My Dead Wife’s Revenge

~Alessia Donato~ I stretched my hand to my side, trying to see if he would be there but he wasn’t, the void was back. The one that left with him every time he stepped out. I walked over to my bathroom, took my toothbrush, and placed some toothpaste on it, imagining how he had cleaned up this morning. I went ahead to shower and wrap my bathrobe around my body when I heard the bedroom door slam open, jolting me out of my wandering thoughts. He was the only one who could come into this room apart from me__The guards knew not to come anywhere near the rooms. I looked around until I locked eyes with the blade I used for shaving my eyebrows, I reached for it for protection, and made slow calculated steps towards the bedroom. I flung the door open, arm extended, slashing the air with the object in my hand. It struck something—someone. Skin. His skin. He stood there, shirtless, his dark hair tousled, sweatpants slung low on his hips. Beads of sweat traced the ridges of his abs, glistening before vanishing into the waistband of his pants. He looked at the strike on his chest, dripping blood slowly before raising his head to look at me. He tilted his head as if he were trying to read me. “Uhmm what are you doing here” I managed to speak, “Good morning to you, wife, I wouldn’t wake up to this every morning” Sarcasm dripped from his words, I knew he was psychotic I just didn’t know it was to this extent. “I didn’t mean to hurt you” I went back into the bathroom to get a towel for him to help suppress the wound. “Why aren’t you out?” I raised my head to stare at his hazel eyes. It felt like I was being sucked in by his eyes, I needed to snap out of it. “I own the freaking Familia, I don’t need anyone’s permission to stay or come to work” he pushed my hands away from the towel pressed to his chest as he walked to the coffee table that I’d ignored. There was breakfast on it. It contained different varieties of food like bacon and eggs, toast, grapes, chopped watermelons, and apples. “Aren’t you going to eat?” Cassian said, pulling the chairs closer to the table. I was confused, Cassian and I had been married for almost a year and he had never been around, he was always out and busy. We stayed in the same room but no sort of connection happened, he never tried to touch me, he just acted like I was invisible__until recently. “Uhm yes” I walked closer to the table, taking my seat next to him. “Do you like it?” I nodded, staring at him with total disbelief. A dozen thoughts ran through my mind. Maybe he was dying, and some doctor told him to make peace with the people he had offended or maybe this was his final act of redemption before the end. But this wasn’t a deathbed moment. This was Cassian, calculated. Firm and always ready, if he was being kind, there was no way it was mercy, definitely strategy. “Are you dying?” I blurted out, trying to choke down some bacon to avoid his eyes. I heard a small chuckle rumble from his chest as he looked at me like I was going crazy. “There are many_better ways to kill you bambino, poisoning is too easy and boring” He wasn’t joking, he was psychotic like that and even I knew he wouldn’t take me down easily__at least not without torture. “Why are you acknowledging me?” My words came out more aggressively than I planned. “Because you’re my wife?” Confusion sat on his face for a while but it was gone the minute he heard his phone ring. His eyes moved to check who the caller was and instantly he frowned. “What do you want” his voice held the kind of authority you didn’t challenge, I felt chills run down my spine. “Keep him there, I’m coming” I knew that was bad news, I mean I knew my husband wasn’t a saint__no man in the mafia was but I still felt weird every time I heard him talk about torturing or killing someone. He stood up, making his way straight to the bathroom to shower. I sat down there and ate the meal he prepared. I knew Cassian wasn’t a good man but he protected me and I was slowly warming up to him.. Yes, he still made me shiver and scared but u knew there was more to him. A ping from his phone brought me out of my trance, I ignored it, arranging my plates knowing that the maids would come help clear the place. I straightened the place a bit, then wandered to the closet to pick an outfit for the day. I heard Cassian’s phone ping again and it was already time this person was messaging him__could it be one of his side pieces? I mean we only had s****l intercourse 3 times after one marriage, he was always busy or never around but who knows whether he was getting it outside. I shook the thought out of my head, trying my best not to be that person. I didn’t want to be the jealous wife who had no self-control and checked her husband's phone. The phone started ringing, I guess the person messaging him was tired of being left unread. The mental battle started again, I had to decide if I was going to let my jealous part take a peep at the caller and read the chats but the other part of me wanted to stay where I was. I picked a bumbshort and a shirt that said ‘come at me b***h’ Cassian picked it for me when we went to shop during the third month of our marriage. I walked to the bed to sit and I heard the phone ping again. I looked around, like a their trying to steal a special jewelry as I made slow steps towards the phone__ I picked the phone up, scrolling through the messages to and it was from someone named ‘Storm’ I guess he was one of Cassian’s men, I was about placing the phone, seeing that I was just being irrational but something caught my eye in one of the messages it was my brothers name VALERIO. Why would this storm of a person message Cassian about my brother? I felt my heart pound in my chest, reading the message slowly as I heard my heart shatter. I couldn’t believe what my eyes were seeing, how could he do this to me? No. No. It wasn’t possible. “What are you doing?” I looked up, his hair tousled and wet from the shower, trinkets of water dripping down his body, disappearing into the towel he tied around his waist as he looked at me with anger and confusion. Tears filled my eyes as I stared at him in disbelief. I slept with him, lived with him and he betrayed me. I married the monster who killed my brother