He Traded A Diamond For Cheap Glass

He Traded A Diamond For Cheap Glass

Bei Ke

5.0
Comment(s)
14.4K
View
23
Chapters

I was the "Ice Queen," the perfect Mafia wife who managed the De Luca empire's millions while my husband, Alessandro, played the part of the feared Underboss. I thought my silence and competence earned me respect. That was until I woke up in the estate's medical bay with a shattered leg. My saddle had snapped mid-jump. It wasn't wear and tear; it was sabotage. Lying in the dark, feigning sleep, I heard Alessandro whispering outside my door with his enforcer. "The buckle was filed down," the enforcer said urgently. "Aria tampered with it. She could have broken her neck." I waited for Alessandro's rage. I waited for him to execute the mistress who tried to kill his wife. Instead, his voice was cold and dismissive. "Bury it," Alessandro ordered. "It's just a broken leg. Aria was upset about the credit cards. She just wanted to teach Katarina a lesson." A lesson. My husband wasn't just cheating on me; he was protecting the woman who tried to cripple me. Three days later, at the Family Charity Gala, he humiliated me publicly. He outbid me for my grandmother's heirloom necklace and clasped it around Aria's neck while I watched from my wheelchair. He thought I was broken. He thought I was just a piece of furniture to be rearranged. He didn't know I had bugged the entire villa while I was recovering. He didn't know I had the recordings of what Aria was really doing when he wasn't looking. I gripped the USB drive in my pocket and signaled the tech team to lock the doors. The statue was broken, but he was about to learn that shattered ice is sharp enough to slit a throat.

He Traded A Diamond For Cheap Glass Chapter 1

I was the "Ice Queen," the perfect Mafia wife who managed the De Luca empire's millions while my husband, Alessandro, played the part of the feared Underboss.

I thought my silence and competence earned me respect.

That was until I woke up in the estate's medical bay with a shattered leg.

My saddle had snapped mid-jump. It wasn't wear and tear; it was sabotage.

Lying in the dark, feigning sleep, I heard Alessandro whispering outside my door with his enforcer.

"The buckle was filed down," the enforcer said urgently. "Aria tampered with it. She could have broken her neck."

I waited for Alessandro's rage. I waited for him to execute the mistress who tried to kill his wife.

Instead, his voice was cold and dismissive.

"Bury it," Alessandro ordered. "It's just a broken leg. Aria was upset about the credit cards. She just wanted to teach Katarina a lesson."

A lesson.

My husband wasn't just cheating on me; he was protecting the woman who tried to cripple me.

Three days later, at the Family Charity Gala, he humiliated me publicly. He outbid me for my grandmother's heirloom necklace and clasped it around Aria's neck while I watched from my wheelchair.

He thought I was broken. He thought I was just a piece of furniture to be rearranged.

He didn't know I had bugged the entire villa while I was recovering.

He didn't know I had the recordings of what Aria was really doing when he wasn't looking.

I gripped the USB drive in my pocket and signaled the tech team to lock the doors.

The statue was broken, but he was about to learn that shattered ice is sharp enough to slit a throat.

Chapter 1

Katarina De Luca POV

The encrypted financial ledgers digging into my palm were proof that my husband was the most feared Underboss in New York. But when I heard the woman's laughter from behind his study door, that fear dissolved into a cold, hard realization.

The sound offered me exactly two choices: die a silent, dutiful wife, or burn this entire mansion to the ground and survive as a widow.

The laughter wasn't soft. It was the loud, performative shriek of a woman who knew she was trespassing and wanted the world to know it.

I stood frozen in the hallway.

My hands, usually steady enough to sign death warrants on bank transfers, betrayed me with a subtle tremor.

The ledger dug harder into my hip.

Alessandro De Luca. The Heir. The man who could silence a room of hardened criminals with a single glance.

He was my husband.

He was the man I had molded myself into a statue for.

I was the Ice Queen. The perfect Mafia wife. I spoke only when spoken to. I dressed in neutrals. I managed the legitimate front of the De Luca empire with the precision of a surgeon.

I did it all to earn a scrap of his respect.

"You're so warm," Alessandro's voice drifted through the wood. It was low, husky. A tone he never used with me. "Real. Not like the ice sculpture I have to sleep next to."

The air left my lungs as if I'd been punched.

Ice sculpture.

That was what I was to him. A decoration. Cold. Lifeless.

I looked at my reflection in the hallway mirror.

My hair was pulled back in a severe chignon. My dress was a structured grey sheath. I looked like a fortress.

I looked like a woman who didn't feel pain.

But beneath the silk and wool, my chest was cracking open.

I pushed the door open.

I didn't knock.

The scene inside was a cliché that tasted like bile.

Aria Diaz was perched on the edge of his mahogany desk. Her legs were spread, her cheap pink dress hiked up to her thighs.

Alessandro stood between them. His hands were on her waist. His head was buried in her neck.

They froze.

Aria didn't look ashamed. She looked thrilled.

She smirked at me, a victor's grin, and deliberately ran a manicured nail down Alessandro's chest, leaving a faint red scratch.

"Katarina," Alessandro said.

He didn't pull away. He didn't look guilty. He looked annoyed.

"I have the quarterly reports," I said. My voice was flat. Mechanical. It didn't sound like my own.

"Get out," he said.

"This is the study," I replied, stepping further into the room despite every instinct screaming at me to run. "Business is conducted here."

"I am conducting business," Alessandro snapped. He turned fully toward me, shielding Aria with his body. "Personal business. Something you wouldn't understand."

Aria giggled again. "Maybe she needs a diagram, baby."

Baby.

She called the future Don "baby."

"You are breaking protocol," I said to Alessandro, my eyes flicking to the open collar of his shirt. "The staff is whispering. Discretion is the first rule of the Family."

Alessandro laughed. It was a cruel, sharp sound.

"Protocol," he mocked. "That's all you are, Katarina. Rules and ledgers. Look at you. You're barely a woman. You're a spreadsheet in a dress."

He turned back to Aria, dismissing me completely.

"Aria makes me feel alive. You make me feel like I'm in a morgue."

Nausea hit me in a violent wave.

The financial files slipped from my fingers.

They hit the floor with a heavy thud, scattering papers across the Persian rug like fallen leaves.

Neither of them looked down.

"Leave us," Alessandro ordered, his back to me. "And close the door. We aren't finished."

I turned.

I walked out.

I passed the maids in the hallway. They lowered their heads, but I saw the pity in their eyes. They knew. Everyone knew.

I was the last to know.

I walked to the master suite. Our bedroom.

The bed was made perfectly. The silk sheets were cold.

I sat at my vanity.

I looked at the woman in the mirror.

She was beautiful. She was powerful. She was a joke.

I picked up a tissue and wiped the perfect nude lipstick from my mouth, scrubbing until the skin was raw.

My father, a Sicilian Capo, once told me: "The sharpest knife is hidden under the calmest water."

I opened the bottom drawer of my vanity.

Inside was a dossier. I had started it weeks ago, just a suspicion.

Aria Diaz.

Gambling debts. Fraud charges in Miami. Links to the rival Russo family.

She wasn't just a mistress. She was a leak. She was a parasite targeting the villa Alessandro had promised to me.

I picked up my phone.

I dialed Giuseppe, the only man in this house who remembered what loyalty meant.

"Signora?" his gruff voice answered.

"Prepare the car," I said. "And Giuseppe?"

"Yes, Signora?"

"The statue is broken," I whispered, staring at my hollow eyes in the glass. "We are going to war."

Continue Reading

Other books by Bei Ke

More
Too Late To Beg: My Cold Ex-Husband

Too Late To Beg: My Cold Ex-Husband

Mafia

3.5

On our ninth anniversary, my husband Dominick didn't toast to us. Instead, he rested his hand on his mistress's pregnant belly in front of the entire crime family. I was just a debt payment to him, a ghost in a forty-thousand-dollar gown. But the humiliation didn't end in the ballroom. When his mistress, Chastity, started hemorrhaging later that night, he didn't call an ambulance. He dragged me to the family clinic. He knew I had a serious heart condition. He knew a transfusion of that magnitude could trigger a fatal cardiac event. "She is carrying my son," he said, his eyes devoid of any humanity. "You will give her whatever she needs." I begged him. I bargained for my freedom. He lied and agreed, just to get the needle in my arm. As my dark red blood flowed through the tube to save the woman destroying my life, my chest tightened. The monitors began to scream. My heart was failing. "Mr. Reyes! She's crashing!" the doctor shouted. Dominick didn't even turn around. He walked out of the room to hold Chastity's hand, leaving me to die on the table. I survived, but Annis Myers died in that clinic. He thought I would return to the penthouse and continue being his obedient, silent wife. He thought he owned the blood in my veins. He was wrong. I went back to the penthouse one last time. I struck a match. I let the room burn. By the time Dominick realized I wasn't in the ashes, I was already on a plane to London. I had left my wedding ring in an envelope, along with the medical records that proved his cruelty. He wanted a war? I would give him one.

Shamed by Design: The Heiress's Reckoning

Shamed by Design: The Heiress's Reckoning

Modern

5.0

My roasted turkey usually brings me joy, but this Thanksgiving, it turned my stomach. My stepsister, Brittany, had cornered my husband, Richard, and was practically living at our house. Knowing my daughter Sophie' s severe nut allergy, I carefully asked Brittany if her son, Leo, had any, before serving my pecan pie. "None at all, Amy. He loves nuts," she lied, smiling sweetly. Minutes later, Leo was gasping, turning blue. Richard rounded on me, his face a mask of fury. "You did this! You knew he couldn' t have nuts!" he roared, shoving pie into my mouth as the guests stared. The public humiliation was just the beginning. My home became a battleground, my husband a stranger. He dismissed my concerns about another nut-laced cookie, leading to our precious Sophie' s near-fatal allergic reaction. But instead of remorse, he jetted off to Aspen with Brittany and Leo, flaunting their "healing trip" on social media while Sophie lay in a hospital bed. Every tag, every beaming photo was a fresh stab, painting me as the villain, the negligent mother, the crazy ex-wife. I endured the whispers, the stares, the viral video portraying me as a monster. My world crumbled, and I felt utterly alone, trapped in a nightmare created by the very people who were supposed to love me. The injustice was unbearable. How could I have been so blind? How could they destroy me so easily? Then, when I was at my lowest, a miracle. My lawyer uncovered a massive, hidden trust fund – fifty million dollars my stepmother had stolen from me. That was when something inside me snapped. Tonight, at Richard' s award gala, they expect me to apologize, to publicly grovel. But I will not break. Tonight, I claim my freedom and burn their perfect lies to the ground. This isn' t an apology; it' s my reclamation.

You'll also like

Flash Marriage To My Best Friend's Father

Flash Marriage To My Best Friend's Father

Madel Cerda

I was once the heiress to the Solomon empire, but after it crumbled, I became the "charity case" ward of the wealthy Hyde family. For years, I lived in their shadows, clinging to the promise that Anson Hyde would always be my protector. That promise shattered when Anson walked into the ballroom with Claudine Chapman on his arm. Claudine was the girl who had spent years making my life a living hell, and now Anson was announcing their engagement to the world. The humiliation was instant. Guests sneered at my cheap dress, and a waiter intentionally sloshed champagne over me, knowing I was a nobody. Anson didn't even look my way; he was too busy whispering possessively to his new fiancée. I was a ghost in my own home, watching my protector celebrate with my tormentor. The betrayal burned. I realized I wasn't a ward; I was a pawn Anson had kept on a shelf until he found a better trade. I had no money, no allies, and a legal trust fund that Anson controlled with a flick of his wrist. Fleeing to the library, I stumbled into Dallas Koch-a titan of industry and my best friend's father. He was a wall of cold, absolute power that even the Hydes feared. "Marry me," I blurted out, desperate to find a shield Anson couldn't climb. Dallas didn't laugh. He pulled out a marriage agreement and a heavy fountain pen. "Sign," he commanded, his voice a low rumble. "But if you walk out that door with me, you never go back." I signed my name, trading my life for the only man dangerous enough to keep me safe.

No Longer Mrs. Cooley: The Architect's Return

No Longer Mrs. Cooley: The Architect's Return

Xiao Xiaosu

I went to the City Clerk’s office for a routine copy of my marriage license to finalize a trust fund audit. I expected a simple piece of paper, but the clerk’s pitying look told me my entire life was a lie. "The license was never finalized, Ms. Oliver. In the eyes of the state, you are single." The three-hundred-guest wedding at the Plaza and the Vogue features meant nothing. My husband, Gray Cooley, had intentionally filed the documents with a "procedural defect" so he could discard me without a legal divorce. Moments later, an iCloud invite titled "Our Little Secret" popped up on my screen. It was a photo of my best friend, Brylee, holding a positive pregnancy test at our Hamptons estate. Gray’s text to her was the final blow: "Happy anniversary, babe. This baby is the best gift. Once the trust unlocks today, we’re done with the charade." I soon discovered they were even stealing my career, reassigning my architectural masterpiece to Brylee while preparing my eviction notice. Gray's mother called me a "barren mule" in a leaked recording, mocking the infertility I suffered after saving Gray’s life in a construction accident. I wasn't a wife; I was a three-year placeholder used to secure his inheritance. How could the man I bled for treat me like a disposable prop? How could my best friend carry his child while pretending to comfort me through my darkest moments? The betrayal burned until it turned into a cold, hard stone of fury. I didn't cry. Instead, I walked into the penthouse of the Barretts, the Cooleys' most powerful rivals. I signed a marriage contract with Kane Barrett, the man the tabloids called the "Beast of Wall Street." "I want a wedding," I told his father, my voice steady and lethal. "Bigger than the one I had with Gray." If they wanted me gone, they would have to watch me become the woman who owns their world.

Burned by Poison, Saved by the Devil

Burned by Poison, Saved by the Devil

Gale Kaaya

My cousin Hailey paid a dock worker to assault me just to ruin my engagement. To survive the military-grade aphrodisiac she poisoned me with, I stumbled into a walk-in freezer and threw myself onto the only source of cold I could find-a man paralyzed by unnatural hypothermia. It was a desperate, primal exchange of my heat for his ice just to keep my heart from stopping. But when Hailey threw open the heavy iron door, leading my fiancé and the entire Bolton family to witness my "shame," her triumphant grin instantly vanished. She hadn't caught me with a low-life thug. She had caught me straddling Demetrius Maddox, the ruthless Iron King of Chicago. The air in the room dropped to absolute zero. My grandmother screamed in horror, and my father turned the color of ash. Hailey, blinded by jealousy, tried to double down. She pointed a manicured finger at the deadliest man in the city and called him a "nameless muscle" I picked up to defile the family name. She didn't realize she had just signed her own death warrant. I didn't cower. I realized this was the only chance to survive the family that wanted me dead. I walked up to the Devil himself, my body still humming with the poison, and looked him in the eye. "Kill me, and the cold inside you wins," I whispered, knowing he was dying from the inverse of my own poison. "I am the only doctor who knows how to cure you." Demetrius tightened his hand around my throat, his dark eyes assessing my worth. "Prove it," he growled. I turned back to my trembling cousin and signaled the enforcer to hand me the whip.

Neglected Wife: Hidden Heiress's Cold Revenge

Neglected Wife: Hidden Heiress's Cold Revenge

Da Lanlan

I stood in the pouring rain at my father-in-law's funeral, the heels of my black pumps sinking into the mud. I was Mrs. Vargas, the wife of New York's most powerful billionaire, yet I was standing at the edge of the crowd like a forgotten statue. Ten feet away, under the dry shelter of the family tent, my husband Hayes held another woman against his chest. It wasn't me he was whispering comfort to; it was Felicity, his late brother's widow and childhood sweetheart. The humiliation didn't end at the cemetery. Hayes moved Felicity and her son into our home, relegating me to the guest wing while she took over the primary suites. He watched silently as her son smashed the only photograph of my deceased parents, then demanded I apologize for "scaring" the boy with my reaction. When Felicity's negligence ruined a twelve-million-dollar family heirloom, Hayes had the audacity to ask me to use my own savings to buy her a "consolation" engagement ring. He treated me like a parasite, never realizing I was a brilliant scientist with a hidden fortune and three patents to my name. I realized then that our three-year marriage was a hollow farce. Hayes had never even touched me, claiming he wanted to "remain pure" for his memory of Felicity. I was nothing more than a business merger, a smudge on the lens of the perfect family portrait he was building with another man's widow. The breaking point came during a lethal blizzard. Hayes promised to accompany me to my family's mandatory gala-a tradition where my absence meant a death sentence. But at the last second, he stood me up to stay home and tend to Felicity's stubbed toe. Left alone to face the wrath of the Santos Matriarch, I was forced to kneel in the freezing snow as punishment until my lungs began to fail and my vision blurred. Just as the darkness started to take me, a black Maybach smashed through the iron gates. My exiled brother, the man the world calls "The Wolf," stepped out of the storm to reclaim what Hayes had discarded. Hayes thought I was a helpless doll who couldn't survive a day without his trust fund, but he's about to find out what happens when you let a Santos daughter freeze.

Chapters
Read Now
Download Book
He Traded A Diamond For Cheap Glass He Traded A Diamond For Cheap Glass Bei Ke Mafia
“I was the "Ice Queen," the perfect Mafia wife who managed the De Luca empire's millions while my husband, Alessandro, played the part of the feared Underboss. I thought my silence and competence earned me respect. That was until I woke up in the estate's medical bay with a shattered leg. My saddle had snapped mid-jump. It wasn't wear and tear; it was sabotage. Lying in the dark, feigning sleep, I heard Alessandro whispering outside my door with his enforcer. "The buckle was filed down," the enforcer said urgently. "Aria tampered with it. She could have broken her neck." I waited for Alessandro's rage. I waited for him to execute the mistress who tried to kill his wife. Instead, his voice was cold and dismissive. "Bury it," Alessandro ordered. "It's just a broken leg. Aria was upset about the credit cards. She just wanted to teach Katarina a lesson." A lesson. My husband wasn't just cheating on me; he was protecting the woman who tried to cripple me. Three days later, at the Family Charity Gala, he humiliated me publicly. He outbid me for my grandmother's heirloom necklace and clasped it around Aria's neck while I watched from my wheelchair. He thought I was broken. He thought I was just a piece of furniture to be rearranged. He didn't know I had bugged the entire villa while I was recovering. He didn't know I had the recordings of what Aria was really doing when he wasn't looking. I gripped the USB drive in my pocket and signaled the tech team to lock the doors. The statue was broken, but he was about to learn that shattered ice is sharp enough to slit a throat.”
1

Chapter 1

23/12/2025

2

Chapter 2

23/12/2025

3

Chapter 3

23/12/2025

4

Chapter 4

23/12/2025

5

Chapter 5

23/12/2025

6

Chapter 6

23/12/2025

7

Chapter 7

23/12/2025

8

Chapter 8

23/12/2025

9

Chapter 9

23/12/2025

10

Chapter 10

23/12/2025

11

Chapter 11

23/12/2025

12

Chapter 12

23/12/2025

13

Chapter 13

23/12/2025

14

Chapter 14

23/12/2025

15

Chapter 15

23/12/2025

16

Chapter 16

23/12/2025

17

Chapter 17

23/12/2025

18

Chapter 18

23/12/2025

19

Chapter 19

23/12/2025

20

Chapter 20

23/12/2025

21

Chapter 21

23/12/2025

22

Chapter 22

23/12/2025

23

Chapter 23

23/12/2025