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Chapter 4

作者: candy
Paolo drove me to my mother's hotel.

She was waiting in her suite. The moment she saw me, she rushed over and wrapped her arms around me.

That was when I started to cry.

“I didn't start the fire.”

“I know.”

“I saw Peter go down. I couldn't pull him out...”

She held me tighter.

I clutched her clothes and sobbed in the arms of a woman I barely knew.

She stayed up with me until almost dawn, then helped me to bed.

My father was on his way back from Italy.

I gave her the order to resume work. She slipped it into a folder for Rinaldi.

“Your father will be at the sit-down the day after tomorrow. He'll ask them about this himself.”

“Let the elders see both signatures. Anthony will tell them what happened if you keep his daughter safe.”

“We will. Let us handle the rest. Get some sleep.”

At ten that morning, Luca finally tracked me down. He was stopped outside the suite.

I asked my mother to rest in the bedroom and met him in the sitting room. Paolo stayed by the door.

Luca glanced at him.

“Since when do you hire bodyguards?”

I didn't answer.

He set a velvet box on the coffee table. Inside was the silver eagle he'd taken from me the night before.

“Put it on.”

He sat beside me and lowered his voice.

“No one will bother you. I've made sure of it.”

“What about the confession?”

“We can change it. Negligence, instead of arson.”

I gave a small smile. He reached for the pin.

I closed the lid, and his hand stopped in midair.

He took out a key and set it beside the box.

I'd made the blue ceramic key tag in Sicily. Two crooked initials were carved into the back.

“The house by the sea is ready. Your dishes are there, too.”

I stared at the key. He meant the house we'd bought three years ago.

We'd crouched on the unfinished floor, planning what we'd do with it after we were married. Luca would handle the kitchen. I'd take care of the garden. We'd retire there one day.

I'd wrapped each piece of my adoptive mother's old dinner set myself and shipped it over.

“That's where you're sending me?”

“I wouldn't trust you anywhere else. Everyone there works for me.”

“What if I want to come back?”

“I'll come get you when this is over.”

“Can I buy my own plane ticket?”

Luca looked at me. He didn't reach for the key again.

“Eve, this isn't the time to be difficult.”

I pushed the key back toward him.

Then I opened the photo of the work order on my phone and laid it in front of him.

“You knew the equipment was faulty.”

“I told them to keep it running for one more day.”

“Peter didn't make it to the end of his shift.”

The room went quiet.

It took a long time for Luca to look at me again.

He pushed my phone back.

“Eve, I can't afford to go down right now. I'll make sure his family is taken care of.”

I nodded and pushed the velvet box toward him, too.

“Neither can I.”

He caught my wrist.

“Do you have to act like we're on opposite sides?”

I looked down at his hand, at the ring that had matched mine for eight years.

“You put us there.”
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