so sharp and deep it takes my breath away.
I lie still and wait for the pain to ease enough for me to think straight.
My phone is beside me. The screen is full of notifications.
All from Delphine.
Photos, videos, one after another.
Roman in an apron in her kitchen, cooking for her.
Roman kneeling at her feet with a basin of warm water.
Roman feeding her, tucking her in, laughing at something she said with his whole face lit up in a way I have never once seen when he's with me.
The two of them at an amusement park in matching outfits, sharing an ice cream cone, his eyes on her like she's the only thing in the world worth looking at.
Three years. Not once had he ever done any of that for me. Not once had he treated me like that.
I put the phone down and bite through the pain until I can sit up.
The divorce papers are in the drawer where I put them weeks ago, already signed on my end, waiting.
I take them out.
Underneath them is the document I brought back from abroad six years ago, a medical report from the night I pulled a man off the docks with nine stab wounds and spent four hours in surgery keeping him alive.
The report lists my injuries. What it cost me to save him.
I set both on the floor in the most visible spot in the room.
Then I drag myself to the window.
It takes a long time. My arms do most of the work.
By the time I manage to get my elbows over the ledge, I'm shaking and soaked through, but I get there. I get there and I look out.
Below, the sea. The villa sits right on the water, and tonight the waves are high and dark and moving fast.
A little ways out, almost too small to notice, a boat waits quietly in the dark. Exactly where I told them to wait.
My phone buzzes.
Roman.
When you're ready to apologize, come to the hospital and do it on your knees. I already put in a word for you. Delphine is generous. She'll forgive you if you mean it.
Another message.
Be reasonable. The wedding photos are tomorrow. I still want to take them with you.
I look at the messages for a long time.
Then I type back.
The biggest mistake I ever made was six years ago, on the docks, pulling some ungrateful bastard out of the water after he'd been stabbed nine times and keeping him alive.
I drop the phone.
I don't look back at the room. I don't look at the papers on the floor.
I jump.
Behind me, the phone on the floor suddenly starts vibrating like crazy.
