Claimed By The Mafia Don (Ariella and Asher) novel Chapter 263

ASHER

My voice was almost a whisper now, pleading.

“Maybe I would have argued, but I would have wanted to know. Curious enough to try. Curious enough to get a DNA test, to fight for him. Why didn’t you?”

Her shoulders slumped as she let out a shaky breath.

“I just…” she said, her voice breaking, “I don’t want to blame you, Asher. But sometimes I wonder why, too. There are a lot of things that happened.... and not all of them are my story. Some of them involve other people.”

“Other people?” I asked, frowning, my pulse kicking up. “What do you mean?”

She looked at me then, really looked at me, her eyes full of something I couldn’t name.

“Just let me start from the beginning,” she said finally, her voice steady, resolved. “Let me tell you what happened five years ago. All right?”

I nodded, every muscle in my body tense, bracing. “I’m listening.”

"It all started with the Don visit, I should say."

"My father, you mean?" I asked.

"Yes." She nodded. "He came with the consigliere to our house. You knew they were coming to talk about our marriage....everyone knew. I was with my mom in the other room, and we were both so excited. I was going to get married to the man I loved, the next Don. My mother was over the moon. But then, when the Don left, something changed."

Her tone softened, her gaze going distant, as if she was half in the room, half back in that moment.

"My dad… he wasn’t really a fan of you at first," she said with a faint, sad smile. "You know how he was....protective, stubborn. He told me, ‘This is the Don's son. He acts like he respects me, but he knows I’m just a low soldier. He might not treat you right just because he knows I can’t do anything to him.’ He was skeptical. But he was coming around.

"When we heard that your dad was coming to actually put everything into writing, that we were officially going to get married, my father finally started to relax. But after that visit, he changed."

She shook her head slowly.

"And it wasn’t gradual. It happened overnight. He just… put distance between us. Sometimes, when we were having dinner, I would catch him looking at me with this sadness, like something heavy was eating at him. Soon after, my mom changed too."

Her laugh was soft and bitter.

She swallows hard, her eyes glassy but fierce.

"And that’s when my dad told me that your father had already arranged a marriage for you, to the Russian princess...... I guess that’s who you’re married to now. We’ve never really talked about that," she says softly.

I just nod at her, her words heavy in my chest.

"Yes," I answer quietly.

"And that’s what your dad said," she continues. "He said I was just a woman from a lowly family, that I didn’t deserve to be married to the next Don. That his son was going to expand his empire and strengthen it, and I wouldn’t be bringing anything to the table.

"He told my dad that he had also gotten married for his empire, and that his son was going to do the same. But he also said that I or my family didn’t need to feel embarrassed or taken advantage of. He was going to marry me himself, to sever any kind of ties that might exist between you and me..... to stop you from doing anything foolish," she says, her voice trailing off.

What Ariella is saying frightens me. I know I saw that contract, but there were these threats she’s telling me about now that were not written anywhere, things I had never known.

I know for a fact that he threatened them... He had to. But I didn’t know how far he would go, or what exactly he said, to keep their whole family silent. To keep Ariella silent. To stop her from trusting me enough to tell me what was going on. To keep her from coming to me for help.... Not giving me a chance to save my child..... To save them