Chapter 2 - The Grandmother Who Couldn't Hear the Lie
At 12:18 a.m., I found myself sitting in a private hotel kitchen with a bleeding arm, a borrowed black suit jacket over my ugly sweater, and a cup of tea made by a man who carried a gun beneath his apron.
I had officially given up trying to understand my evening.
Across from me, Nicholas Valenti stood beside a stainless-steel counter, speaking into his phone.
"No. Nobody leaves until the police finish taking statements."
A pause.
"Then tell the guests they'll be inconvenienced. Someone fired a rifle through a window."
Another pause.
"I don't care whose senator he knows."
He ended the call.
I looked up.
"You're very charming with people."
He glanced at my bandaged arm.
"How bad is it?"
"The nurse says I'll live."
"That wasn't my question."
"I've had worse cuts opening stubborn packages."
He didn't smile.
It bothered me more than it should have.
A woman in a dark uniform stood near the kitchen doors.
Owen's deputy, according to Nicholas.
Her name was Sarah Kline, and she had been assigned to stay with me.
I had already told her twice that I wasn't planning to run.
She had politely informed me that she wasn't there to stop me from leaving.
She was there to make sure no one followed.
Somehow, that was not reassuring.
Nicholas pulled out the chair opposite mine.
"Audrey."
"I know. You need me to tell you everything I saw."
"Actually, I need you to eat something."
I blinked.
"What?"
"You haven't eaten."
"How would you know?"
"You said you were supposed to attend a hospital party. You arrived carrying a gift bag. And you've been staring at those untouched cookies for twelve minutes."
I looked at the plate between us.
Gingerbread cookies.
One had a smiling face.
It seemed inappropriate.
"I was saving my appetite for the party," I admitted.
"Then eat."
"You're awfully bossy."
"I've been told."
"By people who are still alive?"
He leaned back.
"Occasionally."
I laughed.
Then immediately regretted it because laughing made my arm hurt.
He noticed.
Of course he noticed.
I broke a gingerbread cookie in half.
"Your grandmother?"
"Upstairs in a secure suite. Doctor's checking her blood pressure. Owen has people on every entrance."
"Did she tell you what she meant about your father?"
Nicholas stared at the table.
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because she refused to say anything until you were there."
My hand stopped halfway to my mouth.
"Me?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"She says you're the first person tonight who listened without deciding what she meant."
I looked down.
That sentence landed somewhere deep.
Nicholas watched me.
"Grandma lost most of her hearing when she was seventeen. She grew up signing, but for years people treated that as a reason to manage her life."
"My mother is deaf," I said.
"I assumed you had someone close to you."
"She's the reason I became an interpreter."
"Is she still in Milwaukee?"
"She runs the laundromat she inherited from my grandparents. And she has absolutely no idea I'm sitting in a kitchen with Nicholas Valenti."
"You should call her."
"At midnight?"
"She'll worry if she hears about the shooting."
I grimaced.
"She doesn't watch television news much."
"Someone will send her a video."
He turned his phone toward me.
A social media clip showed the moment I entered the ballroom.
My red sweater.
Two hundred staring guests.
Nicholas wrapping his arm around my waist.
The caption read:
NICHOLAS VALENTI INTRODUCES MYSTERY GIRLFRIEND MINUTES BEFORE GALA SHOOTING.
I stared.
"That's horrifying."
"The shooting?"
"My sweater is going viral."
His mouth twitched.
"Your priorities are fascinating."
"My mother is going to recognize that sweater. She made it."
For the first time, Nicholas laughed.
Not loudly.
Not for long.
But the sound transformed his face.
It made him look younger.
Human.
Dangerously attractive.
I stared into my tea until the feeling passed.
Or tried to.
"Can I ask you something?" I said.
"Anything."
"Are you really a mafia boss?"
The amusement left his face.
He leaned forward.
"Do you want the newspaper answer or the real one?"
"The real one."
"My family made its money in industries where intimidation was considered another business expense. My grandfather ran gambling operations and controlled shipping routes. My father expanded into construction and trucking. Some of that business was legal. Some wasn't."
"And you?"
"I inherited both."
"That's not an answer."
"No," he admitted. "It isn't."
I waited.
He looked at the bandage on my arm.
"I've spent five years dismantling the parts of the business I don't want passed down to another generation. I'm not going to pretend my hands are clean. They aren't."
At least he didn't insult me with a fairy tale.
"Have you hurt people?"
His gaze returned to mine.
"Yes."
I swallowed.
"Do you regret it?"
"Some things every day."
The kitchen seemed suddenly quiet.
"Then why should I trust you?"
"You shouldn't. Not just because I told you to."
I studied him.
He continued.
"Trust what you can verify. The police are downstairs. You'll give your own statement. You can leave whenever you want, and if you decide you never want to see me again, I'll respect that."
"Even though I can identify the men?"
"Especially because you can identify them."
I hadn't expected that.
At all.
"Good answer," I whispered.
His eyes softened.
"Glad I finally got one right."
The kitchen door opened.
A woman entered wearing a charcoal pantsuit and carrying a leather notebook.
She had short black hair, tired eyes, and the expression of someone who had already spent too many years listening to powerful men explain why the rules didn't apply to them.
"Detective Lena Ortiz," she said.
I stood.
She shook my hand.
"Miss Keane? I'd like your statement."
"Of course."
Nicholas started to rise.
The detective pointed at him.
"You can stay seated, Mr. Valenti. I'll speak to you separately."
He sat back down.
I almost smiled.
Detective Ortiz led me into a small private dining room.
For the next forty minutes, I told her everything.
The wrong ballroom.
The two men at the bar.
The words I thought I had read.
The planned blackout.
The rifle.
I was careful to tell her which details I had actually seen and which I had inferred.
"You're saying the older waiter mouthed the word 'fireworks'?" she asked.
"Yes."
"Certain?"
"Fairly certain. But some words look alike."
"And 'one shot'?"
"That was clearer. He turned almost directly toward me."
She wrote something down.
"Would you recognize their faces?"
"I think so."
"Even if they changed their clothing?"
"The scar would help with the younger man."
She nodded.
Then she placed a photograph in front of me.
A security camera image.
Two men wearing white jackets.
The older one had silver hair.
The younger had a scar beside his mouth.
"Those are the men," I said.
"You're certain?"
"Yes."
She studied my face.
"Do you know who they are?"
"No."
"One of them used a false catering badge. We're still verifying the other one's credentials."
I leaned forward.
"Did you catch the shooter?"
"Not yet."
My heart sank.
"But we recovered the weapon near a service stairwell," Ortiz continued. "The shooter apparently abandoned it after hotel security blocked the terrace exits."
"Why would he leave it?"
"He had a second route."
She closed the notebook.
"Miss Keane, there's something else."
I waited.
"According to the event staff, the fireworks system was checked at nine o'clock. The last authorized control update occurred shortly after eleven."
"From Mr. Bell's office?"
Her eyes sharpened.
"Who told you that?"
"Mickey. The lighting technician."
Ortiz made another note.
"Did Mr. Valenti tell you who Marcus Bell is?"
"His family's attorney."
"He's also the lawyer responsible for overseeing his grandmother's estate."
A small, uncomfortable silence settled between us.
I thought of Teresa.
The person who needs me dead before tomorrow.
"What's happening tomorrow?" I asked.
The detective closed her notebook.
"That's what we're trying to find out."
At 1:36 a.m., I was escorted into a presidential suite on the hotel's thirty-second floor.
Teresa sat in a comfortable armchair beside an artificial fireplace.
Her wheelchair was nearby.
A physician had just finished examining her.
Nicholas stood by the windows, speaking quietly with Bianca.
When I entered, Teresa immediately brightened.
My favorite reindeer.
I smiled despite myself.
Your sweater insults are getting predictable.
She laughed.
Nicholas looked relieved.
Bianca didn't.
"Grandma," she said, "we need to be careful about what we tell people."
Teresa turned toward her.
Bianca repeated the sentence aloud, louder this time.
I raised my hand.
"She understood you the first time."
Bianca stared at me.
"I beg your pardon?"
"Speaking louder won't make the conversation more accessible. She's looking at your face, and she can sign. You can look at her when you speak."
The room went silent.
Nicholas turned away from the window.
His grandmother's eyes sparkled.
Bianca's cheeks colored.
"I've known my grandmother my entire life."
"Then you know she deserves to be included."
For a moment, I thought Bianca might slap me.
Instead, she exhaled.
Then she turned back to Teresa.
"I'm sorry, Grandma."
She spoke clearly.
And this time, she faced her.
Teresa nodded.
Nicholas looked at me with something unreadable in his eyes.
Then he said, "Bianca, give us a few minutes."
His sister hesitated.
"Nick, the trust meeting is scheduled for nine."
"I know."
"Vittorio says postponing it could create complications."
"Vittorio doesn't decide what happens to our grandmother."
Bianca's expression hardened.
"That's exactly what I told him."
She left.
I watched the door close.
"What trust meeting?" I asked.
Nicholas came to stand beside his grandmother.
"Our family owns a controlling interest in several companies through a trust established by my grandfather. Grandma holds a deciding vote over certain assets."
"And someone wants her dead before tomorrow."
Nicholas looked at her.
"That's what we're going to discuss."
He sat opposite her.
I took a chair beside the fireplace.
Teresa reached for my hand.
Then she began to sign.
Not slowly.
Not like a confused elderly woman struggling to remember the past.
She signed with precise, practiced movements.
My husband created the trust because he did not trust his sons.
Nicholas frowned.
"Grandpa trusted Dad."
Teresa shook her head.
He loved him. That is different.
Nicholas went quiet.
She continued.
Your father wanted to change the family business. He found money missing from the medical foundation. He believed someone was using the charitable accounts to pay criminal partners.
My stomach tightened.
"Medical foundation?"
Nicholas looked at me.
"The Valenti Foundation funds clinics, medical transportation, and rehabilitation programs."
I thought of St. Catherine.
Then I thought of the hospital badge clipped to my skirt.
No.
That couldn't be connected.
Could it?
Teresa continued.
Your father planned to bring everything to the authorities.
Nicholas stared at her.
"Nobody ever told me that."
Because he died before he could.
His face changed.
His father, Carlo Valenti, had died eleven years earlier in a highway collision outside Madison.
Everyone in Milwaukee knew the story.
A luxury sedan.
An icy road.
A tractor-trailer that crossed the median.
A terrible accident.
Teresa signed again.
The truck did not cross by accident.
Nicholas whispered something under his breath.
"Grandma, why didn't you tell me?"
Her hands trembled.
I tried.
She looked toward the closed door.
They told you I was confused.
I felt sick.
Nicholas slowly lowered himself into a chair.
"Who told me?"
Teresa didn't answer immediately.
Instead, she pointed toward a leather folder on the side table.
Nicholas opened it.
Inside was a medical evaluation bearing the letterhead of a private neurologist.
The document was dated six months earlier.
It stated that Teresa Valenti was suffering from significant cognitive impairment and was no longer capable of independently managing financial decisions.
Nicholas stared.
"What is this?"
Teresa signed.
I never agreed to that examination.
I looked at the document.
Then at her.
"Who requested it?"
Nicholas turned the page.
His expression went cold.
"Marcus Bell."
The same attorney whose office authorized the blackout.
Teresa lifted one trembling hand.
Tomorrow, they want a judge to accept this report.
My pulse accelerated.
"Why?"
She looked directly at Nicholas.
Because if I am declared incapable, they can replace my vote.
Nicholas closed the folder.
Very slowly.
"With whose?"
She answered.
Your uncle Vittorio's.
For a long moment, nobody spoke.
Then Nicholas stood and walked to the window.
He rested both hands against the glass.
Below us, police lights flashed along the street.
I thought about the shot fired through the ballroom window.
The bullet lodged in the wheelchair.
The medical report.
The midnight blackout.
Someone had tried to murder an elderly deaf woman to take control of her money.
And whoever arranged it had apparently been preparing a legal way to take her rights even if the bullet missed.
I felt anger begin to replace fear.
Teresa touched my hand.
There is one more thing.
I turned.
Something your father left me.
Nicholas came back immediately.
"What?"
She looked at her grandson for a long time.
Then her expression filled with grief.
He knew he might die.
Nicholas's breathing changed.
He left proof.
"Where?"
Teresa looked at me.
Not Nicholas.
Me.
Then she fingerspelled a name.
R-U-T-H.
My blood went cold.
Ruth.
My mother's name.
Teresa stared into my eyes.
May you like
And signed the sentence that changed everything.
Your mother knows where it is.
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