My Bride, My Mercy

The mornings in the Romano estate always began the same way—without sunlight, without warmth. Aria woke to the sound of the metal latch on her door sliding open. It wasn’t a door, not really. Just a repurposed storage room in the servant’s wing with a bed barely large enough to fit her frame and a small metal bucket tucked into the shadows. They hadn’t bothered to give her a window. People didn’t give windows to keepsakes. “Get up,” the guard at the door muttered, not bothering to look at her. He tossed a folded maid’s dress onto her bed, the same dull black uniform with the pale gray apron she wore every day. Aria sat up slowly, her joints stiff from the cold floor she slept on after the thin mattress had rotted through. She didn’t speak. She’d learned the cost of wasted words years ago. The guard shut the door again without waiting to see if she followed orders—if she didn’t, someone else would drag her out by her hair. She slipped into the uniform and tied the apron, fingers steady despite the tremor in her bones. The mirror in the corner was cracked down the center, and she only ever saw herself in pieces. The girl looking back had long black hair in rough waves, ending unevenly where someone had once cut it with a knife after she’d tried to pull him off her. Her eyes—those once bright, proud hazel eyes—looked faded, like a painting left in the rain. She tucked her hair back and left the room, avoiding the guard’s gaze as she stepped into the hallway. The servant’s wing was quiet except for hushed footsteps and stifled coughs. Most of the staff avoided her. Not because she disgusted them, though some told themselves that lie, but because they were afraid to be associated with her. The last person who’d spoken kindly to Aria had lost three fingers for it. The Romano mansion stretched across the outskirts of the city like a parasite feasting on land that didn't belong to it. The corridors were lined with Italian marble and adorned with gold-trimmed portraits of Salvatore’s ancestors—men who had murdered their way into wealth and then painted over the blood. A thin woman named Emilia, another maid and the closest thing Aria had to an acquaintance, passed her with a bundle of linens in her arms. Emilia hesitated, just slightly, then whispered without looking at her, “The east hall. Don’t be late. They’re in a mood.” Aria nodded once and moved on. Today, the household was louder than usual. Footsteps, nervous muttering, and orders snapped in sharp Italian bounced through the halls. Something was happening. Something big. She didn’t have to be told what—it would have made its way through the staff whispers like smoke in a locked room. Salvatore Romano was hosting a meeting. Not with subordinates. Not with allies. With another mafia organization—one stronger, wealthier, and old enough to remember when guns weren’t their sharpest weapon. She’d heard the guards muttering about it in the kitchens at dawn. The De Luca syndicate was visiting. She kept her head down as she passed one of Salvatore’s men in the hall. Marco, a tall brute with scarred knuckles and an appetite for cruelty, flicked his eyes toward her. His lip curled. “I don’t know why he keeps you around,” he sneered. “Should’ve sold you off with the rest of the brats.” Aria said nothing. Marco stepped closer, blocking her path. His breath reeked of cigarettes and stale wine though it wasn’t even eight in the morning. “You’ll be serving drinks tonight,” he said, voice dripping amusement. “Champagne, wine, whatever they ask for. Don’t spill a drop, souvenir.” That word—souvenir—always tasted like rust in her mouth. He shoved her shoulder as he walked past, and she steadied herself before she could stumble. She didn’t turn around. Men like that wanted the satisfaction of seeing her flinch. She would not give them that. She entered the east hall to help the other servants prepare. The ballroom-style chamber had vaulted ceilings painted with angels and devils locked in battle. Aria remembered when she’d run across this room as a child, her father’s deep laugh echoing as he pretended to chase her. He had been a king then—not a politician hiding behind wealth, but a man feared across cities and seas. Don’t think of him. Thinking hurt worse than the wounds she didn’t let heal. She joined Emilia and two other maids as they laid out glassware across long tables. Men in dark suits moved in and out of the room, setting up chairs, checking weapons, arguing over placement. The entire estate pulsed with tension. “Romano wants everything perfect,” Emilia murmured beside her without turning. “They say Luciano De Luca himself is coming.” Luciano. The name flickered in Aria’s mind like a ghost rising through smoke. She couldn’t remember his face—she had been so young—but she remembered her father once speaking the name with a rare tone of approval. A lieutenant, maybe. One of many men who had worked in the shadows of her family’s reign. He didn’t save them. None of them did. By noon, she’d been assigned kitchen duty. By late afternoon, she was handed a silver tray and told to prepare the champagne service. As she polished the glasses, Salvatore Romano passed by the kitchen entrance with two of his capos. He glanced in her direction only once—cold, flat, dismissive. She might as well have been a stain on the tile. He hadn’t aged kindly. His once-dark hair was now streaked with silver at the temples, and deep lines carved his face from too many late nights and too much greed. But his eyes—those dead, shark-black eyes—were exactly as she remembered them the night her world collapsed. Aria’s breath caught, but only for a moment. Then she lowered her head and kept cleaning. When the sun fell and the chandeliers were lit, the estate transformed into a stage. Guests began to arrive, their cars lining the courtyard in glossy black rows. Men in suits and women in sleek dresses moved through the halls like hunting cats, every step a warning. Guns were holstered beneath coats, and whispers curled through the air like smoke. Aria stood among the servants, tray in hand, as Salvatore greeted the arriving members of the De Luca syndicate at the entrance. She wasn’t close enough to hear the words exchanged, but she could see his strained smile, the tightness around his jaw. Whoever had come clearly outranked him. She kept her eyes low, heart thudding beneath the collar of her uniform. She had become a master of invisibility—of being present without existing. But fate has a cruel sense of humor. As she followed the line of servants into the clearing near the dining hall, she caught a glimpse of the man walking beside Salvatore. He was tall, broad-shouldered, dressed in a tailored black suit that looked like it had been stitched around him. His hair was dark and neatly swept back, his features sharp enough to carve silence. She didn’t see his eyes. Not yet. She didn’t know he would look at her soon. That he would remember a past she had buried beneath blood and ash. That his name would break what little silence remained in her bones. All she knew, in that moment, was the weight of the tray in her hands and the knowledge that breathing too loudly could get her killed. She focused on her steps, on the polished floorboards, on the reflections in the glasses she carried. She did not see the future coming for her. Not yet. But it was already here.