Reborn as the Mafia King's Wife novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: The Broken Key
After Gina and Carlo kill Elena, she wakes at the key handoff and breaks the key in front of Carlo. Matteo sees Carlo's hand on her wrist.
Gina held the cake while Carlo tied my hands.
Twenty-seven candles shook in the draft from the open balcony.
My sister had frosted the cake herself, white with red cherries.
She had always remembered I hated cherries.
"Make a wish," she said.
Carlo took the gun from his coat and set it beside the cake.
Seven months earlier, I had used that gun on my husband.
Carlo had told me Matteo would kill my sister unless I fired first.
Matteo had been standing across his own dining room, empty-handed.
He had looked at me instead of the weapon.
I shot him once below the ribs.
Now Carlo laughed at the tears on my face.
"Still thinking about him?" he asked.
"He was a better man than you."
Gina set down the cake.
For the first time that night, her smile fell away.
"You finally noticed."
She picked up the gun and fired.
I heard the window break behind me.
Then somebody shook my shoulder.
"Elena."
I opened my eyes in a car outside Matteo's house.
Rain slid over the windshield, and my phone glowed in my lap.
Carlo's message said to meet him at the side gate.
The date at the top was seven months before my birthday.
My wrists were free.
I touched my chest where Gina had shot me.
The skin was whole beneath my dress.
A guard opened the car door and held an umbrella over me.
"Mrs. Vescari?"
I stepped out into the rain.
There was no good explanation for a dead woman standing here.
I could think about it after the gate stayed shut.
Carlo waited beside the iron fence in a gray coat.
He reached for my face with the hand that had tied me.
I slapped it away.
"What's wrong?" he whispered.
I took the brass key from my purse.
Matteo had trusted me with every gate in the house.
In my first life, I had handed this key to Carlo.
Three men had entered before midnight.
One of them had gone up the stairs to Ada's room.
I put the key on the curb and stamped on it.
Brass scraped stone but did not break.
Carlo caught my wrist.
"Stop making a scene."
I pulled free and stamped again.
The key bent beneath my heel.
A car slowed behind us.
Carlo looked over my shoulder and dropped his hand.
Matteo stepped out into the rain without an umbrella.
His black shirt was open at the throat.
I had last seen that shirt soaked in his blood.
He looked at the broken key, then at Carlo.
"Why is your hand on my wife?"
Carlo smiled the smile I once mistook for warmth.
"She asked me to meet her."
Matteo waited for me to answer.
In our first life I would have lied for Carlo.
I had seven months of lies to undo.
"I asked him here," I said.
Carlo's smile widened.
"To tell him I changed my mind."
I bent and picked up the ruined key.
"He wanted to get inside tonight."
Matteo looked at Carlo again.
Carlo stepped back toward the dark street.
"She's upset. We had an argument."
"Then you can leave," Matteo said.
The guard moved to the gate.
Carlo stared at me as if I had struck him.
Perhaps I had.
He went to his car, but he did not start it.
A second guard came around the corner with his jacket half-buttoned.
He saw Carlo by the car and stopped under the gate light.
"Should I bring him back?" he asked Matteo.
"No," I said before Matteo could answer.
Carlo's eyes found mine across the road.
For years I had let him make each decision sound like mine.
This one belonged to me, even if Matteo never believed why.
"Watch the rear gate," I told the guard.
Matteo turned toward me.
I had never given an order in his house before.
The guard looked to him for permission.
Matteo nodded, and the man ran through the rain.
Carlo started his car only after we all watched him do it.
The sound of the engine receded, but my hands kept shaking.
Matteo noticed and opened his coat, then stopped himself.
He had no reason to think I wanted comfort from him.
I wanted it more than I could say.
Matteo held out his hand for the key.
I put the bent brass in his palm.
His fingers closed over mine for one second.
I could feel how warm he was.
"There are men coming," I said.
Matteo's face did not change.
"Then show me where."
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