Chapter 3 - The Woman in the Photograph
The bank opened at nine.
Matteo had three attorneys on the phone by seven.
Mara had slept for forty-three minutes.
She knew because she had stared at the clock beside the guest bed until 6:11, closed her eyes, and woke at 6:54 to the sound of Nico crying somewhere down the hall.
Juniper had arrived at two in the morning in a carrier and spent the next four hours under Mara's bed, hissing at anyone who came near.
By breakfast, the cat had decided Matteo's enormous house belonged to her.
Mara found her sitting on a velvet chair in the breakfast room while Nico dropped pieces of banana from his high chair.
Matteo stood by the window drinking black coffee.
He had changed into a charcoal sweater and dark trousers.
Without the suit, he looked less like a crime boss and more like the sort of man a normal woman might make the mistake of trusting.
Mara reminded herself that normal men did not keep armed guards in hallways.
"Your cat bit Enzo," Matteo said.
"Good."
"I like her."
"She doesn't like you."
"Neither do you. I'm noticing a pattern."
Mara poured coffee.
"Don't make jokes before I've had caffeine."
Nico saw her and slapped both palms against the tray of his high chair.
His whole face brightened.
Something inside Mara softened despite every reason it should not.
"Morning, trouble."
She kissed two fingers and touched them to his forehead.
Matteo watched.
The room went quiet in a different way.
Mara straightened.
"What?"
"Nothing."
"That was not a nothing face."
He looked down at his coffee.
"Alessia used to call him trouble."
Mara's chest tightened.
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be."
He looked at Nico.
"He should hear the word without it hurting."
At 9:42, they entered First Continental Bank through a private side entrance.
Mara hated the security, the whispering employees, the way every person in the building seemed to know Matteo before he spoke.
The bank manager personally opened the vault.
Box 418 had not been accessed in twenty-five years.
Its registered owners were Cecilia DeLuca and Evelyn Bennett.
Matteo's mother's name.
Mara's mother's name.
They sat in a private viewing room while the manager placed the long metal box between them.
Mara looked at Matteo.
"You open it."
He shook his head.
"Your name was in the pendant."
"So was your uncle's."
"Exactly."
She inserted the key the bank had retained under sealed instructions.
The lid lifted.
Inside were three things.
A red ledger.
A cassette tape.
And a photograph.
Mara picked up the picture first.
Four people stood in front of a lake.
A younger Cecilia DeLuca smiled into the camera. Beside her stood a woman Mara recognized instantly, even twenty-five years younger.
Evelyn.
Mara's mother.
Thomas Bennett stood beside her.
And in Evelyn's arms was a baby.
Mara turned the photograph over.
Cecilia's handwriting, according to Matteo, filled the back.
August 2001. The first quiet day in months.
Evelyn, Thomas, baby Mara, and me.
If we survive this family, we survive anything.
Mara's eyes filled.
Baby Mara.
Her mother had brought her here.
She had been inside the DeLuca world before she could walk.
Matteo picked up the ledger.
His expression darkened as he read.
"What?"
"Payments."
"To who?"
"Police. Judges. Shipping companies."
Mara swallowed.
"And?"
"Vittorio."
The name appeared over and over.
Sometimes beside amounts.
Sometimes beside coded initials.
Sometimes beside a dragon symbol.
Near the final page, Thomas Bennett had written a note.
V controls the Dragon Circle separately from Carlo. Cecilia is right. They are using the family name to hide operations Carlo never approved.
Mara looked at Matteo.
"Carlo was your father?"
"Yes."
"So your uncle was running something behind his back."
"It appears that way."
"Doing what?"
Matteo's jaw tightened.
"Things my father claimed our family never touched."
He closed the ledger.
Mara did not ask for details.
She did not need them.
The cassette tape sat between them.
The bank had found an old player.
Matteo inserted the tape.
Static filled the room.
Then a woman's voice spoke.
Cecilia.
Matteo stopped breathing.
Mara knew because his entire chest froze.
"If you're hearing this, it means Evelyn or Thomas got the evidence out."
A long hiss of tape.
"Carlo thinks Vittorio is loyal. He isn't. Vittorio has built his own circle inside the family. The dragon tattoos mark the men who answer to him first."
Mara looked at Matteo's hands.
He followed her gaze.
"My father required the tattoos after Vittorio told him the dragon represented unity," he said quietly.
On the tape, Cecilia continued.
"Vittorio arranged the warehouse fire in Cicero. He ordered Thomas killed after Thomas found the accounts. If anything happens to me, it was not Carlo."
Mara's hand flew to her mouth.
Thomas.
Her father.
Not a highway accident.
Murdered.
The tape hissed.
Then Evelyn's voice came through.
Mara had not heard her mother's voice in four years.
The first word destroyed her.
"Sweetheart."
Mara bent forward.
Matteo reached toward her, then stopped.
On the tape, Evelyn was crying.
"Mara, if one day you hear this, I am sorry. I wanted to tell you. I wanted to tell you every year. But knowing would put you in danger."
Mara pressed both hands to her mouth.
"Your father was brave. Braver than anyone knew. He found the truth and tried to take us away. Vittorio killed him for it. I took you and ran."
The tape clicked softly.
"If Cecilia is gone, I failed her. If Matteo is alive, tell him his mother loved him. She begged me to save him before I saved the evidence."
Matteo turned his face away.
Mara watched his throat move.
Then Evelyn said something neither of them expected.
"Alessia knows."
Matteo snapped his head toward the player.
Mara stared.
"Years from now, if Matteo marries the girl named Alessia Romano, trust her. Cecilia's cousin Rosa has the second copy of the records. Alessia's mother knows where."
The tape ended.
Matteo stood so fast the chair rolled backward.
"No."
Mara looked at him.
"What?"
"Alessia's mother died when Alessia was sixteen."
"Could she have told Alessia?"
"Maybe."
He paced once, then stopped.
"Alessia asked me about Bellini Street three months before the crash."
Mara's skin prickled.
"What did you tell her?"
"Nothing."
His voice broke on the word.
Mara said softly, "You thought you were protecting her."
"I told her old family stories were poison."
"You didn't know."
"She asked me if I trusted Vittorio."
Mara felt cold.
"What did you say?"
Matteo closed his eyes.
"With my life."
The room seemed to shrink.
He opened his eyes again.
"Three weeks later, she was dead."
Mara knew the shape of grief when it turned into rage.
She had lived inside her mother's version of it for years.
"Matteo."
He looked at her.
"If he killed Alessia—"
"We prove it."
His laugh was quiet and terrible.
"You think evidence matters to men like Vittorio?"
"It mattered enough for him to kill my father."
That stopped him.
Mara stood.
"He spent twenty-five years making sure this stayed buried. That means he is afraid of something in this box."
Matteo's gaze dropped to the ledger.
She continued.
"You asked why my mother kept secrets. Now I know. Fear became her whole life. I am not giving your uncle the same power over mine."
He studied her face.
Then he nodded.
"All right."
They returned to the house just after noon.
Enzo met them in the foyer.
His expression told Matteo something was wrong before he spoke.
"We found Salvatore."
Matteo's face hardened.
"Where?"
"Parking garage on Lake."
"Alive?"
Enzo shook his head.
Mara went cold.
Matteo asked, "How?"
"Looked like a heart attack."
"But?"
"His watch was missing. His phone was wiped."
Matteo swore under his breath.
Then Rosa came rushing from the nursery.
Nico was in her arms.
"Matteo."
Her face was white.
"He has a fever."
Everything else disappeared.
Matteo crossed the foyer in three strides.
"How high?"
"One-oh-three."
Mara watched the mafia boss transform into a terrified father.
His hands shook as he touched Nico's forehead.
The baby whimpered.
Matteo's voice cracked.
"Call Dr. Hale."
"Already did."
Nico saw Mara over his father's shoulder.
His arms reached for her.
Mara did not hesitate.
She took him.
The baby pressed his burning face against her neck.
Matteo looked at her.
For a moment, all the secrets and dead men vanished.
There was only a frightened child between them.
Dr. Hale arrived twenty minutes later.
He examined Nico in the nursery while Mara and Matteo waited.
Finally he smiled.
"Ear infection. Painful, but not dangerous. Antibiotics. Fluids. Keep an eye on the fever."
Matteo exhaled.
Mara almost laughed from relief.
The doctor packed his bag.
Then he noticed the pendant.
His hand stopped.
Mara noticed.
So did Matteo.
Dr. Hale's face changed.
"Where did you get that?"
Mara's stomach dropped.
Matteo stepped between them.
The doctor's eyes widened.
"Mr. DeLuca, I can explain."
"Then start."
The doctor backed toward the door.
"I didn't know she was Evelyn's daughter."
Matteo's voice became very quiet.
"Who told you to watch for the pendant?"
Dr. Hale looked at Nico.
Then at Mara.
His shoulders collapsed.
"Vittorio."
Mara felt Matteo's rage like heat.
The doctor raised both hands.
"He said if a woman wearing it ever came near the family, I was to call him."
"Did you?"
"No."
Matteo stared at him.
The doctor swallowed.
"Not yet."
Mara looked at the man's trembling fingers.
He was lying.
A phone began ringing inside his medical bag.
No one moved.
It rang again.
Enzo stepped forward and took it.
May you like
One name glowed on the screen.
VITTORIO.
