A Birkin For Every Lie

There are ninety-nine Hermès Birkins sitting in my walk-in closet. To the world, it' s a collection worth millions. To me, it' s a tally of ninety-nine times my husband, Harris, betrayed me. Each bag was a silent apology I accepted to keep our hollow marriage alive. But the hundredth betrayal wasn't fixed with crocodile leather. On the anniversary of my mother's death, I tracked Harris to my family' s private cemetery. He wasn't alone. Jessica, his "first love," was there, standing over the empty plot reserved for my living father, right next to my mother' s grave. They were digging a hole. Jessica smirked, holding a velvet box containing her dead cat and a plaque that read To Arvel, my eternal companion. "It' s just a cat, Cecily," she laughed, tossing her hair. "Don't be so dramatic. Your father won't mind the company. Besides, it shows who Harris really listens to." For years, I accepted the bags and the lies. But desecrating my family's sacred ground? The submissive wife died in that moment. I walked toward them, clutching the evidence that would destroy Jessica' s life and shatter Harris' s world. "Dig it up," I commanded, my voice colder than the grave. "Or I will bury you both right here."

Chapters

Chapter 5

Cecily McNeil POV:

"Misunderstanding?" My voice was a frigid whisper, colder than the tombstone beside us. "There is no misunderstanding, Harris. Just your inexcusable betrayal and her malicious intent." I stared at him, my eyes hard, unyielding. "Get her out of here. Now. Before I do something we'll all regret." I didn't care about politeness anymore. My composure, a carefully constructed facade, had cracked.

Harris sighed, a long, drawn-out sound of a man caught between two immovable forces. He ran a hand through his perfectly styled hair. "Cecily, please. It's just a small burial. Perhaps we can move it to another part of the cemetery. I'll buy a new plot. A private one, just for... pets." He was trying to rationalize, to placate, to sweep her monstrous act under the rug with another financial transaction.

"No." My voice was sharp, cutting through his placating tone. "Absolutely not. This is not a matter of real estate, Harris. This is a matter of respect. Of sacred ground. And what she has done here is unforgivable." My hands clenched, my entire body thrumming with a raw, visceral anger. The ache in my head intensified, a dull throb turning into a sharp, piercing pain.

"This marriage, Harris, is over," I declared, the words echoing in the sudden silence. It wasn't a threat; it was a statement of fact, carved in stone. "I cannot, and will not, tolerate this level of disrespect. Not for myself, and certainly not for my family. My mother, Eleanor, loved you. She saw something in you, something good. And you stand here, enabling this woman to spit on her memory, to defile the very ground she rests in."

His face drained of color. He knew the weight of my mother's blessing, her unwavering support of our union. This was not my usual, quiet disapproval. This was a final decree, a line crossed that could not be uncrossed. "Cecily, no. Don't say that." His voice was low, filled with a sudden, genuine fear.

Just then, Jessica let out a loud, theatrical sob, drawing Harris's attention. "She's being so cruel, Harris! So unreasonable! Does she really think that attacking me is going to solve anything? She's just angry, and she's taking it out on us!" She glared at me, her eyes flashing with a mixture of resentment and fake tears. "You're just jealous, aren't you, Cecily? Jealous that Harris actually cares about someone else's feelings. Jealous that I'm not some cold, calculating art curator who only thinks about money and reputation!"

My eyes narrowed into slits. Jealousy? Me? For this twisted, pathetic charade? Before Harris could react, my hand shot out. I grabbed Jessica' s hair, yanking her head back with unexpected force. She yelped, a genuine cry of pain this time, not a feigned sob. I twisted my hand, forcing her to her knees, her face contorted in shock and fear.

"Jealous?" I hissed, my voice dangerously low, my grip unyielding. "You think I'm jealous of you, you pathetic little creature? You think I envy your sordid affair with my husband? You think I want any part of this disgusting, disrespectful game you're playing?"

Jessica whimpered, her tears now very real, streaming down her face. She looked up at Harris, her eyes pleading. "Harris! Do something! She's crazy! She's going to hurt me!"

"Get out," I commanded, ignoring her pleas. My voice was calm, utterly devoid of emotion, a stark contrast to the violence of my actions. "Dig up that cat, take your disgusting little box, and get out of my family's sight. Or I swear to God, I will bury you both here myself."

Harris' s face was a mask of conflicting emotions. His eyes, dark with anger, swept over my face, then landed on Jessica, still on her knees, crying, her eyes fixed on him in terror. He took a step forward. "Cecily, that's enough. You're going too far."

He tried to pry my hand from Jessica' s hair, but I held fast. He then roughly pushed me away from her. The force of it almost made me stumble, but I quickly regained my balance, my eyes still locked on his. He was protecting her. Again.

"She needs to retrieve the cat herself," I stated, pointing a rigid finger at Jessica. "She dug the damn hole, she can undig it."

"No!" Harris shouted, his face contorted in frustration. He snatched the small velvet box from Jessica' s trembling hands. "I'll do it. Just... just leave, Jess. Go back to the car." He practically shoved her towards my car, which was still parked by the trees, a beacon of escape.

Jessica, stunned, slowly got to her feet, her eyes wide. She cast a venomous look at me, then scurried towards the car, sobbing dramatically as she went. Harris took one of the groundskeeper's shovels, plunging it into the freshly turned earth. His movements were jerky, fueled by a mixture of anger and desperation. He was trying to fix it, to undo her damage, to salvage something.

I watched them go, a bitter laugh escaping my lips. Abandoned. Again. But this time, it felt different. A cleansing, perhaps. The groundskeepers, who had been standing by, looking utterly bewildered, finally looked at me. "Resume your duties," I said, my voice firm. "And fill that hole. Properly."

As they began to shovel the earth back into the small cavity, my eyes caught something else. My breath hitched. On the adjacent plot, my father's plot, a small, polished wooden plaque. It read: "To Arvel, my eternal companion. Always and forever. Jessica."

Continue to next part

Eliza Harrington's world shattered the day she married the cold and powerful Romano Alessandro Visconti, a stunning half-Italian Alpha. Their marriage, a year and a half of passionate intensity and devastating coldness, has left her desperate. She wants out. She wants a divorce. But Romano has a counter-offer, one that binds them together even tighter: an heir. Before he grants her freedom, she must give him a son. Trapped in a high-stakes bargain, Eliza uncovers a shocking truth: her own cruel father has a hand in Romano's heartless behavior. Can she find a way to trust the man who calls her his "cara," his beloved, even as he pushes her away? Or will she lose herself in this tangled web of love, lies, and betrayal?

Billionaire Mafia Romance

9.0

Captured and claimed by the mafia Don

9.0

I'm wanted, Kimberly. Wanted by the Mafia..." Those were my father’s final words before he died in my arms. Moments later, I saw those legs step out of the shadows, marking the beginning of my nightmare. Leonardo Fiore, a cold Mafia Don,who is determined to use Kimberly as a tool in his game for power. His world is cruel and his words are like ice. "There's no love here, Kimberly,” he whispered. It's not part of the deal.” But Kimberly isn't one to accept whatever fate brings, without a fight. “If your love is not part of the deal, I'll make it mine to claim” she declared, feisty, crashing her lips onto his. As tension arises, Kimberly must decide : will she melt Leonardo's icy heart or lose herself trying to survive in his dangerous world.

Mafia Modern Romance

7.6

Discarded Heiress: Reborn from Mafia Prison

7.6

Seven years ago, my fiancé, Don Dante Moretti, sent me to prison to take the fall for my adopted sister, Chiara. He called it a gift—a way to protect me from a worse fate. Today, he picked me up from prison only to abandon me at my family's estate. His reason? Chiara was having another one of her "episodes." My parents then informed me I'd be staying in the third-floor storage room, so as not to disturb the fragile girl who stole my life. They celebrated her "recovery" with a lavish dinner party, while I was treated like a ghost. When I refused to join, my mother hissed that I was ungrateful, and my father called me jealous. They assumed I couldn't understand their venomous whispers. But prison was my university. I learned Spanish. I understood every word. It was then I realized I wasn't just a sacrifice; I was disposable. The love I once felt for all of them had turned to ash. That night, in the dusty storage room, I logged onto an encrypted channel I'd set up years ago. A single message was waiting: "The offer stands. Do you accept?" My hands, scarred and steady, typed back, "I accept."

Billionaire Mafia Modern

7.3

Dooming the mafia devil

7.3

She was sent to destroy him. A man feared in the shadows, a mafia lord whose name alone commanded power and blood. Serafina Dunes had one mission: send Rapheal Dekoms to hell. Murdered by her husband's mistress, Yuanita Serra was ripped from life before her time-only to be reborn as a missionier, and her first task was to kill Rapheal Dekoms. But fate had other plans. What was meant to be a deadly mission became a dangerous game of desire and hate, where every glance and every touch ignited a fire she couldn't control-and threatened to unravel everything he had ever built.

Adventure Mafia Modern

7.6

His Unwanted Wife, The Rival Don's Queen

7.6

The gunman pressed a Glock to my temple and gave my husband a choice. "One walks out. One stays. Choose, Mr. Underboss." I wasn't worried. I was Haven. I was his wife of ten years, his Consigliere, the woman who built his empire. Beside me sobbed Gemma, a fragile twenty-two-year-old he had known for six months. "Take Gemma! Leave Haven!" Connor screamed, his honor twisting into something unrecognizable. He walked out of the warehouse with another woman in his arms, leaving me to be butchered. I didn't wait for the bullet. I threw myself through a glass window into the freezing canal. I survived the fall, but the life inside me didn't. After five years of failed IVF, the miracle baby I hadn't even told Connor about was gone. While I lay in a cold hospital room, bleeding out the remains of our child, my husband was buying diamond earrings for the woman who had set me up to die. When the doctor tried to sedate me for the surgery, I grabbed his wrist. "No anesthesia," I commanded. "But the pain..." "I want to feel it," I said, staring at the ceiling. "I want to feel every scrap of him leaving my body." I burned that pain into my soul. Then, I went home, poured gasoline over our wedding bed, and lit a match. Two years later, I returned to the city. Connor thought I was dead. But when he saw me on the arm of his mortal enemy, wearing the crown of a rival Queen, he realized his mistake. He didn't just lose a wife. He started a war.

Mafia Modern Romance

7.2

Just A Vessel: The Surrogate's Escape

7.2

I went to the bank to set up a trust fund for my twins, only to have the manager look at me with pity. "Mrs. Dunlap, the trust requires the *biological* mother's signature." I froze. I *was* their mother. Or so I thought. That day, I learned my husband, the most powerful Mafia Don on the coast, had used his ex-lover’s frozen eggs. For six years, I wasn't his wife. I was just the incubator. When his "true love," Iliana, returned from exile, my life disintegrated. My children, poisoned by her lies, pushed me down the stairs and called me "just the nanny." Gavyn didn't help me up. He stepped over my bleeding body to take his "real family" out for ice cream. But the ultimate betrayal happened on a windswept cliff. Staged by Iliana, we were both tied up, allegedly rigged to explode. Forced to choose who to save, Gavyn didn't hesitate. He cut Iliana loose. "You did this to yourself, Alex," he said, driving away with the children, leaving me to die. He thought he was leaving behind a corpse. He didn't know I had skimmed ten million dollars from the household accounts. "Cut me loose," I told the hitman, transferring the money. "And tell him the ocean took me." Two years later, the Don is on his knees in my garden, begging for a second chance. Too bad he has to get through my new fiancé first—the head of the rival cartel.

Action Mafia Romance

A Birkin For Every Lie

Chapter 5

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