He Chose The Mistress, I Chose Freedom

He Chose The Mistress, I Chose Freedom

Ben Nan

5.0
Comment(s)
1.5K
View
24
Chapters

"The child is mine." My husband, the Capo of the Chicago Outfit, announced to the world, his hand resting protectively on his mistress's stomach. He was lying to save her life, but in doing so, he signed the death warrant for the baby growing inside me. Just hours before, I had finally gotten the positive test we had prayed for over five years. But Dante chose to claim a traitor's bastard as his heir. When I tried to confront him, he dismissed me cold-heartedly. "It's a strategic lie, Elena. You aren't pregnant, so it doesn't matter." He didn't know. Later, when an accident left his mistress critical, he dragged me to the hospital. He forced me to donate my blood to save her, ignoring my ghostly pallor. He didn't know I was already bleeding out. He didn't know I had just come from the clinic, where I had removed the "complication" he made me feel ashamed of. He thought he was being noble. He didn't realize he was killing his own son to save another man's lie. On the night of the gala celebrating his "heir," I left a white box on his desk and vanished. Inside was a medical report: *Termination of Pregnancy. 8 Weeks. Father: Dante Moretti.* By the time he read it, I was already gone.

He Chose The Mistress, I Chose Freedom Chapter 1

"The child is mine."

My husband, the Capo of the Chicago Outfit, announced to the world, his hand resting protectively on his mistress's stomach.

He was lying to save her life, but in doing so, he signed the death warrant for the baby growing inside me.

Just hours before, I had finally gotten the positive test we had prayed for over five years.

But Dante chose to claim a traitor's bastard as his heir.

When I tried to confront him, he dismissed me cold-heartedly.

"It's a strategic lie, Elena. You aren't pregnant, so it doesn't matter."

He didn't know.

Later, when an accident left his mistress critical, he dragged me to the hospital.

He forced me to donate my blood to save her, ignoring my ghostly pallor.

He didn't know I was already bleeding out.

He didn't know I had just come from the clinic, where I had removed the "complication" he made me feel ashamed of.

He thought he was being noble.

He didn't realize he was killing his own son to save another man's lie.

On the night of the gala celebrating his "heir," I left a white box on his desk and vanished.

Inside was a medical report: *Termination of Pregnancy. 8 Weeks. Father: Dante Moretti.*

By the time he read it, I was already gone.

Chapter 1

The moment Dante Moretti claimed another woman's child as his heir to save her life, he didn't just break his vows to me; he signed the death warrant for the baby growing inside my own body.

I stood in the shadows of the grand hall, rendered invisible by the brilliance of the spotlight.

My husband stood under the blinding glare of the press conference.

He looked every inch the Capo dei Capi of the Chicago Outfit.

His suit was tailored to fit the broad, lethal expanse of his shoulders.

His jaw was set in that granite line that usually made grown men crumble in fear.

But his hand wasn't resting on a gun today.

It was resting protectively on the small, rounded swell of Sofia Ricci's stomach.

Sofia looked up at him with tear-filled, doe-like eyes.

She played the part of the fragile, protected ward perfectly.

The reporters were shouting questions, their voices a frenzied cacophony, like vultures sensing a fresh carcass.

"Don Moretti, is it true? Is the child yours?"

Dante didn't flinch.

He leaned into the microphone, his voice a deep rumble that vibrated through the floorboards and settled deep in my marrow.

"The child is mine," he lied. "Sofia carries the Moretti heir. Anyone who touches her answers to me."

The room erupted in a storm of camera flashes.

I felt the blood drain from my face, pooling somewhere in my feet.

My hand drifted instinctively to my own flat stomach.

Two hours ago, the doctor had handed me a slip of paper.

Positive.

Five years.

We had bled and prayed for five years.

And now, amidst the chaos of the Russian Bratva ambush we had just survived, amidst the blood and the terror, I had finally achieved the one thing required of a mafia wife.

But Dante had just rendered it meaningless.

By claiming Sofia's bastard-the product of her affair with a traitor-he had saved her from the Outfit's executioners.

He had honored the blood oath he swore to her dying father.

But in doing so, he had publicly declared that any child I carried would be the bastard.

Or worse, a product of the Russian captivity we had just escaped.

He had made me a whore to make her a saint.

I turned and walked away before the camera flashes could catch the tears I refused to shed.

I found Dante in his study an hour later, the silence of the room a stark contrast to the chaos outside.

He was pouring a glass of amber whiskey, his hand steady.

He didn't look like a man who had just destroyed his marriage.

He looked like a general surveying a battlefield where acceptable losses had been calculated.

"You're upset," he said, not turning around.

"Upset?" I let out a dry, cracked laugh. "You just told the world you cheated on me. You legitimized her child and delegitimized your wife."

He turned then, his dark eyes cold and hard.

"It was necessary, Elena. The Outfit would have killed her for sleeping with the enemy. I swore to her father I would protect her. It is a debt of honor."

"And what about your vows to me?" I asked, my voice trembling. "Do those debts not count?"

"You are my wife," he said, stepping closer, his presence suffocating. "You have my name. You have my protection. That should be enough."

He reached out to touch my cheek.

I flinched back as if he had burned me.

His eyes narrowed.

"Don't be dramatic. It's a strategic lie. The child isn't mine. You know that."

"But the world doesn't," I whispered. "And if I were pregnant? What then, Dante? Would you claim mine too? Or would that complicate your noble lie?"

He sighed, running a hand through his dark hair, exasperation evident in the gesture.

"You aren't pregnant, Elena. We've been trying for years. It's not an issue."

The words hit me like a physical blow.

He didn't know.

And looking at him now, this stranger who prioritized a dead man's promise over his living wife's dignity, I knew he never would.

"You're right," I lied, my heart shattering in my chest. "I'm not."

He nodded, satisfied. "Good. Keep your head down. Let the rumors blow over. I have a war to plan against the Russians."

He walked past me, brushing my shoulder.

He smelled of expensive cologne and betrayal.

I went to the Consigliere's office the next morning.

The lawyer looked nervous, sweat beading on his upper lip.

He pushed the separation papers across the mahogany desk.

"Mrs. Moretti, are you sure? The Don... he hasn't signed these."

"He's busy," I said, my voice void of emotion. "He told me to handle the paperwork."

I picked up the pen.

My hand hovered over the signature line for Dante Moretti.

I knew his signature better than my own.

I had traced it on love letters in college.

I had stared at it on our marriage license.

I signed his name with a flourish, the ink flowing like black blood as I forged my freedom.

The Consigliere went pale. "Elena... if he finds out..."

"File it," I commanded, channeling the Falcone blood that ran through my veins. "And book me an appointment at the private clinic on State Street."

"For what?"

"A procedure," I said, standing up. "To remove a complication."

I walked out into the biting Chicago wind.

I dialed Dante's number one last time.

It rang three times.

"What is it?" his voice was clipped, impatient.

"Dante, I need to tell you something. About us. About..."

"Dante!" Sofia's voice pierced the background, shrill and joyful. "The baby is kicking! Come feel!"

Dante's breath hitched on the line.

"I have to go, Elena. Handle whatever it is yourself."

The line went dead.

I looked at the phone screen.

Then I threw it into the trash can on the corner.

I walked into the clinic.

The fluorescent lights hummed, a sterile drone against the silence of my soul.

"Are you sure?" the doctor asked, looking at the ultrasound screen. "The fetus is healthy. It's... it's a boy."

A son.

The heir he wanted.

Tears finally leaked from my eyes, hot and stinging.

"I'm sure," I whispered. "There is no father. There is no future. Please. Just take it away."

As the anesthesia mask covered my face, I remembered Dante's wedding vow.

I will burn the world to keep you safe.

He was burning it, alright.

But he had left me to turn to ash in the flames.

Continue Reading

Other books by Ben Nan

More
The Painter's Unending Haunt

The Painter's Unending Haunt

Horror

5.0

My best friend, Noah, had my hands broken. He did it so I could never paint again. Then he told my wife, Olivia, that I had lost my mind and needed to be sent away for "rehabilitation." They sent me to what was essentially a prison, where I was starved, beaten, and eventually died alone on a cold floor. Now, I'm a ghost, haunting Noah's lavish party, a celebration of his stolen success. He' s exhibiting paintings that are eerily like my lost collection, while everyone praises him as an art mogul. Olivia, my wife, is there too, looking beautiful but with a shadow in her eyes. Noah's assistant, the one who helped break my hands, even lies to her face, saying I'm still "adjusting" at the center. The arrogance is breathtaking. Olivia stands in the house my stolen art paid for, listening to the lies of the man who killed me. He even fakes an injury to garner her sympathy. It was shocking when a call came through, revealing I' d been secretly flying every six weeks for a year to donate blood for Olivia's rare condition, saving her life. Then the news broke: the "rehabilitation" center I was sent to was a network of abusive prisons where patients died. No one heard my silent screams. My wife even refused to believe the truth, preferring to cling to Noah' s comforting lies, even as she tried to salvage my shredded art from the attic. But then my real parents, billionaires who had been searching for me for decades, showed up. And Noah, my murderer, embraced them, pretending to be their long-lost son. He wanted to steal my inheritance, too. "Mom? Dad?" he said, holding out the locket my birth mother gave me. My wife's refusal of Noah's marriage proposal was a small flicker of hope, soon extinguished by his manipulative feigned heart attack. But then the funeral home called, asking Olivia to pick up my remains. My ashes scattered on the floor after Noah fumbled the urn, and my mother-in-law suddenly revealed I' d donated my kidney to Olivia. That was the moment. She called 911, reporting a murder. My murder.

He Said No, She Found Love

He Said No, She Found Love

Romance

5.0

The last thing I remembered was the cold. It was the kind of cold that seeped into your bones, mocking the thin dress you wore. I was dying in a dark, abandoned warehouse, our son Leo trembling beside me. Then, his voice. Over the kidnapper' s phone, Harrison Hayes, the man I' d loved for years, flatly declared: "Wrong number. I don' t know them." He didn' t know me. He didn' t know Leo. Five years of a miserable marriage dissolved into one brutal truth: he resented me, seeing my existence as the ruin of his life. My death, simply a convenient erasure. And then, nothing. A profound, silent void. Until, a voice, warm and familiar, broke through the darkness: "Ava? Happy birthday." My eyes snapped open. I wasn't in a warehouse. I was at my 21st birthday dinner, staring at a younger Harrison, before the resentment carved lines around his mouth. This was the night it all began, the night I confessed my desperate love. But this time, the memory of his callous "Wrong number" burned. The phantom ache of my son' s absence was a hollow void in my chest. I would not make the same mistake. I would not confess. I would let him go. I would let him have his perfect life with his perfect Charlotte. When Charlotte Evans, his first love, walked in, I didn't fight. I left. I walked out into the cool night, hailing a cab, for the naive girl I had been, for the son who would now never exist. The pain was immense. But underneath it, a fragile seed of freedom took root. I wouldn' t be a victim. I would save myself. My first call was to my parents' lawyer. I was activating a forgotten betrothal agreement. I was going to Daniel Thorne.

Too Late, Mother: I Am Reborn

Too Late, Mother: I Am Reborn

Sci-fi

5.0

My eighteenth birthday was supposed to be a fresh start, "Lottery Day" for the Life Path Augmentation (LPA) program. My toxic mother, Susan, was desperate for me to get the Support Role Optimization (SRO) LPA, reducing me to the compliant trophy wife I was in my first life before it all ended in tragedy. But then, my older sister, Jessica, whose insatiable greed for an "easy life" was legend, bizarrely elbowed her way forward, only to be ironically assigned the very SRO meant for me. As I stepped up, the machine hummed, then announced its shocking verdict: I received the High-Potential Innovator (HPI) LPA, the burden that had led to Jessica' s ruin in our previous timeline. My mother' s carefully constructed world imploded; Jessica' s triumphant smirk dissolved into furious disbelief. They immediately launched their counter-attack, determined to crush this "dangerous" potential. My Caltech scholarship, my lifeline to a real future, was brutally yanked away, deemed a distraction from my "duty" to support Jessica's floundering attempts at social climbing. Every penny I earned from grueling dead-end jobs was siphoned into their bottomless pit of familial exploitation. "Family comes first," my father would drone, a chilling echo of their manipulation from a past I desperately sought to rewrite. This was it – the same old cage, just with new bars. But they fundamentally misunderstood. Their betrayal only fueled the quiet revolution brewing within me. As their carefully laid plans crumbled around Jessica, I wasn't just enduring; I was processing, learning, plotting. And soon, the architect of their downfall wouldn' t just be a thought, but a force.

You'll also like

The Discarded Heiress: Marrying My Lethal Husband

The Discarded Heiress: Marrying My Lethal Husband

Xiao Wang
5.0

The rain in Detroit was slick with grime when my family finally came to fetch me. They didn't want a reunion; they wanted a sacrificial lamb to marry into the Kaufman empire to save their failing business. I thought I was just being sold off, but the limo ride ended under a dark overpass where six hired thugs were waiting with chains. My own sister had ordered them to "break my spirit" so I’d be a shaking, pathetic mess by the time I reached the altar. They called me "Detroit trash" and sprayed air freshener when I sat on their leather seats. My stepmother wanted a video of me begging for my life, and my father was ready to trade me like a used car to a man everyone called a "vegetable." They expected a submissive country girl, unaware that I was a high-level "cleaner" who could snap a radius bone before they could even scream. When I finally reached the Kaufman estate, I found my fiancé, Barron, slumped in a wheelchair, drooling and silent. But as soon as the doors closed, the "invalid" grabbed my wrist with a grip of iron and whispered a command that changed everything. I didn't understand why my own blood was so desperate to see me destroyed. What had I ever done to deserve a hit squad and a forced marriage to a man they thought was a corpse? But Barron isn't a vegetable, and I'm not a victim. We just touched down at the Moon family gala in a matte-black helicopter, and as the doors slide open, the "broken" bride is about to show them exactly what happens when you throw away the wrong daughter. "If we're going to crash a party," Barron whispered, his eyes burning with lethal clarity, "we should make an entrance."

Secret Triplets: The Billionaire's Second Chance

Secret Triplets: The Billionaire's Second Chance

Roderic Penn
4.5

I stood at my mother’s open grave in the freezing rain, my heels sinking into the mud. The space beside me was empty. My husband, Hilliard Holloway, had promised to cherish me in bad times, but apparently, burying my mother didn't fit into his busy schedule. While the priest’s voice droned on, a news alert lit up my phone. It was a livestream of the Metropolitan Charity Gala. There was Hilliard, looking impeccable in a custom tuxedo, with his ex-girlfriend Charla English draped over his arm. The headline read: "Holloway & English: A Power Couple Reunited?" When he finally returned to our penthouse at 2 AM, he didn't come alone—he brought Charla with him. He claimed she’d had a "medical emergency" at the gala and couldn't be left alone. I found a Tiffany diamond necklace on our coffee table meant for her birthday, and a smudge of her signature red lipstick on his collar. When I confronted him, he simply told me to stop being "hysterical" and "acting like a child." He had no idea I was seven months pregnant with his child. He thought so little of my grief that he didn't even bother to craft a convincing lie, laughing with his mistress in our home while I sat in the dark with a shattered heart and a secret life growing inside me. "He doesn't deserve us," I whispered to the darkness. I didn't scream or beg. I simply left a folder on his desk containing signed divorce papers and a forged medical report for a terminated pregnancy. I disappeared into the night, letting him believe he had successfully killed his own legacy through his neglect. Five years later, Hilliard walked into "The Vault," the city's most exclusive underground auction, looking for a broker to manage his estate. He didn't recognize me behind my Venetian mask, but he couldn't ignore the neon pink graffiti on his armored Maybach that read "DEADBEAT." He had no clue that the three brilliant triplets currently hacking his security system were the very children he thought had been erased years ago. This time, I wasn't just a wife in the way; I was the one holding all the cards.

Chapters
Read Now
Download Book
He Chose The Mistress, I Chose Freedom He Chose The Mistress, I Chose Freedom Ben Nan Mafia
“"The child is mine." My husband, the Capo of the Chicago Outfit, announced to the world, his hand resting protectively on his mistress's stomach. He was lying to save her life, but in doing so, he signed the death warrant for the baby growing inside me. Just hours before, I had finally gotten the positive test we had prayed for over five years. But Dante chose to claim a traitor's bastard as his heir. When I tried to confront him, he dismissed me cold-heartedly. "It's a strategic lie, Elena. You aren't pregnant, so it doesn't matter." He didn't know. Later, when an accident left his mistress critical, he dragged me to the hospital. He forced me to donate my blood to save her, ignoring my ghostly pallor. He didn't know I was already bleeding out. He didn't know I had just come from the clinic, where I had removed the "complication" he made me feel ashamed of. He thought he was being noble. He didn't realize he was killing his own son to save another man's lie. On the night of the gala celebrating his "heir," I left a white box on his desk and vanished. Inside was a medical report: *Termination of Pregnancy. 8 Weeks. Father: Dante Moretti.* By the time he read it, I was already gone.”
1

Chapter 1

05/01/2026

2

Chapter 2

05/01/2026

3

Chapter 3

05/01/2026

4

Chapter 4

05/01/2026

5

Chapter 5

05/01/2026

6

Chapter 6

05/01/2026

7

Chapter 7

05/01/2026

8

Chapter 8

05/01/2026

9

Chapter 9

05/01/2026

10

Chapter 10

05/01/2026

11

Chapter 11

05/01/2026

12

Chapter 12

05/01/2026

13

Chapter 13

05/01/2026

14

Chapter 14

05/01/2026

15

Chapter 15

05/01/2026

16

Chapter 16

05/01/2026

17

Chapter 17

05/01/2026

18

Chapter 18

05/01/2026

19

Chapter 19

05/01/2026

20

Chapter 20

05/01/2026

21

Chapter 21

05/01/2026

22

Chapter 22

05/01/2026

23

Chapter 23

05/01/2026

24

Chapter 24

05/01/2026