Chapter 4 - The Woman Giovanni Chose as His Voice
Nora did not return to the Moretti estate immediately.
Lorenzo refused.
For once, she did not argue.
Doctors kept her in the hospital for four days before allowing discharge under strict orders.
No lifting.
No kneeling.
No prolonged standing.
No unnecessary stress.
When the obstetrician said the final instruction, Nora laughed.
Lorenzo sat in the chair beside her.
The doctor looked confused.
"Something funny?"
Nora shook her head.
"You'd have to know my week."
The doctor glanced at Lorenzo.
"I'd rather not."
Nora was thirty seconds from being released when she learned Lorenzo had arranged a private apartment for her in Manhattan.
"No."
Lorenzo closed his eyes.
"Of course."
"I'm not taking an apartment."
"It's temporary."
"Still no."
"You cannot return to the servants' wing."
"Why?"
"Because Carlo Vescari knows you're connected to my father."
"So?"
"So I prefer you alive."
"I prefer being able to pay my own bills."
"It's not a gift."
"Then what is it?"
"Security."
"That sounds like a gift with men holding guns."
Lorenzo leaned against the wall.
"Fine."
"Fine?"
"You'll work."
Nora blinked.
"Doing what?"
"Helping my father communicate."
She became quiet.
"That's a real job?"
"Yes."
"You'd pay me?"
"I generally pay employees."
She narrowed her eyes.
"How much?"
Lorenzo named a number.
Nora nearly dropped her discharge papers.
"Per month?"
"Per week."
"Absolutely not."
He stared.
"You're negotiating downward."
"Nobody pays that much to sit with an old man."
"My father is not an old man."
"He is literally an old man."
Lorenzo almost smiled.
"You're terrible at this."
"At what?"
"Being intimidated."
"I'm trying."
They eventually agreed on a salary that still made Nora uncomfortable but resembled specialized caregiving rather than charity.
She would live in a renovated apartment inside the estate's secure residential wing.
Not the servants' quarters.
She would have medical transportation.
Scheduled rest.
And absolute authority to refuse physical tasks.
Nora insisted everything be written into a contract.
Lorenzo looked impressed.
"Learning."
"I've met your family."
"Fair."
When Nora returned to the estate, Giovanni waited near the front window.
His appearance had changed dramatically.
Clean white shirt.
Dark cardigan.
Fresh haircut.
Trimmed beard.
New wheelchair.
Communication tablet.
Physical therapist.
Nora stopped.
"Look at you."
Giovanni selected words.
HANDSOME?
She laughed.
"Extremely."
The tablet spoke again.
YOU LOOK TERRIBLE.
Nora stared.
Lorenzo, standing nearby, covered a smile.
"Five years silent and that's what he says to me?"
Giovanni's eyes moved.
PREGNANT.
Nora placed a hand over her belly.
"Still pregnant."
GOOD.
Then:
SORRY.
Her smile disappeared.
"For what?"
WORK.
Nora understood.
He had seen everything.
Mrs. Gable.
The bruises.
The exhaustion.
"You don't owe me an apology."
I SAW.
"I know."
COULD NOT HELP.
Nora approached.
"You helped by staying alive."
Giovanni's eyes filled.
She took his hand.
"That's enough."
Lorenzo looked away.
He suddenly felt like an intruder inside a bond he had not earned.
Giovanni spent hours each day with assistive therapists.
His control improved quickly because, contrary to earlier medical reports, he had retained more function than anyone understood.
He could move two fingers on his right hand.
Turn his head slightly.
Produce weak sounds.
Dr. Rosen warned everyone not to expect miracles.
Neurological recovery after so many years was unpredictable.
Giovanni did not need miracles.
He needed tools.
Within two weeks, he could construct sentences using the eye-tracking device.
And he had a great deal to say.
First came names.
Gable.
Dr. Fulton.
Accountant Peter Marlow.
Two maids.
An orderly.
All involved in neglect or theft.
Then came another name.
CARLO VESCARI.
Lorenzo sat across from him.
"What does Carlo want?"
Giovanni typed slowly.
BOOK.
"What book?"
BLACK.
"Ledger?"
YES.
"Where?"
Giovanni stared at him.
SAFE.
"Which safe?"
MINE.
"Manhattan?"
NO.
The conversation lasted nearly an hour.
Eventually, Lorenzo understood.
Twenty-two years earlier, Giovanni and Carlo Vescari's father, Salvatore, had operated together.
Not as equal partners.
As temporary allies.
They had bribed city inspectors, union officials, and politicians to control waterfront development.
When Giovanni withdrew from certain illegal businesses, he preserved documentation as insurance.
Carlo believed those records could expose the Vescari family and several people who were still powerful.
"Why didn't you destroy them?"
Giovanni typed:
INSURANCE.
Lorenzo laughed bitterly.
"Of course."
Then Giovanni added:
MISTAKE.
The word surprised him.
"Keeping them?"
YES.
"Why?"
DANGER.
Lorenzo leaned back.
"Where are they?"
Giovanni's eyes moved toward Nora.
Nora looked behind herself.
"What?"
The machine spoke.
SHE KNOWS.
Nora almost laughed.
"I absolutely do not."
Giovanni typed:
STORY.
"What story?"
LILY.
Nora froze.
"The story about Lily?"
One blink.
Every night before the stroke? No.
Nora had talked to Giovanni about wanting Lily to have a life without cold.
She had once described the small wooden music box she hoped to buy for her daughter.
A white box painted with lilies.
She had seen it in an antique store.
But she never bought it.
Giovanni typed:
LILY ROOM.
Lorenzo stared at him.
Then understood.
"The Lily Room."
The estate contained dozens of rooms, several with old family names.
Nora had never heard of it.
Lorenzo had.
"My mother's sitting room."
Giovanni's late wife, Isabella, had loved lilies.
After her death, the room had been closed.
They went together.
The Lily Room sat on the second floor overlooking the eastern gardens.
Dust sheets covered furniture.
A faded mural of white lilies decorated one wall.
Giovanni directed them through the tablet.
FIREPLACE.
Lorenzo examined it.
Nothing.
LEFT.
Nora looked left.
Bookshelves.
THIRD SHELF.
Behind a collection of old Italian poetry, they found a brass key.
Lorenzo stared at his father.
"You hid the key twenty years ago?"
One blink.
"Why leave a clue based on Mom?"
Giovanni typed:
ONLY FAMILY.
Then he looked at Nora.
TRUST.
Nora understood.
He trusted her enough to lead them there.
The key opened a small steel compartment beneath the fireplace.
Inside was no ledger.
Only a letter.
Lorenzo opened it.
His mother's handwriting covered one page.
If Giovanni ever brings you here, it means the past has returned to collect what we refused to bury.
Below it was an address.
A church in Manhattan.
St. Cecilia's.
Lorenzo stared.
"My mother hid it."
Giovanni blinked.
"Did she know what was in the ledger?"
Two blinks.
No.
"Only where?"
One blink.
The following day, Lorenzo visited St. Cecilia's with Marco and federal attorney Vincent Hale, a longtime legal adviser who had no relation to Brody.
Nora remained with Giovanni.
They played chess using the communication screen.
Giovanni destroyed her in twelve moves.
"That's rude."
He typed:
YOU ARE BAD.
"You could pretend I'm good."
LIE?
"Fair."
Then the screen displayed:
BRODY.
Nora's smile disappeared.
"What about him?"
LOVE?
She stared at Giovanni.
"Did I love him?"
YES.
"I thought I did."
STILL?
"No."
Giovanni studied her.
Nora looked down.
"I miss who I thought he was."
The tablet remained silent.
"That's different."
YES.
She smiled sadly.
"Did you love your wife?"
Giovanni's eyes softened.
ALWAYS.
"How long were you married?"
FORTY ONE YEARS.
Nora breathed out.
"That's longer than I've been alive."
TOO YOUNG.
"Everyone keeps saying that."
YOU ARE.
Nora rubbed her belly.
"I don't feel young."
Giovanni typed slowly.
LILY NEEDS MOTHER NOT MARTYR.
Nora read it twice.
"What does that mean?"
REST.
She laughed.
"You're becoming Lorenzo."
Giovanni immediately typed:
INSULT.
Nora laughed so loudly Elena heard her from the hall.
That afternoon, Lorenzo returned carrying a weathered black ledger.
Giovanni's expression changed.
"Found it," Lorenzo said.
The ledger contained names, payments, dates, properties, and photographs.
Enough corruption to reopen dozens of investigations.
But one section mattered more.
A series of payments had been made to a company controlled by Carlo Vescari.
Five years earlier.
The month Giovanni suffered his second stroke.
Lorenzo turned the page.
Medication purchases.
A private clinic.
A neurologist.
Then Giovanni typed:
NOT STROKE.
Everyone froze.
Lorenzo looked up.
"What?"
Giovanni typed again.
SECOND.
"Your second stroke?"
NOT NATURAL.
Nora covered her mouth.
Lorenzo's voice lowered.
"Someone caused it?"
YES.
"How?"
MEDICINE.
The room became silent.
Giovanni's medications had been tampered with.
His first stroke had been natural.
His second—the event that took almost all remaining speech and movement—had not.
"Who?"
Giovanni's eyes moved slowly across letters.
He spelled a name.
PETER MARLOW.
The Moretti accountant.
The same man who signed fraudulent care invoices with Mrs. Gable.
Lorenzo stood.
"Where is he?"
Marco checked his phone.
"He left the estate the night you arrived."
"Find him."
"We've been trying."
Giovanni typed another word.
VESCARI.
Lorenzo's eyes darkened.
Carlo had not merely exploited Giovanni's condition.
He had helped create it.
Nora felt sick.
"Why keep him alive?"
Lorenzo looked at her.
"Because a dead Giovanni creates questions."
She understood.
A helpless Giovanni created control.
Carlo had spent five years ensuring the former don remained trapped and dismissed while searching for the ledger Giovanni had hidden.
Then Lorenzo's phone rang.
Marco answered.
His expression changed.
"What?"
He turned the screen.
Security footage from a gas station thirty miles away.
Peter Marlow.
Getting into a car.
The driver was Brody Hale.
Nora stared.
Brody had not only worked for the Vescaris.
He was helping the man who had poisoned Giovanni.
Then another realization struck her.
"When Brody came to the hospital, he said Carlo would kill him."
Lorenzo nodded.
"What if he wasn't afraid?"
"What?"
"What if he wanted us to think he was?"
Lorenzo's face changed.
Nora continued.
"He knew I'd tell you what he said."
"A message."
"Exactly."
Giovanni's tablet spoke.
TRAP.
Everyone looked at him.
Lorenzo reached for his coat.
"No one leaves the estate."
Nora looked toward the windows.
Night had fallen.
Snow still covered the grounds.
"What do you think they're planning?"
Giovanni typed slowly.
ME.
Lorenzo stared at his father.
Carlo no longer needed the ledger.
Lorenzo had already found it.
The only person who could explain twenty years of history was Giovanni himself.
May you like
If Carlo could not keep him silent anymore, there was only one option left.
Kill him.
