We Belong Together

We Belong Together

foreverthatgirl01 · Completed · 119.8k Words

936
Hot
937
Views
0
Added
Add to Shelf
Start Reading
Share:facebooktwitterpinterestwhatsappreddit

Introduction

After his first wife passed away, Matteo Marino, a wealthy CEO and, behind the scenes, a strong mafia boss, was compelled to remarry the daughter of one of his father's most trusted men. Aria Barone, a little girl terrified at infancy from seeing her loving mother slain and burnt alive by one of her father’s competitors, was married off to the cruel Matteo. Does she discover Matteo's darkest secrets or does she fall in love with him?

Chapter 1

Aria’s POV

 As I brushed my hair, I watched the long, dark strands flow over my shoulder, shimmering in the sunlight that streamed through the window. 

 Rosalie had always admired my hair, calling it 'beautiful brown silk' and claiming that men couldn't help but stare. But I knew that it was more than just my hair that made me special. She would often taunt me on why men wouldn’t look in her direction or pay close attention to her if we happened to be in the same room. ‘All eyes will be on you, riri.’ She’d say. 

All in all, Rosalie was beautiful. She had midnight black hair and grey eyes. Tall and willowy like a top-class model. Sometimes, I wished I had all her features, maybe just maybe, I wouldn’t be forced to marry a man like Matteo. Maybe someone else would have fallen for me and taken me away before the deal was struck.

Matteo was a self-centered man, so I’ve heard. I’ve heard tales of how cruel and misshapen his mind was, and that was the man I was to marry. I remembered how my father said those words; ‘you are to marry Mr. Marino’s son, Matteo’. There was a break in his voice when he said them, so I’m guessing he did want me to make the decision on my own long before the deal with the Marinos. 

I winced when Rosalie forced my body into the oddly small dress. My dad picked it out for me, and it occurred to me there, and then it was all his plan to expose more than half of me to Matteo tonight. Rosalie murmured a series of curses as she took in my frame tightly hugged by the freakishly small dress. 

“Did he pick this out at the children section?”. She asked, completely irritated.

“It’s going to rip apart if I laugh during dinner”. I said with a small smile on my face.

“Good thing Matteo isn’t known for his jokes. You’re good”.

We both laughed, and I pulled her in for a warm hearty hug. She looked at me lovingly and pushed a few strands of my hair away from my face. Rosalie was my favorite person in the world. She filled every gap I had. She was everything to me. 

To think we met in a toilet cubicle, she was being chased by drunk boys covered in mud and sweat. She ran into my cubicle and waited till they got fed up and went home. She didn’t care to look if it was occupied. She didn’t care to look if I was armed. After the scenario, she turned to me and smiled. I remember her first words being; “you taking a shit?”. I was embarrassed, and I was indeed taking a shit but in my own space, which she invaded. She scoffed and left, and ever since then, I have been seeing her more than often, especially during school hours. 

I bit down on my bottom lip, slightly making sure not to smear the red glossy lipstick already there. 

 “You think he has two horns?”. I asked.

“I don’t know. I bet three?”. She replied with a snarky smile on her face. 

I was scared of Matteo. I mean, who wouldn’t after all the tales of his cruelty and complicated nature going all around town. All I knew about my husband to be, was that he was well known and popular for his atrocious behavior. And now, I had to look forward to this dinner with the Marinos; My father’s poor attempt of making me and Matteo meet before the wedding, which was a few days from now. I couldn’t believe it. I was going to be the wife of one of the wealthiest men in Venice. A man lots of women want. A man I wouldn’t want to have a thing to do with on a normal day. 

“How many women would hate me for marrying Matteo?”. I asked Rosalie while she made my hair into a low bun. 

“I’m guessing thousands”. She shrugged.

“Do you think-”. 

“Hey! I need you to calm down, Riri”. She cut me right off. “From what I’ve seen in the magazines…he doesn’t have huge monstrous horns or claws or a tail. He’s a man. A real man. You can make the best of this, Aria. I know you can”. Rosalie hugged my frame from the back, released my quivering body, and turned to look me in the eyes.

“I’m scared, Rosalie”. I cried.

“Oh, there goes your makeup”. She sighed. 

“One last question-”

“I’m all ears, Ri”. She replied, picking out my concealer and blushing from the top section of my cupboard.

“Do you think I’ll ever get him to love me”. There was a piercing shattering sound made from the concealer dropping on the floor. My friend turned to me and smiled. Her smile was small and forced.

“You want him to love you?”. She asked.

“I don’t expect anything from this”. I replied, my voice low.

“His wife is dead! Do you expect that man to fall for you after his wife? You’re back up, ri. Never forget that” I felt a sudden tightness in my chest, and I struggled to catch my breath. Turning away from Rosalie, I caught my reflection in the mirror and stared into my own eyes.

Rosalie had finished her makeup hunting and was back before me applying it once again. She murmured some words, and what I could make out of her streak of talking were; I’ll kill him if he hurts you. I smiled at her, and she reciprocated. I grabbed the small purse from my plush bed, hugged my best friend, and headed out of my room. 

I sat like a newly bought porcelain doll watching Mr. Marino and my father talk about their childhood experiences and laugh horrendously over it. Matteo wasn’t present at the table or at my home yet. His father pleaded with mine, asking for more time. “There’s traffic. He’ll be here soon” I didn’t think so. I hoped in my little head that he bailed on us all. I hoped never to see him, but they looked happy. Marino and my father, Barone. They looked happy to trap us together in a marriage none of us wanted. What if he wanted this? I couldn’t help but think. There was no way he wanted to be with anyone else after his wife. And me? Definitely not. I watched the two old men laugh to their heart’s content and sip their expensive wines. I felt out of place at the table. I wanted to disappear and never return till Matteo found someone else. 

Marino’s gaze fell on me, and he smirked “She looks like Kate”. He looked at me with disdain in his eyes. “Maybe not so much”. He collected himself and returned to his meal. 

“Ah! she does look like Kate”. My father said, a proud smile on his face.

Kate was my mother. The one woman I loved more than anything in this world, but she was taken away from me. I could never bring myself to forget the incident that took place that night at our home back in the States. My mother, on the floor, laid in a pool of her own blood. Body, charred from the intense burning. I couldn’t recognize my mother.

I sat by her body, broken and scared. It was a horrible sight for a six year old. It haunted me in my dreams, and in those dreams, I did nothing to help. I felt worthless. For the first time in thirty minutes of our dinner, I didn’t hear the men speak. I raised my head, and I saw their eyes directly on me. Watching me. A large hand gave my hand a light squeeze, and I turned to my father, Barone. He blinked away his tears and wiped my wet cheeks with his palm. 

“It’s alright, honey”. I heard him say. I gasped. Tears in my eyes. A trembling frame and a crowded mind. I forced a smile, pulled my hand away from his hold, and excused myself. 

“My makeup is ruined. I better go fix it before Matteo gets here”. That was all it took for me to leave. 

I headed straight to the guest room. Tapped a few times on the door, and it was pulled open by my best friend. She rubbed her eyes and yawned a little. She was asleep. I woke her but I didn’t care. I dropped my purse and ran into her arms, and she held me there for as long as I could remember. Then, I passed out.

Last Chapters

You Might Like 😍

Goddess Of The Underworld

Goddess Of The Underworld

885.6k Views · Completed · Sheridan Hartin
Left at a pack border with a name and a stubborn heartbeat, Envy grows into the sharpest kind of survivor, an orphaned warrior who knows how to hold a line and keep moving. Love isn’t in the plan…until four alpha wolves with playboy reputations and inconveniently soft hands decide the girl who won’t bow is the only queen they’ll ever take. Their mate. The one they have waited for. Xavier, Haiden, Levi, and Noah are gorgeous, lethal, and anything but perfect and Envy isn’t either. She’s changing. First into hell hound, Layah at her heels and fire in her veins. Then into what the realm has been waiting for, a Goddess of the Underworld, dragging her mates down to hell with her.

When the veil between the Divine, the Living, and the Dead begins to crack, Envy is thrust beneath with a job she can’t drop: keep the worlds from bleeding together, shepherd the lost, and make ordinary into armour, breakfasts, bedtime, battle plans. Peace lasts exactly one lullaby. This is the story of an orphan pup who became a goddess by choosing her family; of four imperfect alphas learning how to be better. Steamy, fierce, and full of heart, Goddess of the Underworld is a reverse harem, found-family paranormal romance where love writes the rules and keeps three realms from falling apart.
To protect what’s mine

To protect what’s mine

533.8k Views · Completed · Winter Rowe
Amalie is more special than she ever thought possible. Why would the twenty-two-year-old think any different after she has been told she’s nothing for her whole life by her family? Adoptive mother of a three-year-old, Ama has been locked up by her family for the past seven years. But everything changes when her old friends, the Alpha twins, Markus and Calyx, take over the Moonstone pack. Finding out that the twins are her mates, she is a white wolf, and has a connection to the Moon Goddess, is just icing on the cake of her life is a huge mess. Ama just wants a normal life with her mates and protecting her pup, but life rarely gives us what we want. She is thrust into world that she no longer remembers and has forgotten her. Amalie is charged with protecting those closest to her. But she has her own past to overcome as she heals and attempts to move forward. Will she come out alive or lose herself along the way? After all, someone has to be pulling the strings, why not pull her along for the ride?
The Shattered Moon King

The Shattered Moon King

1.6k Views · Ongoing · Hannah Kalu
In a world shattered by monsters, the only thing more dangerous than a lost memory is a forgotten identity.
Lena is a survivor. For years, she has weathered the harsh, post-apocalyptic landscape by following one rule: trust no one. But when she finds an amnesiac man near death in the wilderness—a man with kind eyes and a strength that is anything but human—she makes a choice that will unravel her solitary existence.
She calls him Cain, but the shattered-moon tattoo on his back brands him as Kaelen, the long-dead Alpha of the powerful Sky-Fall pack. His return triggers a brutal civil war with the usurper who stole his throne and his fated mate. Hunted by Lycan assassins and a fanatical human commander desperate for the secrets locked in Lena's own past, their only hope lies in embracing the very power Kaelen can't remember and Lena has always feared.
As they uncover a conspiracy that threatens not just the pack, but the future of every living thing, Kaelen must fight for a kingdom he doesn't know and Lena must confront a legacy she tried to bury. In a world of broken thrones and fated bonds, they will discover that the greatest choice is not between love and duty, but between who you are told you must be, and who you choose to become.
The Game of Claiming

The Game of Claiming

12.7k Views · Completed · Billie Patsy
When Lila Moreno stepped into the Romano mansion, she didn’t expect to be caught in the middle of a silent war. The four infamous Romano brothers rule the city’s underworld with blood and money—yet the moment they see her, their power turns personal.
A drunken bet becomes their private game: win the maid.
The rules?
Don’t let the others know you’re falling for her.
And never, ever let her leave.
But each brother plays differently—
The eldest buys her obedience.
The second steals her breath.
The third corners her in the dark.
The youngest ruins anyone who touches her.
Lila isn’t sure if she’s a player in their game… or the prize they’ll destroy each other to claim
The Dragon's Last Fae Queen

The Dragon's Last Fae Queen

6.6k Views · Ongoing · Sylvia Sylvester
Hidden all her life in the slums of Emberveil, Aerith has one rule: never let the dragons see her eyes. Fae are extinct, hunted, burned, and erased from the kingdom. Or so everyone believes. But on the night of her eighteenth birthday, when her forbidden magic stirs awake and her grandmother falls deathly ill, Aerith breaks the one rule meant to keep her safe. She enters the royal dragon pharmacy… and collides with a werewolf princess who drags her straight to the dungeon. There, in the deepest shadows of the palace, the youngest dragon prince sees her glowing eyes and instantly knows what she is. A fae. A secret the entire kingdom would kill for. What would be her fate? Another dead Fae? Or the Last Dragon's Fae Queen?

“Prince? Dickhead? Asshole? Or stalker?” A slow, dangerous smile curved his lips. “Maybe I should show you the one title I want you to use.” Before I could react, his hand closed around my chin, tilting my face up. His lips crashed into mine, hard, claiming, breath-stealing. When he finally pulled back, his voice was a rough whisper against my lips. “You could call me yours… because you are mine.”
Tempted By The Enemy

Tempted By The Enemy

3.9k Views · Completed · rituparna darolia
Twenty-two-year-old Alyssa Van Every is in a dilemma. Her close friend, Sienna, is marrying billionaire, Lucas Donnelly who, along with his brothers, happens to be her older brother, Alex's sworn enemy.
She escapes to Preston Island to attend the wedding without informing him only to collide with Lucas’s hot, fiery and arrogant brother, the twenty-three-year-old, Nicholas Donnelly. Sparks immediately fly between them but Alyssa refuses to acknowledge them fearing her brother's wrath.
The wedding is over and Alyssa tries hard to forget the mysterious Nicholas Donnelly but can he forget her? Can he ignore the attraction he feels for her, feelings that have resurfaced after ten years?
What will Allyssa do when she is stalked by the man who has been invading her dreams since the day she met him? What will she do when she is whisked away to a deserted island by the unpredictable Nicholas Donnelly? Can she tame her heart or surrender to sinful temptations? Read to find out!
Part of the Temptation Series. Can be read as a standalone.
After the Affair: Falling into a Billionaire's Arms

After the Affair: Falling into a Billionaire's Arms

1.5m Views · Ongoing · Louisa
Dear readers, this novel is coming to an end soon. I highly recommend another fantastic story of the same genre:


I’d appreciate all your support, thank you so much!
From first crush to wedding vows, George Capulet and I had been inseparable. But in our seventh year of marriage, he began an affair with his secretary.

On my birthday, he took her on vacation. On our anniversary, he brought her to our home and made love to her in our bed...

Heartbroken, I tricked him into signing divorce papers.

George remained unconcerned, convinced I would never leave him.

His deceptions continued until the day the divorce was finalized. I threw the papers in his face: "George Capulet, from this moment on, get out of my life!"

Only then did panic flood his eyes as he begged me to stay.

When his calls bombarded my phone later that night, it wasn't me who answered, but my new boyfriend Julian.

"Don't you know," Julian chuckled into the receiver, "that a proper ex-boyfriend should be as quiet as the dead?"

George seethed through gritted teeth: "Put her on the phone!"

"I'm afraid that's impossible."

Julian dropped a gentle kiss on my sleeping form nestled against him. "She's exhausted. She just fell asleep."
Lone Wolf

Lone Wolf

6.5k Views · Completed · roanna hinks
We were surrounded by three wolves, Sapphire killed one but two big ones came up behind them before we could finish them off.
I am completely a sobbing mess.
But before I can do or say anything, Sapphire pushes through and pushes me back into the darkness with a block on me.
I am in darkness yet again due to my wolf, why is she doing this?
I have had enough of this, I want out. I want answers.

Mila Dawson and her wolf Sapphire are the white wolf creation of the Moon Goddess herself. However, Mila is the only wolf in a small town full of supernatural beings and has no memory of how she came to the small town. When a new pack of wolves moves into the territory near the town, Mila is stunned to find out that the alpha’s son Nathaniel is her mate. When she turns 18, memories flood back and she is hit with some dark secrets, a lost family member, a guardian, and a pending war to face. This is the Book 1 of 2.
Let Them Kneel

Let Them Kneel

234.6k Views · Ongoing · My Fantasy Stories
Kaelani spent her life believing she was wolfless.
Cast out by her pack. Forgotten by the Lycans.
She lived among humans—quiet, invisible, tucked away in a town no one looked at twice.

But when her first heat comes without warning, everything changes.

Her body ignites. Her instincts scream. And something primal stirs beneath her skin—
summoning a big, bad Alpha who knows exactly how to quench her fire.

When he claims her, it’s ecstasy and ruin.

For the first time, she believes she’s been accepted.
Seen.
Chosen.

Until he leaves her the next morning—
like a secret never to be spoken.

But Kaelani is not what they thought.
Not wolfless. Not weak.
There is something ancient inside her. Something powerful. And it’s waking.

And when it does—
they’ll all remember the girl they tried to erase.

Especially him.

She’ll be the dream he keeps chasing… the one thing that ever made him feel alive.

Because secrets never stay buried.
And neither do dreams.
The Spy Who Left

The Spy Who Left

1.3k Views · Completed · Orion Vale
"She's naive. A pretty little socialite who got lucky marrying above her station."
"I still can't believe she actually did it. Aria Hart, filing for divorce. Who saw that coming?"
"How long do we think it'll take before she comes crawling back?" Another voice joins the conversation.
"Three days," Victoria declares. "Five at most. She has no money, no skills, no family. Where's she going to go?"
When Aria Chen divorced billionaire Leon Hart, New York's elite sneered, betting she'd crawl back within days. She never did.
Three years later, the world is rocked when Dr. Aria Vale, CEO of a revolutionary cybersecurity empire, steps into the spotlight. The mysterious genius who built a billion-dollar company from nothing is none other than Leon's discarded wife, the woman everyone thought was just a pretty ornament.
Now, every powerful man wants the queen Leon threw away a renowned scientist seeking partnership, a financial titan proposing an empire, and an actor offering devotion. Each sees the brilliance Leon ignored.
Then Leon discovers the truth: Aria's sacrifices, her secret double life, and the daughter she's been raising without him. For the first time, the man who once took her for granted must fight for her love. But can he compete with men who valued her from the beginning?
A story of love, betrayal, and power where the king must kneel before the queen who never needed saving.
Omega Bound

Omega Bound

2.3m Views · Completed · Veronica White
Ayla Frost is a beautiful, rare omega. Kidnapped, tortured, and trafficked to rogue clans and corrupt alphas to do with as they pleased.  Kept alive in her cage, broken and abandoned by her wolf, she becomes mute and has given up on hope for a better life until one explosion changes everything. 

Thane Knight is the alpha of the Midnight Pack of the La Plata Mountain Range, the largest wolf shifter pack in the world. He is an alpha by day and hunts the shifter trafficking ring with his group of mercenaries by night. His hunt for vengeance leads to one raid that changes his life. 

Tropes:
Touch her and die/Slow burn romance/Fated Mates/Found family twist/Close circle betrayal/Cinnamon roll for only her/Traumatized heroine/Rare wolf/Hidden powers/Knotting/Nesting/Heats/Luna/Attempted assassination
HER ALPHA, HER SAVIOUR

HER ALPHA, HER SAVIOUR

2.4k Views · Ongoing · Iris
I sold myself to a monster to save my mom—and walked into a cage.

Kane Hellboud, charm and wealth personified, wanted only me in exchange for her treatment. No cameras, isolation, or noose-like rules were part of the deal. Behind his smile? Cold, violent possessiveness that destroyed our fake marriage.

Most of all, I didn’t know the supernatural walked among us, hiding in the cracks of ordinary life. Not until Abel Stone stepped into mine—dark-eyed, sharp-tongued, and oozing dangerous promises. He’s my new boss. He shouldn’t make my skin tingle or my pulse race. I shouldn’t feel this primal pull, this illogical recognition that tugs at something deep in my bones.

Around him, lights burst, electronics fry, and something ancient in me awakens.

Kane feels it. His grip tightens, punishments turn brutal, and he hides the truth of what I am.

Trapped between two powerful men, I’m no prey, no pawn—no helpless victim.

Prisons burn. Monsters bleed. As for me? I'm the storm in skin—deadly beyond suspicion.