Loading promotion info...
My Fiancé Faked My Family's Execution to Please His Real Bride
Novelix
Completed
"The order came down that my fiancé had betrayed the Family. I was in my wedding dress, waiting for him. There was no betrayal. No slaughter. My father and brothers were fine. Dante was fine. They were all at dinner with Mia — the real heiress — faking a treason order so she'd stop crying. They forgot one thing. Vale women would rather die than be shamed. By dawn, fourteen of us were dead in that cell. I was the last. I watched them carry our bodies home. I watched them learn the truth. And I watched Dante beg a ghost to stay. I didn't. I walked into the light without him."
Chapters (3)
第1章
The order came down that Dante Moretti had betrayed the Family — and I was sitting in my wedding dress, waiting for him to come get me.
In one breath, my wedding became a funeral.
My fiancé got thrown in the Pit. My whole family went down with him. The Vales, every one of us guilty of running with a traitor's son.
The men would be executed in the fall.
The women? Sold off. Shipped to the brothels. Whores for the rest of their lives.
Every generation after us, too.
When the news hit, Nonna pulled the gold pin out of her hair. Her hands wouldn't stop shaking.
Mama tore her long white sash into pieces. One for each of my sisters-in-law.
"A Vale woman dies clean," she said. "She doesn't get used."
That night, Nonna walked into the stone pillar.
Mama hung herself.
My sisters-in-law took their babies and jumped into the well.
I was swallowing my last poison pill when I heard the guards outside the cell start to complain.
"The Don's son and the Vale men spoil that real daughter way too much."
"She's just scared Dante still wants to marry the fake one. Scared her own father and brothers love the girl they raised for sixteen years more than her. So she cried, and she made them prove they meant it. And they forged an order. Treason, seizure, the whole thing. Tricked every woman in the family into a cell."
The other one laughed.
"The Don's son said if she signs the breakup letter, we let the Vale women out tomorrow morning. Right now the men are back at the estate throwing her a dinner. Figuring out how to cheer her up."
There was no treason.
There was no slaughter.
My fiancé was fine.
My father and brothers were fine.
They were alive. They were drinking wine.
They just wanted the real Vale daughter to feel safe.
They forgot one thing.
Vale women would rather die than be shamed.
And there was nobody left in that cell to walk out.
The poison moved fast.
I curled up on the cold straw.
Outside, the two guards were still joking around.
"It's just a show. If Miss Vale had signed the letter earlier, would she be spending the night in here?"
I wanted to tell them I wasn't scared of one night.
But something hot and sweet flooded my throat. I opened my mouth and a mouthful of black blood came out.
One of them finally noticed something was wrong.
"What's with her?"
He lifted his lantern and walked up to the bars. He looked in. His face went white.
"Get — go get a doctor!"
The other one grabbed his arm.
"Relax. Miss Vale's stubborn. She's probably just trying to scare the Don's son."
"Besides, she gave orders. Whatever happens in there tonight, we don't open this door. You want to be the one who ruined her plan?"
The guard with the lantern hesitated.
Then he stepped back.
I lay on the floor, my stomach twisting like a thousand dull knives turning inside me.
But the pain wasn't the worst part.
The worst part was what they'd just said.
My father hadn't been fired. He wasn't in a cell.
Nonna didn't have to bury her own son.
Mama, my sisters-in-law, the little ones — they could all be alive right now.
All somebody had to do was tell them the truth. One sentence.
By the time it went dark, my wedding dress was soaked through with blood.
When I opened my eyes again, I was floating above the cell.
Below me, my body lay still. Eyes shut. A thin line of black blood running from my mouth.
Mama was hanging from the sash she'd torn into strips.
Elena, my oldest brother's wife, had pushed her only gold bracelet through the bars before she died. Begging the guard to bury the Vale women later.
Gia had been three months pregnant.
Rosa bit through her own tongue. She held her six-year-old so tight the whole time, keeping her hand over the little girl's eyes, so Lily never saw the bodies.
And I was last.
I should have gone earlier.
But Nonna saved the one pill for me. The one that kills on contact.
She wiped the blood off my face. Then she pressed it into my palm. Her hand was shaking.
"Rena. You came in here in your wedding dress. You walk out of this world clean, still wearing it."
"Don't be scared."
"Nonna's going first. I'll wait for you up ahead."
Then she turned, braced herself against the wall, and walked — one step at a time — into the stone pillar.
I lunged for her. Mama and my sisters-in-law held me back.
The sound her body made when it hit.
I'd never heard anything like it.
A few hours ago, she was in the east parlor picking out the tiara I'd wear to my wedding. Laughing. Saying that yes, Dante Moretti was the Don's son, but if he ever laid a hand on a Vale girl, she'd march into the Don's house on her own two feet and file a complaint.
Something yanked me out of that cell.
Down the streets. Through the gates. Back to the Vale estate.
Every window was lit.
There was a dinner laid out in the main hall.
My father, my three brothers, and Dante. All of them.
And Mia Vale, sitting right in the middle. Wearing the pink silk dress Mama had made for me.
Her eyes were still a little puffy. Her plate was piled high. Everybody had been putting food there all night.
Marco slid a dish of crab meat in front of her.
"You like crab, right? I shelled all of it."
Luca pulled out a white jade flute.
"You said you liked these. I had someone bring it up from Tuscany."
Nico dropped a fluffy little puppy into her lap.
"Stop being upset. Tomorrow Rena signs the letter, and this whole thing is over."
第2章
I stood in the doorway, and I remembered the last sixteen years.
I hate the cold. So Papa had heated floors put into my suite.
I love the custard from the south. So Marco would take a detour on every trip and bring some back for me.
Luca taught me to ride. The first time I fell off, he carried me on his back three blocks to the doctor.
Nico and I fought about everything. But when I got punished, he'd copy out my lessons for me in secret.
They used to hold me in their hands like that, too.
Then a month ago, the real Vale daughter came home.
Mia had spent sixteen years out there on her own. She'd gone through hell.
My parents couldn't sleep at night from the guilt. My brothers wanted to give her everything good in the world.
I wanted to make it up to her, too.
I gave her the suite I'd lived in for sixteen years. I put every piece of jewelry Mama had given me in front of her. Every property Papa had signed over to me. Every gift my brothers had brought back from their trips. I told her to take whatever she wanted.
She didn't take a single thing.
She just looked at me with red eyes and asked me:
"You've had my parents and my brothers for sixteen years. Are you going to keep my fiancé, too?"
That was the first I knew she wanted Dante.
On the road home, she'd been attacked by robbers. Dante and his men pulled her out of it. He handed her a handkerchief. Nothing, just a reflex. And she remembered it.
But the wedding was already set.
Dante took my hand and told her, with the whole family standing there:
"I saved you because you're Rena's sister."
"There's only one woman I'm marrying in this life. Rena."
Mia fainted on the spot.
When she woke up, she stopped eating. Stopped drinking. Then she cut her wrist.
Mama sat next to her bed and cried all night. Papa and my brothers took turns talking to her. She only said one thing, over and over:
"If she stays, I'll spend my whole life being the girl they picked up on the road."
"So either she goes — or I do. Choose."
And that's when everybody started asking me to give a little.
Papa sighed and said, "We're just calming her down. Once she settles, everything goes back to normal."
My brothers said, "You're the reasonable one. Mia's not. If we don't give her what she wants, she's actually going to die."
Even Dante went quiet.
They said it was temporary. They said once Mia understood nobody was abandoning her, it would all be fine.
Now they were saying it again.
Mia sat with the puppy in her lap and asked, quiet:
"And if she won't sign?"
Dante's fingers tightened around his glass. His knuckles went white.
"She'll sign. Rena cares about this family more than anything. She thinks we're all going down because of her. She's not going to gamble with the safety of every woman in the house."
Mia's eyes filled up instantly.
"You're still defending her. In front of me. After everything you promised me."
"Or do you only ever get to hurt me when she's watching?"
Dante was quiet for a long time.
"I didn't say that."
"You're still holding on to her!"
Mia stood up, crying. "All of you — you're all still holding on to her! Then why even bother pretending? Tomorrow when she walks out, you'll all go back to her. Papa will feel bad she spent a night in a cell. Mama will hold her and cry. My brothers will turn on me. And you'll marry her again."
Papa set his glass down immediately.
"No. Mia, we promised you. We'll do what we said."
Marco kept his voice soft. "After she signs, we'll send her to the estate in the country for a while. When you're not scared anymore, she can come home."
Luca frowned. "Rena's actually always been good to you. Everything you liked, she gave up for you."
Mia slammed her glass down.
"Look at me. Every single thing she gave me, she gave it with that face. Like she was doing me a favor. Like I was a stray dog she felt bad for."
"She handed me back my own life and made me thank her for it."
The room went quiet again.
Nico sighed. "Fine. Let's not talk about her. Tonight's your dinner. Stop crying."
Dante reached inside his jacket and set something in front of Mia.
A pendant. Gifted to him by the old Don. He never took it off.
"I'll give you my word. After the engagement is called off, I won't marry Rena for a year."
He paused.
"And after that — if you still can't accept it — I'll let her go. I'll find her a good man."
Papa cleared his throat, trying to lighten the room.
"Everything set at the Pit?"
Marco nodded. "I sent three thousand in cash ahead. The cell was cleaned out. Blankets, a brazier, hot water. All arranged. The guard on duty tonight is an old friend of mine. He won't let Nonna and the others suffer."
Luca said, "Mama's not strong. I've got a doctor standing by outside. We'll go get them first thing in the morning."
Papa relaxed. "Good. Mama's always been forgiving. Once she knows the truth, she'll yell at us a little, that's all."
"Your mother's a kind woman too. She'll understand we owe Mia."
Nico laughed. "The wives won't hold a grudge either. Only Lily's a scaredy-cat, she'll probably cry. I'll pick up a few boxes of candy tomorrow, that'll fix it."
They'd even worked out who would pick up who.
Papa would get Nonna.
My brothers would each go apologize to their own wife and kid.
Dante would take me himself. He had a house ready on the south side of the city, planted with magnolias. My favorite.
He said once I cooled down, he'd stay there with me a while.
Every one of them was sure that when the sun came up, everything would be the way it was before.
I stood there, a ghost stuck in place, and all I felt was tired.
Nobody knew the three thousand never made it to the Pit.
The guy they'd sent to deliver it had been bought by Mia.
No blankets. No brazier. No hot water. No doctor.
She took the cash and paid three thugs with it. Told them to ruin me.
I looked at her face while she said it.
She wasn't sorry.
She was smiling.
第3章
Half an hour before I died, the cell door opened.
It wasn't a guard with food. It was three men. Drunk. Reeking.
The way they looked at me made my skin crawl.
The one in front held up a badge.
"Heard this is the Don's son's leftovers? My boys have never had a rich girl in a wedding dress. Never been the first."
Mama stepped in front of me.
"You lay a hand on her and you're dead."
The man laughed.
"A whore headed for the brothels tomorrow? Who cares?"
"Besides, somebody paid us to come."
I felt it before he even said it.
Her.
The real daughter said to make it messy.
He reached for my collar.
I shoved him off. Another one grabbed my wrist and slammed me into the ground.
The tiara cracked against the stone wall. Pearls scattered everywhere.
His hand came down again.
Then Rosa came off the floor behind him and sank her teeth into his arm.
He screamed. Backhanded her across the room.
Gia grabbed a broken bowl and dragged it down another man's face.
Mama, Lily, even Nonna, old as she was — they all piled on top of them.
A dozen of us. Wooden pins. Shards of porcelain. Bare hands.
We went at those three men like animals.
Elena locked her arms around me and took a kick meant for me. Her forehead split open. She didn't let go.
"Rena, get behind me! Don't let them touch you!"
Nonna swung her cane into the leader's skull.
"There are Vale women still breathing in here! You don't get to put your hands on us!"
They thought a bunch of spoiled rich women wouldn't fight back.
They were wrong.
One of them got his throat opened up with a piece of porcelain. Blood everywhere. They backed out of the cell, cursing.
At the door, the leader spat on the floor.
"Playing the saint. You think the Vale men are coming to save you?"
"They're at home eating dinner with their real daughter."
The door locked behind them.
The cell went dead silent.
Elena tore a strip off her sleeve and covered my ripped collar.
Mama held me. Her hands were shaking so badly she couldn't close the fabric.
Nonna sat in the blood and looked around the room. Every one of us, cut and bruised. She said nothing for a long time.
We'd still had a thread of hope.
Maybe Papa and my brothers hadn't actually committed treason.
Maybe Dante would find a way to get us out.
Those three men killed the last of it.
If anyone could walk into the Pit and do that, the Vales were finished.
Nonna closed her eyes.
When she opened them, her face was calm in a way that scared me more than the men had.
"If they march us to the brothels at dawn, are you afraid?"
Nobody answered.
My little niece didn't know what a brothel was. She just hugged Rosa's leg and said she wanted to go home.
Rosa crouched down and kissed her forehead.
"Sweetheart. Mama's taking you somewhere with no bad people in it."
Mama took the gold pin out of her hair and handed it to Nonna.
The other wives started taking off their jewelry too.
Whoever could swallow gold did. Whoever could hang themselves did.
But there wasn't enough.
Nonna looked toward the back of the building. The well.
She said the Vale name could be ruined. The Vale house could be seized.
But no Vale woman would ever be passed around.
"We pick our own way out," Nonna said.
"The road's cold. But we go together, so it's not."
Mama nodded, crying.
The others nodded.
Then Lily ran across the room and threw herself at me.
"Auntie. I'm scared."
"I don't want to die."
She was six.
Yesterday she was still threatening to block my door on my wedding day and make Dante pay ten gold bars for the bride.
I held her and my throat felt like someone was cutting it.
I wanted to say don't be scared.
I couldn't get it out.
Because I was scared too.
I didn't want to die either.
I had my dress on. Mama had stitched twin flowers inside the collar. Nonna had sewn the red thread into my hem by hand.
Dante promised he'd come for me on the biggest white horse he owned.
He said after the wedding he'd take me south to see the rain, and north to see the snow.
We'd already picked names for our kids.
I never got a carriage. Not one.
In the end it was Rosa who carried Lily away. She pressed the little girl's face into her chest and started singing her an old lullaby.
I couldn't watch.
The pill Nonna gave me was still in my fist.
She said I was the daughter she'd raised for sixteen years. Maybe not Vale blood, but Vale bone. So nobody was allowed to touch me.
They didn't know.
The order outside that cell was fake.
The treason was fake.
The men going to prison was fake.
Only their dying was real.
