My dear little broccolis💚💚💚

💚I think we are 4 chapters or so till the end ...

💚 So I know you've been waiting since Caesar died for this update, but two things happened. First, once again, we're getting toward that touchy topic of religion, and it's is always hard to make sure that I translate properly the way Clary feels about religion and Father Crowley. Second MY LAPTOP HATES ME 😭😭😭 I was halfway through the chapter when I couldn't find what I wrote already. So what you're getting is not as good as what I once wrote, and I tried to do what some of you recommended on Instagram, but … alas, nothing worked. I was really frustrated with the story, and on the verge to just ragequit, but with peace and love, here I am … though this chapter doest hold much peace and love haha.

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Love, Mina💚💚💚

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💚 The Mobster's Wife 💚

Chapter 17: Hellfire (3,5K) - Disney, The Hunchback of Notre-Dame

Clary woke up before dawn with her bladder bursting, and one of her daughters thinking that it was a pushing bag. She rushed to the bathroom, her eyes half opened and once again wishing that the last three month of her pregnancy would go fast. She didn't mind being pregnant, in fact, there was something magical and reassuring about carrying her babies. But it was also exhausting and emotionally though she knew she was found to have just as many sleepless nights when the twins would come, she knew that she wouldn't be alone anymore. Jace and her father would be there to help.

Sure, they were always so eager to help at this present time, but there was so much they could do. For instance, they could be patient with her for going to the bathroom every single hour of the day like an incontinent person, but they couldn't really relate to that. Maryse, on the other hand, was a great person to talk to.

She had told her of that one time when she was pregnant with Izzy and she didn't even realise that she wet herself as she sneezed … in front of her in-laws. Or that one time she broke down in tears because she saw a cloud in the form of a bunny.

With a loud yawn that could probably dislocate her jaw, Clary got back to her bedroom, only realising once she slipped back into bed that Jace's size was stone cold. She frowned because Jace never left her in the middle of the night without letting her know beforehand, and she went downstairs, to check if maybe he was there.

She knew that, though he had been incredibly supportive, it was hard on him that she had been so susceptible to melancholia. In fact, more than once he was the one who told her to go to Father Crowley so the holy man could give her the words of comfort that he was failing to find. And in all honesty, more than once, Father Crowley had prevented Clary from falling into depression.

Once downstairs, she found her husband sitting on the couch, his elbows on his knees and his hand in his hair, and she wondered if maybe he was being worried about the news that they were having twin girls. After all, she was ecstatic of the news, but a part of her was scared that could make things even harder for them.

She walked to Jace, and put her hand on his shoulder, startling him out of his thoughts, which was a first for her. Jace was always so aware of his environment and she had never managed to surprise him, no matter how discreet she always tried to be. He snapped his head to her, and she saw that his eyes were ravaged by worry. But it wasn't what she lingered on. no, her first thoughts were on the blood on his hand.

"Jace …" She whispered, sitting by his side as she was discreetly checking if he had any injury. He silently watched her as she examined him, and when her eyes got back to his golden orbs, he said,

"I love you, babe. You know that, right?"

"What happened?"

His eyes longly studded her face, before he let her know, getting up, "I'd rather not tell you, right now."

"Jace, what's wrong?"

"Trust me, babe. Not now."

And without further of an explanation, he went upstairs to take a shower whilst she was left in the living room. For a moment, she blankly stared at the stairs where Jace had just disappeared, not sure of what just happened. There were so many things that didn't add up.

First of all, though it wasn't uncommon for Jace to leave in the middle of the night, he always let her know beforehand. So where did he get that blood? second, Jace and she had agreed to just each other and be honest. sure, he still refused to tell her what happened to her brother, and she would hold Hodge's secret as long as she could, but those were events of the past. They were being as truthful as possible about the present events.

It was, in fact, something Father Crowley was very insistent on. Whether it was her feelings of insecurity towards that harlot Aline, or Jace being forward about what he was doing for a living.

She knew what kind of man her husband was. In fact, they had this very conversation in that very bathroom he was using at the moment. It wasn't the first time he was coming home with literal blood on his hand, and she doubted it would be the last time. So why didn't he just tell her what it was about?

It was as she was looking at the skyline of New York from the balcony of the penthouse that she finally understood why this interaction had seemed off. It wasn't the fact that Jace didn't want to talk to her yet. After all, he had assured her he would tell her at some point. It was the fact that he didn't even try to kiss her. Not even a gentle kiss on her forehead before going for a shower.

Every time she had caught him back from the streets in the middle of the night, Jace had kissed her. He had rarely hugged her. But he had always kissed her. In fact, Jace was a very tactical man when it was in the privacy of their home, and it was something that he never hid from her, or her father when they moved in with him.

She did her best to not let her mind go to the awful places it could sometimes go, but she knew that as long as she wouldn't get straight answers, she would imagine the worst. And at this precise moment, the worst was taking her on that irrational road of jealousy. She knew that Jace loved her, and had no interest in Aline but …

What if? What if she had called him so they could work together on some business in the middle of the night, and he realised that she wasn't a huge whale pregnant with twins and always crying, no matter what he could tell her? What if having sex with his wife made him realise that he could do so much better elsewhere?

She swallowed with difficulty, before going back to their room. She sat on their bed and waited for her husband to get in, doing her best to reassure herself with the same mantra that Jace loved her. She Jace got back to their room, he seemed surprised to see the lights on, as well as her sitting on their bed, and so he told her,

"You should get back to sleep, babe. It's barely five in the morning."

"Do you really think that I'll be able to sleep?" She challenged.

"I told you, trust me. I will explain everything in time."

"This isn't very helping with my stress level, and the doctor did say to keep it to a minimum," She countered. She was fully aware that she was using her condition to get the answers she wanted, but she also knew that she was going to overthink this situation until she would get those answers.

Jace longly stared at her, as if assessing her under a new light, before he walked to her and crouched in front of her, his towel still hanging on his hips. He took her hands in his, and repeated the same thing he had told in the living room,

"I love you, babe. I just hope that you know that."

She snapped her hands out of his grip, not liking that he had to repeat a statement that they both knew was true. She watched his Adam's apple go up and down before he finally spoke,

"I don't want you to stress over it. It's nothing. I'm handling it. But … last night I went to the shooting range for a spell. I wasn't tired, and I didn't want to wake you up since you were sleeping so well for the first time in weeks. What I didn't expect was for Aline to find me there and … for her to make a move on me."

Clary's heart stopped to beat for a brief moment. And two things happened at once. Jace retook possession of her hands, and the thought of murder crossed her mind. She released a breath at the intensity of this foreign feeling. Never before, no matter how much a person had wronged her, had she thought of even wishing for someone's death.

"Nothing happened, babe. I stopped it before she could try —"

"Did you kill her?" She cut him off, remembering the blood on his hands. This question was bringing a strange emotion out of her, and for a brief second, she was hoping he would affirmatively answer to that.

"Jordan intervened and … I didn't want to upset you. She's locked in one of the warehouses until I decide what to do with her."

Clary looked down, before closing her eyes. She knew Aline was bad news from the moment she had seen her, and though Jace had listened to her concerns, she couldn't help but feel that things could have gone a whole differently if she had been raised differently. If her father hadn't sheltered her for her whole life, Aline never would have dared make a move on her man, she never would have seen her as a meek little thing that could be discarded like a second thought.

But in the meantime, as Father Crowley often pointed out, it was because Valentine had sheltered her for her whole life that she had compassion for the less fortunate. After all, Jace cared very little about homeless, and struggling people, when he had been in this position himself. It should be the other way around, he should be the charitable one, and she should be the oblivious one sine she had lived all her life in an ivory tower.

She tried to see clearly in how she felt, but all she could see was red. She wished that she had been Jace and that she had taught that worthless piece of a human being what it meant to go after her husband. Especially after she had warned her off.

"Babe. It's nothing. Don't stress over it. She's not worth it," Jace pleaded, taking his face in his hands and forcing her to look into his eyes.

"What are you going to do with her."

His golden eyes studied her face, though she saw the way his jaw slightly clenched. It was clear what he wanted to do, but it was also clear that he didn't want the situation to affect her, "I'll take care of her once the girls will be born."

.~°~. .~°~. .~°~.

"Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned."

As she waited for the good priest to explain her sin, Clary tried to clear her thoughts and feelings. She couldn't understand why she was so keen to make someone suffer, and she even started wondering if there was something wrong with her soul. After all, what kind of good religious person would wish harm upon another human? One of the ten commandments was 'thou shalt not kill' after all. But then again, Aline shouldn't have tried to make a move on her husband. Thou shalt not covet, and thou shalt not commit adultery.

So she explained the situation to Father Crowley and her conflicted feelings toward Aline, and as she had expected, the priest preached compassion and foreignness.

"Not everyone can be forgiven," She let out between her teeth, hardly seeing how she would be able to break bread with a woman who disrespected her so ostensibly.

"And yet, you are always the first one to plead a case for your husband. You and I both know that he has far more sins than this woman."

"Jace knows his limits."

"Does he? Or do you just wish he does?"

"He didn't kill her. Because of me," She argues because she had no doubts that it was the only reason that made Jace spare alines life. He could say what he wanted about Jordan showing up, Clary knew that it was thinking of telling her she killed Aline for her that stopped her. Because she would have been upset, and this was not the time to get her upset.

"And yet, you wish he had."

"No," She admitted after a while. "It would be … wrong."

"Jace has already ended many lives before, and you've always known it. Why would this lie be any different in his eyes."

"It … I don't know. Jace has always made a point to separate home from work, and I think that if e went all the way through this time, it would have broken the barrier he created."

"Murder is murder, Clary. It is not because you hide it behind the pretence of a profession that it makes it any better."

"Well, the Church is no better, is it? Bible has many bloody pages, and you know it. Event made by man, but condoned by the Church," She snapped back because though she knew her husband's sins, she still believed that he was a good man. sure, his soul was tainted, but they were all humans, and she did not know a single person who was completely pure.

And in her heart, the sins Jace committed in his profession weren't as severe as the ones he could commit in his personal life. And so far, his personal life has very few sins. sure, he refused to honour his parents, or to recognised that there was a God, but as she said, no one was perfect.

"Why did you come to see me, child? You can't possibly think that I will give you my blessing for you to kill that poor woman?"

"No. Of course not. I just … wanted to know if I was justified in my anger."

It wasn't really a lie. But it wasn't the honest truth. The truth was, she would have loved nothing more but for her priest to give her the go she wanted. But he was a man of God, and of course, he would never tell her to commit a sin.

"I think you should let your husband deal with this as he wants to do, and just forget about this scarlet woman. You are too pure to even accord a thought to her."

.~°~. .~°~. .~°~.

All day long, she tried to do as Father Crowley had advised her, but she couldn't. The very idea that Aline was going to become an afterthought to Jace until their children would be born was unbearable for her. But she knew she wouldn't be able to bear the guilt. All day, she stayed alone with her dark thoughts, only distracted by Omoi and Bastille playing in the garden. Though it was more Omoi trying to get Bastille's attention.

Finally, she knew what she must do to feel better about this whole situation, and she called Jordan to come and pick her up, without telling him anything. Jordan dismissed Lauren when he pulled over at the mansion, and as soon as she was in his car, she asked,

"Does Jace know you're with me?"

"He was busy with some business. So he should know in about an hour."

"Good. I want you to take me to Aline."

Jordan briefly looked away from the road to suspiciously narrow his eyes at her. "You don't have your gun in your purse, do you?"

"No."

"Good. I don't think you can live with that weight on your shoulders."

"You're right. I can't. I wasn't raised to do so."

Jordan nodded, refocusing his attention on the road, and Clary caressed her belly, sure that she wouldn't give her children this week spot. She didn't want them to turn into murderers, but she also wanted them to be able to make a decision, without torturing themselves over it.

"I would like a favour from you, Jordan."

"You want me to kill her for you? Comes back down to the same. ii don't mind pulling the trigger, but you'll feel guilty nonetheless."

She smiled to herself, glad that Jordan was one of those people who always spoke their minds. This was probably why Jace trusted him so much because he knew that Jordan would always tell him what he thought, even if it wasn't something he wanted to hear.

"I agree. I just don't want her to still be in our lives. Even locked up in some warehouse. She's nothing, isn't she? So … I just want her out of her lives."

"But you don't want to know how," He added for her, and when she nodded and told her, "It's done. But you get to tell Jace. I don't like being near him when he's in a temper. My heart is not so young anymore, and heart-attacks can happen."

She chuckled at his joke, and for the rest of the way, they talked about her pregnancy and his own child. She didn't tell him about the twins, keeping this information just between Jace and her, and when Jordan pulled over in front of some old warehouse, she couldn't help but get her heart beating faster.

She had no idea what she would say to Aline, and what she would do, but she wanted the girls to know that she was well aware of what she did, and not as sheltered at the brunette might have thought.

Still, when she caught sight of Aline, she gasped with horror. Her face was all swollen, with one closed black eye, and two missing teeth. Clary could also see the clear print of a hand on Aline's neck and given the state of her hair, it was obvious that she had been ruffled up. She was tied to a wooden chair, her hands in her back and her feet tied to the chair's feet.

Clary remained frozen until Jordan rested a hand on her shoulder and reminded her of one of Jace's motto, "Betrayal is betrayal to Jace. No matter the gender. Jace doesn't really care if the person trespassing his limits is male or female. In any case, if he feels betrayed, he'll strike."

She nodded, remembering Jace's harsh words a few months ago when he told her that he would have killed her if she hadn't been his wife. Then she cleared her throat and waited for Aline to look at her. The woman tied to smirk, but it looked more like a grimace on her bloated face.

"Have you come to gloat?"

"No. I …" She stumbled into translating her emotions into words, before finally feeling free, and telling that person that no longer held importance in her life,

"To be honest, I came here to rant at you. But … seeing you, I'm just reminded that you're nothing. You're just a speck of dust that tried to be something more. You didn't affect my marriage, and you won't affect my family. Because you're nothing. In fact, you are so not special, that after tomorrow, you won't even be an afterthought for my husband.

You will return to your state of nothing and never again we will even think of you."

And it was with this new sense of self, that Clary turned her back on Aline, finally feeling more superior than her. Though she took the time to tell Jordan loud enough for nothing to hear,

"I might be a good Christian, but I am not a saint. Whatever you decide to do with her, make sure she suffers."

.~°~. .~°~. .~°~.

💚Your thoughts and opinions are always welcomed💚

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💚 So ... I know this chapter took forever. As I said up, it was frustrating. The story is almost over, but I will probably do a few bonuses as I did for Road Trippin.

💚 Now, what did you think of the Clace? The way Jace acted, and the way Clary reacted?

💚And, what do you think of the Aline situation? And Jordan?

💚 And how about Clary and her convo with Father Crowley?

💚 And don't forget to check out my other story of the moment, Sweetie, Let Me Give You The Daddy

💚And what's was your favourite part? I'm always curious about that.

💚 What do you think will happen next?

💚 Cassandra Clare owns the names of the characters from the Mortal Instruments franchise, everything else is mine.

Love, Mina💚💚💚