I Was My Sister's Replacement novel · Chapter 1 of 16
Chapter 1: The Red Wine
On the day I turned twenty-nine, my nephew threw a glass of red wine in my face.
He did it in front of the entire Corvino family, gathered around the long table in the Westchester mansion.
Candles were lit, and the Hudson looked black beyond the windows.
I was wearing a white dress.
I was also wearing a diamond cross necklace.
My husband had placed it in my hands that afternoon, inside a velvet box, without saying a word.
"Happy birthday," Massimo had murmured, staring out the window.
He didn't say my name.
He never did.
For five years I was "the lady" to the staff, "the Don's wife" to the associates, "the sister" to the relatives.
And to my husband, I was a useful piece of furniture.
The kind you keep in the house so the child doesn't end up alone.
Five years ago, my sister Bianca died in a crash on the river road.
My mother was dying of cancer in a Brooklyn hospital.
And my nephew Dario, who was five, stopped speaking.
Massimo came to see me one night, with the look of a man who doesn't ask for favors.
He offered to pay for my mother's treatment and care for her until the end.
In exchange, a contract.
Five years of marriage, not a day more, to give his son a mother while he recovered.
I signed.
My mother died two years later, but she had the best beds, the best doctors, and a peaceful goodbye.
And I stayed in that house, raising a boy who, little by little, started speaking again.
Maybe that's why I thought I'd won.
Maybe that's why it felt like a gift that night when the boy came to the table with a glass in his hand.
Dario was ten now, with black curly hair and his father's gray eyes.
He approached slowly, looking at my neck.
I smiled at him.
"Do you want to toast with me, sweetheart?"
He didn't answer.
He looked at the diamond cross.
His face went white.
And he hurled the wine at me with both hands, with all his strength.
The cold liquid hit my eyes, my mouth, my neckline.
It ran down my cheeks, down my neck, down the white fabric of my dress.
Its sour smell burned my eyes.
The whole table went silent.
Someone dropped a fork.
I blinked, wiping my face with the back of my hand.
Dario was still there, half a meter away, holding the empty glass.
His eyes were full of a hatred that didn't fit inside a child.
They were his father's eyes.
"Don't think you're going to replace my mom," he said, his voice trembling. "That necklace is hers. You never deserved it."
"Dario..."
"It's your fault she's dead."
My heart stopped.
"I wish you had died instead," he went on. "Then I could smash your headstone instead of sitting here celebrating your stupid birthday."
Someone caught their breath.
"When I grow up," he said, lowering his voice, "I'm going to throw you into the Hudson."
Five years of nightmares, of homework, of fevers and midnight stories.
Five years of holding his hand to cross the street.
Five years of love.
All of it came crashing down on me along with the wine.
I looked at Massimo.
He was sitting at the head of the table, glass in hand, his face like stone.
He hadn't moved.
"Dario," he said, with an icy calm. "Go to your room."
"But, Dad..."
"Go."
The boy dropped the glass, which rolled across the tablecloth, and ran out.
Everyone was staring at me.
My husband's associates, their wives, his younger brother Rocco, leaning back in his chair with a smile at the corner of his mouth.
Massimo cleared his throat.
"Nina, don't take what he says seriously. He's a child."
It was the first time in five years he'd said my name.
And he said it to ask me to keep quiet.
Something went cold inside me, silently.
It wasn't anger.
It was clarity.
I stood up.
I took the napkin from my lap, wiped my face, calmly, and brought my hands to the back of my neck.
I unclasped the necklace.
I set it on the tablecloth, next to my plate, with a soft clink.
"This is Bianca's," I said. "I didn't realize."
From the purse hanging on my chair, I pulled out a thick white envelope with a lawyer's seal.
I'd brought it that morning, because the date had been on the calendar in my head for five years.
I placed it in front of Massimo.
"Today marks five years of the contract."
"It ends at midnight."
"Your lawyer already signed it."
"You still need to sign, but it doesn't matter: the clauses are automatic."
"Nina."
"Thank you for paying for my mother's treatment. Thank you for taking care of her until the end. I'll remember that forever."
"Nina, sit down."
"This is as far as I go, Massimo."
I grabbed my purse.
I walked out of the dining room in my white dress soaked in wine, in front of everyone, without looking at anyone.
Behind me, I heard my husband's chair scrape back.
I heard his voice, hoarse, a single word.
"Nina."
I didn't turn around.
In the foyer, by the oak door, a man was leaning against the frame with his hands in his pockets.
Rocco.
Thirty-six years old, hair slicked back with gel, brown eyes that always seemed to be smiling, a gold ring on his pinky.
He stepped aside to let me pass, but when my shoulder brushed against his, he lowered his head and spoke into my ear, very softly.
"Rivers keep secrets well, sister-in-law."
I froze.
"Your sister knows. If you open your mouth, you won't be the only Albanese in the Hudson."
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