Chapter 10 - THE HOSPITAL ROOM
St. Vincent’s had a private wing on the fourth floor, and by the time Dante arrived it had two of his men outside the door and a nurse who had been paid to say nothing.
Lorenzo Bellini was in bed nine.
He had been beaten. That was the first thing Dante saw — the swelling around the left eye, the split lip, the hand resting on the blanket with three fingers in a splint. Someone had worked him over carefully, in the way of men who wanted information rather than pain.
He was awake.
He looked at Dante for a long moment and then at Allesia, who had come in behind him, and something crossed his ruined face that was not surprise.
“You brought her,” he said.
“She brought me,” Dante said.
Bellini laughed, and it cost him. He winced and put his good hand to his ribs.
“Sit down,” he said. “Or don’t. I don’t know how long I’ve got.”
Dante sat.
Allesia stayed by the door.
“Vittorio,” Dante said.
Bellini’s eyes closed.
“Yes.”
“Alive.”
“Yes.”
“Since when?”
“Since always.” Bellini opened his eyes. “Since the funeral, which was a funeral for a body that was never in the box. He had a man in the coroner’s office. He had a man everywhere.”
“Why?”
“Because he wanted out of the family without leaving it.” Bellini shifted against the pillow. “Your father was the face. Vittorio was the hands. When your father started asking questions about where the money was going, Vittorio decided it would be simpler to be dead. So he died, and he kept taking, and no one ever looked for a dead man.”
“He killed my mother.”
Bellini was quiet.
“Say it,” Dante said.
“I don’t know that he killed her.” Bellini’s voice was rough. “I know she was afraid of him. I know she found the accounts. I know she told me once that if anything happened to her, I should keep my mouth shut and my eyes open, and that I should stay close to the family, and that I should never trust a Moretti.” He laughed again, bitterly. “She meant him. She meant Vittorio. And I did it. Twelve years, I stayed close, and I kept my mouth shut, and I kept my eyes open, and I found out everything too late.”
“Why did you accuse Allesia?”
Bellini looked at her.
“Because she was in the study,” he said. “Because I saw her come out, and I knew what was in that safe, and I knew that if Vittorio’s people found out she’d seen the wall open, she was dead.”
Allesia stared.
“You were trying to get me out of the house.”
“I was trying to get you out of the city.” Bellini closed his eyes. “I went to Mrs. Conte. I told her there was a problem and that the maid needed to go, quietly, that same morning. I thought she’d give you a severance and a car and send you north.”
“And instead she packed my suitcase before dawn.”
“She had the letter ready when I called.” Bellini opened his eyes. “I should have known then. I should have known, and I didn’t, because I am a coward and I have been a coward for twelve years.”
“Mrs. Conte,” Dante said.
“She’s his.” Bellini’s voice was flat. “She’s been his since before your mother died. She was Bianca’s housekeeper, and she loved Bianca — I believe that. But she loved her own life more, and Vittorio has a way of finding the thing you love and putting his hand around it. She sealed the room. She took the folder from the safe. She made sure nobody ever went down that corridor again.”
Dante sat without moving.
“Why now?” he said. “Why take the folder now, after eleven years?”
“Because the ledger.” Bellini coughed. “Your mother made a copy. Giovani Romano kept it. Vittorio didn’t know where. He’s been looking for eleven years. When he heard a maid had a photograph of Bianca in her wallet, he panicked.”
Dante looked at Allesia.
She had gone very still.
“He knew about the photograph?”
“He knew about you.” Bellini’s eyes moved to her. “He’s known since the beginning. Giovani changed your name, moved you around, taught you to keep your head down. It worked for eleven years. But then you took a job in the one house in Chicago where the man you were hiding from keeps his books.”
Allesia put a hand against the doorframe.
“He knew I was here,” she said.
“He knew,” Bellini said. “He didn’t know how much you knew. That’s what he was trying to find out. That’s what he’s still trying to find out.”
Dante stood.
“You’ll be moved tonight,” he said. “To a place of my choosing.”
Bellini looked at him.
“And what about you?”
“What about me?”
“Vittorio’s been waiting fourteen years for you to find out.” Bellini’s voice dropped. “He’s not going to run. He’s going to call.”
Dante’s phone rang.
He looked down at the screen.
Unknown number.
He answered.
“Hello, nephew.”
The voice was warm. It was the voice of a man at a dinner party, a man with a glass of wine, a man who had kissed a boy on the cheek and asked about school.
Dante said nothing.
“You found my mother’s book,” Vittorio said. “And the letter. She was always better at writing than she was at staying quiet.”
“Where are you?”
“Where I’ve always been.” A pause. “I want to see you. Both of you. There’s a place on the river where your father and I used to go, before he got serious. I’ll text the address. Come alone.”
“No.”
“I didn’t expect you to.” Vittorio laughed, softly. “Bring whoever you like. Bring the whole house. I only want to talk, Dante. I’m the last family you have.”
Dante looked at the phone.
“You’re not my family,” he said.
“Careful,” Vittorio said, and the warmth went out of his voice. “You don’t know what you’ll be when this is done.”
The call ended.
Dante stood in the hospital corridor with the phone in his hand and Allesia watching him from the doorway.
“Well?” she said.
“He wants to meet.”
“And?”
Dante looked at her.
“And I’m going to go,” he said. “And you’re going to stay.”
“No,” Allesia said.
“Allesia—”
“No.”
She stepped out of the doorway, into the corridor, and stood in front of him, and the fluorescent light made her look older and harder than she had looked in the kitchen of his house.
“Yesterday,” she said, “I was told I was fired before anyone asked me anything. This morning, I was told my suitcase was packed before I woke up. This afternoon, a man I’ve never met called me by my father’s name.” She looked up at him. “You do not get to decide for me. Not you. Not him. Nobody.”
Dante looked at her for a long moment.
“Then you’re coming,” he said.
“Yes.”
“It will be dangerous.”
“I know.”
“You might not come back.”
Allesia looked at him.
May you like
“Neither might you,” she said.
And there it was.
