Married To The Consigliere: The Canary's Revenge

I was the secret pen pal of Xavier Falcone, the ruthless Heir to the Syndicate.

We spent six months trading ciphers and falling in love in the dark.

But my half-sister Natalie stole my burner phone and claimed my identity as his "Canary."

When I ran through the pouring rain to his territory to tell him the truth, his eyes were devoid of mercy.

He believed her lies about my jealousy and handed me over to his men without a second thought.

He locked me in his heavily guarded penthouse and forced a laced glass of vintage scotch down my throat.

The cramping started ten minutes later, blood soaking through my white dress as he killed our unborn child.

"A rat does not deserve to bear my blood."

He stood over me with a blank, aristocratic face, mocking me as I bled out on his cold marble floor.

Until my last breath, I didn't understand how the man who wrote me such tender words could be so heartless.

Why did he refuse to recognize my soul? Why did he leave me to die so brutally in the dark?

Opening my eyes again, I was back on the day Natalie pointed a gun at me to steal my phone.

This time, I didn't fight back.

"Take the phone, Natalie. It is yours."

I handed over the man I loved and signed a contract to marry Gabriel Romano, the most lethal architect of death in the Underworld.

In this life, I would rather marry a true monster than ever look at Xavier Falcone again.

Chapter 1

Serena Sinclair POV

I stared down the cold, circular void of the barrel, but the true sentence was not held in my half-sister's gun; it glowed from the screen of the burner phone in her left hand.

The screen read: "I am coming to claim you tonight, my Canary."

If I told Xavier Falcone-the ruthless Heir to the Syndicate-that I was the actual woman he had been secretly writing to for six months, he would execute my sister for identity theft. But my first life had taught me a more visceral lesson.

If he discovered it was me, he would lock me in his heavily guarded penthouse, force a laced drink down my throat to kill our unborn child, and mock me as I bled out upon the polished veins of his marble floor.

I pressed my knuckle against the cold steel of the barrel, and a tendon in my hand twitched involuntarily as I pushed it aside.

"Take the phone, Natalie," I said, my voice hollow. "It is yours."

Natalie lowered the weapon. A sneer pulled at the corner of her mouth, distorting her features. "You are a bastard child, Serena. You have dirty blood. Do you really think the Heir to the Falcone Famiglia would ever marry someone like you?"

I did not. I held no such delusion.

I reached into the drawer of my mahogany desk, pulled out the decrypted ledgers, and slid them across the polished wood.

"I am ceding him to you," I vowed. "I will maintain Omertà. I will never speak a word of this to anyone."

Natalie snatched the papers. Her eyes, narrowed with avarice, darted across the complex ciphers I had spent months decoding for him. "You better keep your mouth shut," she hissed. "If you try to ruin this for me, I will have the Soldiers drag you to the basement."

The threat of it made a familiar acid rise in my throat. I remembered the basement. I remembered the grit of cold concrete pressed into my cheek in my past life.

I remembered running through a torrent of rain to Xavier's territory, begging him to believe I was the girl on the encrypted phone. I had whispered the private codes, the Macallan 1926, the encryption shifts only we could know, but Natalie had already branded me a thief who had stolen the Canary's journal. His eyes had been devoid of mercy. He had informed me that Natalie had already issued a warning about her jealous, spying half-sister. Then, without a moment's pause, he had gestured me over to his men.

I blinked away the memory. The phantom, damp smell of rain faded, replaced by the heavy, saccharine perfume Natalie wore.

"I just want out," I told her. "I want a clean trust fund. I want an arranged marriage far away from New York and the Falcone territory."

Natalie smirked. She walked over to my printer and connected her phone. A minute later, she tossed a freshly printed property deed and a financial settlement onto my desk.

"Sign it," she ordered.

I picked up the pen and looked at the numbers. It was enough money to guarantee I would never have to rely on our father, Silvio-a greedy Capo who only cared about his legitimate daughter. I signed my name on the dotted line, the ink bleeding slightly into the paper.

"Xavier is at the Commission's VIP banquet right now," Natalie said, checking her reflection in my dressing table mirror. "He is rejecting every daughter from every Boss in the city. He told my father he only wants the Sinclair girl."

Because of the messages. Because of the cyphers we had passed back and forth like secrets in the dark.

It had all started at an exclusive mafia gala in the Hamptons. I was bored, sitting in an alcove draped in shadow, decrypting a coded ledger for fun. Xavier had walked past, and his gaze had fallen upon my work. He did not say a word, but an hour later, a waiter had slipped a burner phone into my purse. We never used our real names. We never met in the light.

"I am meeting him in the alley behind the banquet hall tonight," Natalie continued. "Right after he leaves the Commission's table. I am going to confess that I am his Canary."

I nodded slowly. That was exactly what she had done in the previous timeline.

"Just remember the rules," I said, keeping my voice perfectly flat. "Never call him from that phone. Only text. Use the encryption key on page four."

"I know how to read, Serena. I do not need a bastard telling me what to do."

She turned on her heel and walked out of my heavily guarded wing. The heavy oak door clicked shut behind her, severing the light from the hallway. On the desk, the freshly printed property deed seemed to absorb what little light remained.

I sank back into my chair. My hands began to shake, so I pressed them flat against the desk until the wood bit into my palms.

I had survived the first hurdle. I had given up the man I loved-the man who had eventually hollowed me out and left the shell behind-to save my own life.

My phone buzzed with an alert from my bank. The trust fund had been transferred.

I looked out the window at the dark, sprawling estate grounds. I was finally going to walk out of this wing, past the guards who never met my eyes. I didn't yet understand that leaving the cage doesn't mean the cage leaves you.

Serena Sinclair POV

The smell of vintage scotch made me gag, pulling me from sleep.

I woke up in a cold sweat, my hands clutching my stomach.

The phantom pain of the forced abortion ripped through my body.

I curled into a tight ball on my mattress, gasping for air.

In my past life, Xavier had brought me a glass of scotch to calm my nerves.

I had drunk it.

Ten minutes later, the cramping had started.

The blood soaked through my white dress.

He had stood over me, his aristocratic face completely blank.

He told me a rat did not deserve to bear his blood.

My bedroom door flew open, the crash of wood against the wall splintering the memory.

I sat up, pulling the blanket to my chest.

Natalie marched in.

She threw a black leather folder onto my bed.

"He is asking questions," she demanded, pacing the floor. Her phone was a pale rectangle in her white-knuckled grip.

"He is testing me. He asked me what his favorite drink is."

I took a deep breath, forcing my heart rate to slow down.

"The Macallan. Nineteen twenty-six."

Natalie typed furiously into her phone.

"What else? Give me something specific. Something only the two of you would know. And make it simple-I can't keep bluffing my way through these damn ciphers. "

I swung my legs over the side of the bed.

"We met once. In the back of a tinted SUV."

Natalie stopped typing.

She looked up, her eyes wide with a sudden, ugly jealousy.

"You met him?"

"It was pitch black," I explained, keeping my voice carefully toneless.

"He never saw my face. He just wanted to hear my breathing. He wanted to know I was real."

"Perfect. I can fake that." A wicked smile curved her lips. "I will tell him I was nervous and demanded the lights stay off."

She pocketed her phone and pointed at the black folder on my bed.

"Mother found you a husband."

My stepmother, Cynthia, hated my existence; this was no act of kindness.

I pulled the folder into my lap and opened it.

A photograph stared back at me.

Gabriel Romano.

He was the Consigliere of the Romano Family.

He was known as the architect of death-lethal, brilliant, and completely unhinged when crossed.

His dark hair was slicked back, and his eyes held a cold, calculating intelligence that made the fine hairs on my arms stand on end.

"Mother thinks it is too good for you," Natalie sneered.

"But I told her it is perfect. The Romanos are ruthless. If Gabriel treats you like garbage, you might run crying to Xavier for help. That makes you a very useful pawn."

I stared at Gabriel's picture.

He was a Made Man.

He had enough power to keep Xavier away from me, and at that moment, nothing else mattered.

"When do I meet him?" I asked.

"Tomorrow. On a private Syndicate yacht," she snapped.

"Mother will chaperone. Do not embarrass us, Serena."

Natalie left the room, the door slamming shut behind her.

I traced the edge of Gabriel's photograph.

I did not care if he was a monster.

I just needed a monster whose name was not Xavier Falcone.

Serena Sinclair POV

An ocean breeze whipped my hair across my face. I pulled my silk scarf tighter around my neck and adjusted my dark sunglasses.

Gabriel Romano sat across from me on the sun-bleached deck of the private yacht. He was dressed in a flawless charcoal suit. When he poured me a cup of tea, his movements were precise, almost gentle.

"I know your status in the Sinclair Family, Serena."

His voice was soft, but the tail end of his words scraped like sandpaper across the grain of the teakwood table.

I looked at him. "Then you know I have nothing to offer you. I am an illegitimate daughter. I have no political pull."

Gabriel set the teapot down. He leaned forward. "You have yourself. That is more than enough. I consider this match an absolute honor."

I studied his face. There was no mockery, no hidden current in his expression.

"I will send my Don to your father within five days to formalize the marriage contract," Gabriel said.

I nodded. "Thank you."

At length, the yacht docked at the VIP pier. Gabriel stood and offered me his hand. I took it, his palm warm and calloused.

As I stepped onto the wooden dock, the stiletto heel of my shoe caught on a loose plank. I stumbled forward.

Gabriel caught me by the waist. His grip was firm, anchoring me against his solid chest. The sudden movement caused the wind to catch my silk scarf, which tore from my neck as my sunglasses slipped down my nose.

"Are you alright?" Gabriel asked, his voice dropping to a whisper.

I looked up to answer him, but the words died in my throat.

Standing not ten feet away, surrounded by his heavily armed detail, was Xavier Falcone.

Xavier stopped dead in his tracks. His gaze, like a rusty nail, pinned itself to the nervous way I was wringing my hands-a habit the Canary had described to him in vivid detail. A visible ripple of confusion crossed his composed features.

"Who is she?" Xavier demanded, his voice a sharp sound that cut through the low thrum of the docks.

Gabriel stepped smoothly in front of me, completely blocking Xavier's line of sight. He tucked me behind his broad shoulders, a living barricade against the other man's presence.

"She is my future bride," Gabriel said, his tone dangerously calm. "She is shy around strangers. Let us go, Serena."

As Gabriel guided me away, I could feel Xavier's eyes burning into my back.

That night, back in the close air of my heavily guarded wing at the Sinclair estate, the nightmares returned.

I was locked in Xavier's penthouse. The door frame splintered as he kicked it down. He stood over me, his face twisted in rage. I was begging him to let my ashes be scattered far away from New York. I just wanted to be free.

He grabbed my face. "You will never escape this place, Serena. Even in death, you belong to me."

I woke up screaming, the sheets damp with a cold sweat.

My bedroom door was ajar, and there was a loud commotion in the hallway. A sharp ringing filled my ears, drowning out the other sounds as I rolled out of bed and pressed my back against the wall, hiding behind the heavy velvet curtains.

"Where is the scotch?" my half-sister, Natalie, was yelling at a maid.

"I gave the wooden box to the guard," the maid stammered.

Then, I heard heavy footsteps. A voice that made the marrow in my bones feel cold echoed in the corridor.

"Why are you in this wing, Natalie?" Xavier asked, and the sound of his voice seemed to lower the temperature in the corridor.

I stopped breathing. He was right outside my door.

"I was just checking on the staff," Natalie lied, her voice trembling slightly.

"You never mentioned you had a younger sister living here," Xavier pressed.

"She is a nobody, Xavier," Natalie said quickly. "An illegitimate mistake. She is not worth your time."

There was a long, agonizing pause in which I could picture with perfect clarity Xavier's dark, knowing smirk.

"Let us go, then," Xavier finally said.

Once their footsteps faded away, I stepped out from behind the curtain and looked at myself in the mirror. I saw my own sharp, defiant features looking back at me. I would marry Gabriel Romano. I would never let the Heir drag me back into the dark. But the way Xavier had looked at me on the dock-like he was trying to place a ghost-told me the dark wasn't done with me yet.