All Chapters of The Capo’s Sacrificed Wife: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

In those final days, I pushed myself harder than ever before.I was in the Family's laundry front before dawn and dragged myself home long after midnight.After washing heaps of bloodstained sheets, I'd go work as a cleaner at a back-alley bar.When a drunk threw up on the floor, I'd get on my knees and scrub it clean. When a toilet clogged, I'd stick my hand in to clear it.I let the harsh, cheap chemicals eat at my hands until the skin was raw and weeping. I let the rough wooden floors tear my knees to shreds. Through it all, a silent rage burned in my chest.The meager allowance Dean tossed my way was barely enough to cover the protection money and rent on our hovel, let alone a single bottle of black market antibiotics for Lucas.So I worked myself to the bone. I had to save money. I had to save enough for my son to see a doctor.The laundry foreman couldn't stand to watch anymore. He grabbed my arm and pulled me away from a vat of bleach."You're not working, you're killing yourse

The more I spoke, the more pathetic our marriage seemed."To avoid any hint of scandal, you left me to rot in that laundry, my hands soaked in chemicals. Over the years, I've had my skin burned by chemicals, my arms scalded by boiling water, my knees cracked from the winter cold blowing through a broken window. And I never said a word of complaint.""Because I was your wife. I had to protect your precious reputation.""But this time, I won't stand by and watch my son die!""He's only ten years old! His life hasn't even begun! Because he's Dean's son, he has to be last in line for medicine? Because his father wants to look selfless, my son is the one who has to be sacrificed?""I've given up on your power, on your resources. I'm just begging you, stop using our lives as paving stones on your way to the top!"Perhaps startled by our argument, the small, hot body in my arms began to convulse violently.Dean's gaze fell on our son's flushed face, then moved down, settling on my old, rain-s

Gone?"What do you mean she's been gone? Where could she and the boy have gone?"The foreman's voice was raspy. "It was the day you took those widows to the compound... Your convoy had just cleared the neighborhood when a church bus pulled up. It took her and the boy away.""The boys only found out later. The missus signed on as a volunteer relief worker. She went to the most violent, lawless borough in the South.""Impossible... Why would she go to a place like that..."Dean muttered the words, then, as if struck by a whip, he turned and sprinted down the street.He tore to the gray, crumbling apartment building, took the stairs three at a time, and kicked open the door to their flat.The hinges screamed.Inside, the weather stripping on the windows was cracked, letting in a cold draft.A large patch of blackish-green mold crawled up the corner of the wall to the ceiling. The old radiator on the floor was rusted black and completely cold.The mattress sagged in the middle, covered by

He drove without sleeping.The car sped down the highway at 140 miles per hour. His second-in-command, Tommy, drifted in and out of sleep in the passenger seat, but Dean's hands never left the wheel as he drove south from New York without a break.He didn't swerve for the rain, the roadblocks, or the wail of police sirens.His coat sleeves were stained with coffee and ash, his face was covered in stubble, his lips were cracked and bleeding, and his eyes were shot with red, but he didn't notice.Three days later, he finally drove into the ruin of the southern borough.The streets were littered with the charred skeletons of cars and walls pocked with bullet holes.The church sanctuary was nothing more than a half-standing doorframe. A statue of Jesus leaned against the rubble, its face spattered with dark, dried blood.In the backyard was a row of fresh graves, marked with crosses for the volunteers who had died in the conflict.One of the white wooden crosses was crudely carved with a

At six in the morning, the rain stopped.Sofia, wrapped in a wool shawl, stood just inside the gate. Her eyes were red and swollen. She looked more haggard than the night before, but her emotions had stabilized.She looked at the man before her. He was a man in his prime, yet his salt-and-pepper hair was plastered to his forehead by the rain. His custom-made coat was so soaked it could be wrung out, and his lips were blue with cold, but his back was still ramrod straight.Beside him, Lucas was bundled tightly in the coat, his eyes half-open.Sofia let out a long sigh."I spoke with Lucas for a while last night.""I know that to save him, you've spent the last few years breaking every rule you once lived by. You've flown in the top brain specialists from Europe, diverted the scarcest black market drugs, even gone to war with other Families for medical equipment…"Dean raised his bloodshot eyes but said nothing."I'm old," Sofia said, her gaze drifting past him to the gray morning sky. "