Too Late For Regret: The Mafia King's Despair

My twin sister Haleigh returned with a fake diagnosis of Stage 4 Pancreatic Cancer and a "dying wish" to marry my fiancé, Jameson Blair.

Without a second thought, Jameson, the most feared Underboss in New York, took the three-carat diamond meant for me and slid it onto her finger.

I became the spare. The obstacle standing in the way of a tragedy's happy ending.

When Haleigh planted a brown recluse spider in my room, I was the one bitten and poisoned. Yet, my brothers kicked me while I was delirious with fever, accusing me of trying to terrorize their "dying" angel.

On her birthday yacht party, a grill tipped over during a storm. My synthetic dress caught fire instantly.

As flames seared the skin off my legs, I screamed for help.

But Jameson and my brothers formed a human shield around Haleigh, frantically checking her hand for a single speck of ash while I burned alive just ten feet away.

The final straw came at the cliffs. Haleigh staged a suicide attempt to frame me for bullying her.

To teach me a lesson, Jameson bound my wrists and hung me over the edge of the abyss on a rope, leaving me dangling helplessly over the churning ocean.

They thought they were punishing a monster.

They didn't know I had a jagged rock in my hand.

As they drove away to comfort the liar, I didn't wait for them to come back.

I sawed through the rope myself and let the ocean take me.

Three years later, after discovering Haleigh never had cancer, my brothers and Jameson found me alive in Florence.

They knelt on the cobblestones, weeping, begging for a second chance.

I looked at the men who had watched me burn.

"You aren't sorry you hurt me," I said, turning to walk away with another man.

"You're just sorry you bet on the wrong sister."

Chapter 1

I watched through the rain-streaked window of the cafe as Jameson Blair, the most feared Underboss in New York, slipped the three-carat heirloom diamond meant for me onto my twin sister's finger.

My phone buzzed against the cold marble table.

It was a notification from the family calendar, a digital ghost from a future that no longer existed.

Isabella and Jameson: Wedding Rehearsal.

I swiped the notification away.

Across the street, the heavy oak doors of City Hall swung open.

Jameson stepped out first.

He looked like a king who had just conquered a new territory, his dominance absolute.

His black suit was tailored to hide the holster he wore under his left arm, but I knew the shape of the gun against his ribs better than I knew the beat of my own heart.

Last week, he had executed three men for breaching Blair territory.

Today, he was killing me without firing a single shot.

Haleigh clung to his arm.

She looked frail in her white dress, a calculated fragility that made men want to burn the world down to keep her warm.

My brothers followed them out.

Derrick, Blake, and Kane.

They were smiling.

They hadn't smiled at me in five years.

Not since Haleigh ran away to "find herself," leaving me to fill the empty seat next to the most dangerous man in the city.

I was the spare.

The seat warmer.

The cage meant to hold the beast until the real keeper returned.

I sipped my black coffee. It had gone cold, tasting of bitterness and ash.

Five years I had spent learning Jameson's moods.

Five years of soothing his temper after a hit went wrong.

Five years of wearing the clothes he liked, speaking when spoken to, and preparing to be the wife of a Mafia Don.

Then Haleigh came back two weeks ago.

She came back with a story about Stage 4 Pancreatic Cancer and a dying wish to marry her first love.

It was a lie.

I knew it was a lie because I had seen the glitter in her eyes when the doctor-a man on our payroll-read the fake chart.

But Jameson didn't see it.

My brothers didn't see it.

They only saw the Golden Child returning home to die.

They saw me as the obstacle standing in the way of a tragedy's happy ending.

I stood up and smoothed the skirt of my dress. It was time to play my part.

I walked out of the cafe and crossed the wet street. The air smelled of exhaust, ozone, and expensive cologne.

Jameson saw me first.

His eyes were the color of the Atlantic in winter.

Cold.

Unforgiving.

There was no guilt in them. Only a hard, possessive look directed at the woman on his arm.

Haleigh saw me and gasped. She pressed a hand to her chest, performing a perfect pantomime of shock.

Jameson's arm tightened around her waist instantly.

"Isabella," Derrick barked.

My oldest brother stepped in front of me, blocking my path to the happy couple.

"Go home."

I didn't look at him. I looked at Jameson.

"Congratulations," I said.

My voice was steady. I had practiced this in the mirror while I packed the go-bag currently hidden in a locker at Grand Central.

Jameson didn't speak. He just stared at me, his jaw set in a line of granite.

Haleigh stepped out from behind Derrick.

She reached for my hand. Her skin was warm. Far too warm for a dying woman.

"I'm so sorry, Bella," she said, her voice trembling for the audience of bodyguards and brothers. "I never wanted to hurt you. But time is so short."

She pulled me into a hug.

Her perfume was suffocating. Gardenias and decay.

She leaned close to my ear.

Her grip on my shoulders turned into a pinch, her nails digging viciously into my flesh.

"He was never yours," she whispered.

Her breath was hot against my neck, branding me with the truth.

"He was just passing time until I came back."

She pulled away, tears shimmering in her eyes. A perfect performance.

Jameson looked at me.

His gaze dropped to the hand Haleigh had touched, then back to my face.

"She is Haleigh," he said.

Three words.

That was his justification.

Because she was Haleigh-the sun, the moon, the stars.

And I was just Isabella.

The shadow.

Jameson opened the door of the black SUV.

He helped Haleigh inside as if she were made of glass.

Derrick, Blake, and Kane piled in after them.

They didn't look back.

The car pulled away, splashing dirty water onto my shoes.

I stood alone on the curb.

The rain began to fall harder, soaking through my dress.

I didn't cry.

I had cried enough tears over Jameson Blair to fill the Hudson River.

I turned and walked to the corner, my spine straight, my resolve hardened.

I raised my hand for a taxi.

"Where to?" the driver asked.

"Sotheby's International Realty," I said.

"I have an island to buy."

Mr. Abernathy was a ghost draped in a bespoke suit.

He sat behind a glass desk that cost more than most people's entire education, and he didn't so much as blink when I told him my budget.

Nor did he ask where the daughter of the Douglas crime family had acquired millions of dollars in untraceable cryptocurrency. He simply tapped the screen of his tablet, his face a mask of professional indifference.

"I need isolation," I said, sitting spine-straight, my hands folded demurely in my lap. "No neighbors. No flight paths. No maps."

Abernathy slid the tablet across the polished surface of the desk.

The screen displayed a solitary speck of green lost in a vast sea of blue.

"It's in the Caribbean," he said smoothly. "Technically, it doesn't exist on any modern tourist chart. It was utilized for smuggling operations in the eighties, which works to your advantage. It comes equipped with a generator, a high-grade water filtration system, and a bunker."

"Perfect," I whispered.

I didn't even glance at the price.

I pressed my thumb against the biometric scanner to authorize the transfer. The money-years of skimming off the top of my brothers' laundering operations-vanished in seconds.

They thought I was stupid. They thought I was just painting pretty pictures in my room while they discussed 'business.' They never noticed that the numbers didn't add up.

"The deed will be held under the shell company," Abernathy said, his eyes finally meeting mine. "Ms. Hale."

The name sounded strange on his tongue.

Clean.

"Thank you," I said.

I stood up. My legs felt heavy, as if dragging the weight of my past, but my chest felt lighter than it had in a decade.

"The jet leaves in forty-eight hours," Abernathy warned. "Don't be late."

I walked out into the city, the noise washing over me.

I had forty-eight hours to survive.

I returned to the penthouse at dusk. The elevator opened directly into the living room, and laughter hit me like a physical blow.

Jameson was in the kitchen.

He had discarded his jacket, his sleeves rolled up to reveal the dark ink of tattoos wrapping around his forearms. He was plating pasta with a domestic grace that terrified me.

He never cooked. Not for me.

Haleigh was perched on the counter, swinging her legs like a teenager. She was nursing a glass of red wine.

Alcohol and pancreatic cancer. A miracle combination.

Derrick and Blake were sitting at the island, watching her with rapt attention, as if she were a favorite television show they had missed.

The laughter died the moment I crossed the threshold.

Jameson looked up. The chef's knife in his hand paused, hovering over the cutting board.

"Where have you been?" he asked.

His voice was low. Dangerous. It was the tone he used seconds before ordering a hit.

"Out," I said simply.

I turned toward the hallway, intending to disappear.

Derrick slapped his palm against the marble counter. "Don't walk away when he's talking to you, Isabella."

I stopped. Slowly, I turned to face them.

"He's not my fiancé anymore, Derrick. I don't answer to him."

The room went dead silent.

Jameson's eyes narrowed into slits. He set the knife down. Very slowly.

"You live under my protection," he said, his voice deceptively calm. "You answer to me until I say otherwise."

I looked at Haleigh. She was smirking behind the rim of her wine glass.

"Did you discard me for her dying wish, Jameson?" I asked, my voice steady. "Or was I just a placeholder for the real thing all along?"

Jameson rounded the island. He stopped inches from me, invading my space.

I could smell the garlic and fresh basil on his hands, clashing with the metallic scent of violence radiating off him.

"You were a duty," he said coldly. "Haleigh is a choice."

The words carved a hollow space in my chest, but I refused to bleed for them.

I nodded once. "Understood."

I turned to go to my room.

"Not that room," Blake interrupted.

He pointed a callous finger toward the small door near the laundry room. "We moved your things. Haleigh needs the master suite. She needs the space for her... recovery."

The guest room. The room meant for staff.

"Fine," I said.

I walked into the cramped space without looking back. Boxes were piled haphazardly against the wall. My paintings were stacked in the corner, and I could see the canvas of my favorite piece dented inward.

I sat on the narrow, lumpy bed.

A moment later, the door creaked open.

Haleigh slipped inside, clutching a small, ornate wooden box.

She closed the door softly behind her.

"I brought you a peace offering," she said.

Her voice was sweet. Sickeningly so.

"I don't want it," I replied.

"Come on, Bella. Don't be bitter." She stepped closer, invading my sanctuary. She pressed the box into my reluctant hands. "It's a welcome home gift."

She leaned in, her face close to mine. Her eyes were dead, devoid of any genuine light.

"I always get what I want," she whispered.

With a flick of her finger, she unlatched the box.

I felt something scuttle across my fingers-light, frantic legs.

Panic flared in my chest. I looked down.

A brown recluse spider, massive and terrifying, leaped from the velvet lining.

It landed squarely on the back of my hand.

I screamed.

I thrashed my hand wildly, throwing the box across the room. A sharp, stinging pain pierced my skin-fire spreading instantly from the bite.

Haleigh threw herself onto the floorboards.

She started screaming, her voice shrill and theatrical.

"Help! Jameson! She's trying to kill me!"

The door burst open.

Jameson and my brothers rushed in, a wall of testosterone and fury.

They saw me standing over Haleigh.

They saw the practiced fear on her face.

They didn't see the spider scuttling into the shadows under the bed. They didn't see the bite mark already swelling angrily on my hand.

They only saw what they wanted to see.

The monster attacking the angel.

I woke to a blinding whiteness that stung my eyes.

The sharp, chemical tang of antiseptic and lemon cleaner assaulted my nose, instantly grounding me in a clinical reality.

My hand throbbed with a searing heat, as if the veins beneath the skin were filled with molten lead.

I tried to lift it, but the limb was dead weight, encased in layers of thick, sterile gauze.

A stifled sob broke the heavy silence.

I turned my head, fighting the stiffness in my neck.

Maria, our housekeeper, was huddled in the corner chair.

She was weeping into her apron, her shoulders shaking with silent tremors.

"Maria?" I croaked.

My voice was a wrecked thing, dry as sandpaper against stone.

She rushed to the bedside, her eyes red-rimmed.

"Oh, Miss Bella. You're awake."

She poured water into a flimsy plastic cup and held it to my cracked lips with trembling hands.

I drank greedily, the cool liquid soothing the fire in my throat.

"Where am I?"

"The family clinic," she whispered, her voice barely audible.

She glanced nervously at the door, as if expecting a monster to barge in.

"They brought you here after... after the incident."

The memories crashed back in.

The spider.

The venom.

"Where are they?" I asked, dread coiling in my stomach.

Maria looked down at her hands, twisting the fabric of her apron.

"They are at the penthouse."

"Why aren't you there?"

She took a shaky breath, her eyes darting away from mine.

"They left you on the floor, Miss Bella."

The words hung in the sterile air, heavy and suffocating.

"Mr. Jameson... he kicked you away from Miss Haleigh. They thought you pushed her."

I closed my eyes, letting the darkness wash over me.

The burning in my hand was nothing compared to the glacial cold spreading through my veins.

I was burning up with fever from the venom, delirious and dying, and they had kicked me.

Maria gripped my good hand, her fingers tight.

"I saw the bite," she whispered fiercely.

"I killed the spider. I told them."

"And?"

"They said you must have brought it in yourself. To terrorize her."

I laughed.

It was a broken, jagged sound, devoid of any humor.

"Of course they did."

I stayed in the clinic for two days.

Solitary confinement.

No one came.

Not my brothers.

Not Jameson.

On the third day, the fever finally broke, leaving me weak but lucid.

I discharged myself.

I put on the clothes Maria had smuggled in for me-a simple, shapeless grey dress-and hailed a cab back to the penthouse.

I walked in.

The penthouse had been transformed into a palace of celebration.

Balloons choked the ceiling.

Pink and gold everywhere.

A massive banner was draped across the floor-to-ceiling windows, blocking out the city skyline.

Happy Birthday Haleigh.

I froze in the entryway.

It was October 14th.

Our birthday.

Twins.

Jameson was standing by the fireplace, looking every bit the lord of the manor.

He was holding a velvet box.

Derrick and Blake were laughing nearby, clutching champagne flutes.

Haleigh was in the center of the room, crowned with a glittering tiara.

She looked at me.

Her smile faltered for a fraction of a second, a glitch in her perfect facade, before widening into something sharp.

"Oh, look! The ghost is back!"

Jameson turned.

His face was a mask of indifference, impervious as stone.

"Enjoy your vacation?" Blake called out, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

"A spider bite isn't an excuse to disappear when your sister needs you."

He didn't know.

Or he simply didn't care.

I walked further into the room.

My bandaged hand throbbed in a painful rhythm with my heartbeat.

"Happy Birthday, Haleigh," I said softly.

Jameson stepped forward, ignoring me entirely.

He held out the velvet box to Haleigh.

"Open it," he said.

His voice was soft.

A tender tone I used to think was reserved only for me, in the dark.

Haleigh snapped the box open.

A diamond necklace.

It glittered violently under the chandelier lights.

"Oh, Jameson!" she squealed.

She threw her arms around his neck, claiming him.

Derrick handed her a set of keys.

"Vintage Porsche," he announced proudly.

Kane handed her a deed.

"The vineyard in Napa," he said.

I stood there.

Empty-handed.

Forgotten.

Jameson looked at me over Haleigh's shoulder, his eyes cold.

"You need to accept this, Isabella," he said.

"She is my wife."

I looked at him.

I looked at the man who had once promised to protect me from the world.

"You're right," I said.

My voice was calm.

Unnervingly so.

It unsettled him.

He frowned, a flicker of confusion crossing his face.

Haleigh clapped her hands, demanding attention.

"Time for the slideshow!" she announced.

She pointed a remote at the projector screen that had been set up in the corner.

"I made it myself! To celebrate my journey!"

The lights dimmed automatically.

Music started playing-an upbeat, sugary pop song.

Photos of Haleigh flashed on the screen.

Haleigh as a cherubic baby.

Haleigh posing at graduation.

Then, the atmosphere shifted.

The photos changed.

Haleigh, sloppy drunk in a nightclub.

Haleigh snorting a line of white powder off a glass table.

Haleigh sitting provocatively on the lap of a rival mob boss.

The room went deadly silent.

The silence was thick, suffocating.

The music kept playing-a cheerful soundtrack to a train wreck.

The final slide appeared.

It was a high-resolution photo of Haleigh passed out on a bathroom floor.

Text was superimposed over it in bright, dripping red letters:

Happy Birthday to New York's Favorite Whore.

The silence was shattered by Haleigh's blood-curdling scream.

Jameson roared.

"Kill it! Turn it off!"

Blake scrambled for the projector, ripping the cord violently from the wall.

The room plunged into darkness.

When the lights flickered back on, Haleigh was on the floor, sobbing hysterically.

She pointed a shaking finger at me.

"She did it!" she screamed, her face blotchy and ruined.

"She hates me! She wants to ruin me!"

I stood perfectly still.

I hadn't done it.

I had been rotting in a clinic with spider venom coursing through my veins.

But facts didn't matter in the Douglas family.

Only perception mattered.

Jameson turned to me.

His face was twisted into a snarl.

He looked like a wolf who had finally decided to devour the sheep.

He stalked toward me.

"You," he said.

His voice was a low rumble of thunder, vibrating in his chest.

"You are going to regret that."