Borrowed Bride: A Fake Marriage, Secret Baby, Dark, Mafia Romance (Mafia Lords of Sin)

Twelve months ago, I turned up on Leonardo Simone’s doorstep drenched from the storm and begging for his help.

With my emotions in constant fluctuation from giving birth, it was painfully easy to fall into the role of damsel in distress just to get safety and security for Freya and I.

I told myself I didn’t believe a word Fawn said about Marco, and yet I couldn’t risk possibly endangering my daughter. So, Leo was my only hope as the wolves closed in around me.noveldrama

He took me in without question and was very clearly eager to save someone from Marco Barrone. I cried in his arms for days and he never left my side. To his credit, in the first few months he was very attentive, and Freya and I were taken care of to the highest degree.

It was only supposed to be a few months—just until I was able to feed Freya properly and get her all her vaccines and required injections. Then, it was until I could get her to sleep through the night and get both of us back up to a healthy weight. The days turned into weeks, and the weeks bled into months. Before I knew it, six months had passed, and I was no closer to understanding anything Fawn had told me.

It was difficult to dwell on that when my baby daughter now consumed my entire life.

And she was thriving. Thanks to the intense security Leonardo had at his home estate, she was happy, healthy, and safe. To my knowledge, no threat ever reached my door, and it became almost too easy to keep up the pretense of needing saving.

Leonardo would ask me often how I escaped from Marco, and I would tell him a vague tale of escaping from the hospital after sending Marco away for the nurse. Leo would always get the same sad look of understanding on his face whenever I told that story, then he would promise me constantly that I was safe and no one would harm me and my daughter.

I came to enjoy that security because, unlike Marco, Leonardo was rather absent. He would always call ahead to let me know when he was coming, and we would spend a lot of time together when he helped me with Freya, but all in all, I was given my privacy.

And then Leonardo proposed.

It came as a huge shock when he got down on one knee and declared that he had fallen in love with me. He wanted to ensure the safety and security of me and my daughter for the rest of our lives and I was completely lost for words.

I warmed to him, but I didn’t love him.

And yet, I got the distinct impression that I couldn’t say no. If he decided to toss me out on the streets, I would be right back at square one with no idea who was a threat, or how to keep my daughter safe. It was one thing to pick pockets and scam men for money; it was quite another to support myself and a seven-month-old baby.

So I said yes.

Protecting Freya became my priority from the second she was born and keeping Leonardo on my side was the best way to do that.

With the engagement came a new freedom as Leo left me to plan every detail. In his words, he wanted me to have a dream wedding so everything would be under my control.

During the day, I would do just that. But as the nights drew in and my mommy brain no longer became the main ruler in my mind, I started to dig.

I dug into Marco and his father, Dante. My time spent looking into Cherry had made me rather deft at connecting dots and finding out things that were meant to be hidden, so within a few weeks I was knee-deep in hell. It wasn’t that hard to find information on the families that did dealings with the Barrone’s. I remembered most of them from that dinner where Marco and Leo were at each other’s throats.

From there, I followed thread after thread and a semblance of the truth began to become clear to me.

Fawn was right, to a degree.

Many families involved with Marco ended up culled, one way or another. The men would end up dead through accidents that I knew to be code for murder, and the families of women and children would vanish. There would be no trace of them anywhere, and from those disappearances came the rumors.

Rumors now backed up by Fawn’s story and the obvious pain of her past.

Every piece of evidence I scrape together after hours of digging, points at Marco’s direct involvement, but my heart refuses to accept it. On one hand, he’s a dangerous man leading an even more dangerous Mafia. He’s callous and brutish, and I witnessed firsthand how eager he is to kill when he had Leo cornered. That version of him might be capable of Fawn’s accusations.

But each time my mind reaches that conclusion, my heart twists in a different direction and I think of the man who would do anything for his sister. The man who has given up his life to protect her and keep her safe, who even sacrificed his own happiness to prevent her from being married off.

It’s like I’m dealing with two different versions of the same man.

And he is the father of my child. The idea that he could be capable of such a betrayal is more than I can bear, and my researching nights always end the same; sickened as I war with myself over what is the truth.

Fawn truly believes her truth, and it’s not completely baseless given what I’ve found. But I struggle to accept the idea that he sold her into slavery.

And that I could have been next.

That kind of research fills the next few months and then, in a blink, I’ve been with Leo for a year. Freya’s first birthday is a grand affair in the estate, and Leo puts on such a show that I entertain the idea of staying here for good.

I’m safe. Freya would have a good life, a safe life.

That is what I should want.

And yet Marco never leaves my thoughts. The truth is mucky and I’m being pulled in two directions, each as unforgiving as the next.

Without confronting Marco, the truth remains muddied like garden puddles after a downpour, and each time I look into Freya’s eyes, all I see is him.

Did I really fall for a monster? Did I wander like a lamb right into the jaws of the lion?

I’m no closer to the truth when yet another day of research ends at the same conclusion; no one knows. There’s nothing concrete, but there is enough belief and suspicion that the Barrones are deep in the skin trade and no woman is safe.

“What are you looking at?” comes Leo’s voice as he wanders close, rocking Freya in his arms. She gurgles up at him and he smiles widely, then he tries to peer over my shoulder.

I slam the laptop closed and grasp his collar, distracting him with a light kiss on his cheek. “Wedding surprise,” I say, throwing him off the track.

“You can’t give me a hint?” When he moves in for a real kiss, I slip away and ease Freya from his arms, then shake my head.

“The wedding is next week, you can’t wait that long?”

Leo rolls his eyes and fixes me with a steady stare. “I’d wait forever for you.”

It’s painfully romantic and so misplaced that my heart breaks for him, but I force a smile regardless, trying to ignore the strange, cold look in his eyes.

It hits me at that moment that Leonardo isn’t just my protector anymore—he is my captor. And he’s beginning to sense that my heart isn’t in this engagement.

I have to stay strong and see this through to the end. Once I’m married to Leo and Freya’s safety is secured, I can plan my next steps.

Until then? I am the perfect fiancée.