The Capo's Regret: The Curse Was A Lie

For fifteen years, my husband Bennett refused to let me get pregnant.

"My blood is a curse, Kelsey," he would say, gripping my hand with terrified intensity. "It kills the women who carry it. I won't risk you."

I believed him. I mourned the children we never had just to stay alive for him.

Then he brought Aria home.

He claimed she was a distant cousin in trouble. But from the shadows of the ballroom, I watched him caress her swollen belly with a tenderness he never showed me.

When I confronted him, the mask fell.

"You provide the image, Kelsey," he said coldly. "She provides the bloodline. Do not make a scene."

To teach me a lesson in obedience, my horse's reins were sabotaged.

I woke up in the hospital with a fractured leg, only to learn he had ignored my emergency calls to hold Aria's hand during a routine ultrasound.

Lying in that sterile bed, the truth hit me harder than the fall.

There was no curse.

He had medically gaslighted me for a decade, stealing my fertility with a lie, just to replace me with a mistress he called "cousin."

He thought he had broken me. He thought I would fade quietly into the east wing.

Instead, I wiped my tears and planted listening devices in his office.

He wanted a legacy?

I boarded a train to Paris, leaving behind a bomb that would burn his entire world to ash.

Chapter 1

(Kelsey POV)

I stood in the shadows of a massive marble pillar, weighed down by diamonds that cost more than most people earn in a lifetime, and watched my husband caress another woman's swollen belly.

He didn't see me.

He saw only her, and the child that was supposed to be impossible-a miracle denied to us by the curse that had kept my own womb empty for fifteen desolate years.

It felt like a lifetime ago, but it was only this morning that I had woken up in our penthouse overlooking Central Park.

The sheets were cold on his side.

They were always cold.

I had spent the morning meticulously constructing the mask I presented to the world.

Foundation to conceal the violet shadows under my eyes.

Silk to drape over the hollowness in my chest.

I was Mrs. Kelsey Randolph.

The wife of Bennett Randolph, the most feared Capo in the New York syndicate.

Downstairs, the house manager and the wives of three senior soldiers had been waiting for me.

They perched on the edge of the velvet sofas, clutching their china cups as if they were lifelines.

"Mrs. Randolph, the charity gala is set for next week," one of them ventured.

Her eyes flickered to my flat stomach.

They always did.

I ignored the slight, taking a slow sip of my black coffee.

"Excellent," I said.

My voice was steady.

It was the voice of a woman who had everything.

But I had nothing.

Later, at breakfast, Bennett had sat across from me at the long mahogany table.

He didn't look up from his tablet.

"Bennett," I had started, my voice small. "I was reading about that agency in California again. The surrogacy one."

He stopped scrolling.

The temperature in the room seemed to plummet ten degrees.

"Kelsey," he said.

His voice was a low rumble-a sound that used to make my toes curl but now only made me flinch.

"We have discussed this."

"But if we use a donor egg," I tried, desperate.

"No." He cut me off.

He looked at me then, his eyes dark and unreadable.

"You know the history, Kelsey. My mother died screaming while giving birth to me. My blood is a curse. It kills the women who carry it."

He reached across the table and took my hand.

His grip was firm. Possessive.

"I will not risk you," he said. "I will not let you die for a child."

I believed him.

I let his lie wrap around me like a warm blanket because the alternative was too cold to bear.

I was such a fool.

The hours bled into evening.

I found myself at the family gallery, overseeing the installation of the new exhibit before the guests arrived.

Two new associates were maneuvering a crate near the back.

They didn't see me standing behind the partition.

"The Boss is dropping a fortune on that new girl," one whispered.

"Yeah, Aria. She looks just like the wife did ten years ago," the other laughed.

"Only fertile."

The word struck me like a physical blow.

I froze.

Aria.

I knew that name.

Bennett had introduced her months ago.

"A distant cousin," he had claimed. "She is in trouble. She needs family."

I had welcomed her.

I had bought her clothes.

I had found her an apartment.

A wave of nausea rose in my throat, violent and acidic.

I moved through the rest of the evening on autopilot, smiling at people I despised, shaking hands with men who had blood under their fingernails.

Finally, I needed air.

I walked toward the terrace but stopped dead when I heard a low laugh emanating from the alcove near the restrooms.

It was Bennett.

I stepped closer, concealed by the heavy velvet curtains.

He was standing there with Aria.

She was wearing a dress I had paid for.

Her hands were resting on the small, undeniable bump of her lower abdomen.

Bennett's hand covered hers.

He was smiling.

It wasn't the cold, practiced smile he gave me.

It was real.

I made a noise-a sharp intake of breath that I couldn't suppress.

Bennett looked up.

His eyes met mine.

For a second, there was panic.

But then the mask slammed down.

He didn't pull away from her.

He didn't apologize.

"Kelsey," he said.

His tone was flat. Business-like.

I stared at his hand on her stomach.

"The curse," I whispered. "You said it would kill her."

"It was necessary," he said.

He stepped in front of Aria, shielding her from my gaze.

"The family needs an heir, Kelsey. You know this."

"But you said..."

"I said what I needed to say to keep you safe," he interrupted. "You are my wife. My responsibility."

He looked back at Aria, and his expression softened in a way that shattered my heart into a million jagged pieces.

"But she gives me a future."

He looked back at me, cold and unyielding.

"You provide the image, Kelsey. She provides the bloodline. Do not make a scene."

He turned his back on me.

He turned his back on fifteen years.

I felt the bile rise in my throat.

I grabbed the wall to keep from sliding to the floor.

My hands were shaking so hard I could hear my bracelets rattling against each other.

He didn't care.

He had what he wanted.

And I realized, with a clarity that was more painful than any physical wound, that my marriage wasn't just dying.

It had been a corpse for a long time.

I was just the last one to notice the smell.