Chapter 6
My mother opened the door, looked at Nico, and said, “You look worse than I expected.”
Nico stood on her porch holding a bottle of wine he had apparently decided was safer than flowers.
“I’m not sure how to answer that.”
“You don’t have to.”
She took the wine.
“Come inside.”
I covered my mouth to hide a smile.
Nico noticed.
His eyes narrowed slightly.
“You could have warned me.”
“I told you to bring courage.”
“That was not specific enough.”
My mother called from the kitchen.
“I can hear both of you.”
Nico looked toward the ceiling.
I had never seen him nervous in front of anyone.
Men twice his age lowered their voices when he entered rooms.
Executives rearranged schedules when he called.
But standing in my mother’s modest Connecticut living room beneath a framed photograph of me wearing braces at thirteen, Nico looked like a man considering escape.
I enjoyed it more than I should have.
The house smelled of tomato sauce and rosemary.
Nothing had changed since my last visit.
My mother’s blue blanket rested over the couch.
A bowl of lemons sat on the dining table.
Family photographs crowded the mantel.
Nico stopped in front of one.
It showed my mother and me at the beach when I was seventeen.
“You had short hair.”
I touched the back of my neck.
“I hated it.”
“You looked happy.”
“I was.”
My mother appeared behind us.
“She was.”
Nico turned.
Her expression had changed.
The humor was gone.
“Sit.”
Nico sat immediately.
I nearly laughed again.
My mother took the chair across from him.
I remained beside the window.
For several seconds, she studied him.
Then she asked, “Why did you investigate my daughter?”
Nico did not look at me.
“Because I was concerned that anyone close to me could be used against me.”
“That explains why.”
“Yes.”
“It doesn’t explain why you thought you had the right.”
“I thought money and risk gave me rights they didn’t.”
My mother’s eyebrows lifted.
Good answer.
Not sufficient.
But good.
“Did you investigate me?”
“Yes.”
“What did you learn?”
Nico hesitated.
“Everything the investigator could legally obtain.”
“Which was?”
“Addresses. Employment. Property records. Financial information.”
“My divorce?”
“Yes.”
“My debt?”
“Yes.”
“My medical records?”
“No.”
My mother looked at me.
“Do you believe him?”
It was an uncomfortable question.
“I believe that answer.”
She returned her attention to Nico.
“What happened to the information?”
“Celia Voss received instructions to destroy it.”
“And instead?”
“She kept copies.”
“Because you trusted her.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“She had worked with companies connected to mine for years.”
“That isn’t trust.”
Nico said nothing.
My mother leaned back.
“That is convenience.”
His eyes lowered.
“Yes.”
I watched him carefully.
The old Nico would have become defensive.
Not loudly.
He rarely needed volume.
He would have redirected the conversation toward practicalities.
Risk.
Security.
Business realities.
Instead, he allowed my mother to make him uncomfortable.
Perhaps that was growth.
Perhaps it was guilt.
Maybe both.
My mother asked, “Did you love Elena?”
Nico finally looked at me.
“Yes.”
“Wrong direction.”
He turned back to her.
“Yes.”
“Then why did she have to leave before you learned how to respect her?”
The question hit me too.
Nico’s hands remained still on his knees.
“Because I confused providing for her with listening to her.”
My mother nodded slowly.
“And because you liked being needed.”
He looked surprised.
So did I.
She continued.
“Men like you always do.”
“Men like me?”
“Men who can solve problems with money.”
Nico almost smiled.
“Usually more than money.”
“That wasn’t a compliment.”
The smile disappeared.
“I understand.”
She stood.
“Lunch.”
That was apparently the end of the interrogation.
For now.
We ate lasagna.
My mother asked Nico whether he could cook.
“No.”
“Nothing?”
“Coffee.”
“That’s not cooking.”
“I’ve been told.”
I looked at him.
“By whom?”
“Arthur.”
“Arthur cooks?”
“Apparently.”
“How did I never know this?”
“You never asked.”
The words escaped before either of us understood them.
Silence fell.
Nico’s expression changed.
My mother looked between us.
I set down my fork.
There it was again.
The simplest truth.
You never asked.
How much of our old relationship had been built from assumptions because neither of us had asked?
Nico spoke quietly.
“I should have.”
I nodded.
“Yes.”
After lunch, my mother took me upstairs.
She closed the bedroom door.
“You still love him.”
I stared at her.
“Subtle.”
“I’m old enough to stop wasting time.”
“You’re fifty-eight.”
“Exactly.”
I sat on the edge of my childhood bed.
“Love isn’t the problem.”
“No.”
“Trust is.”
“Yes.”
“And I don’t know whether I can rebuild it.”
“Then don’t decide today.”
I looked at her.
She sat beside me.
“You spent years letting him decide too much. Don’t turn freedom into another deadline.”
That sentence stayed with me.
Downstairs, something broke.
My mother sighed.
“Nico.”
We found him standing in the kitchen holding half a ceramic handle.
“I was trying to help.”
My mother took the broken mug.
“That was my least favorite one.”
Nico looked relieved.
“You’re welcome.”
She laughed.
The sound startled all three of us.
Then my phone rang.
Mara.
Her voice immediately erased the warmth from the room.
“Lena, we found Jonas Pike.”
“Where?”
“Philadelphia.”
Nico heard the name.
His posture changed.
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
“Did police get him?”
“No.”
My stomach tightened.
“Then what do you mean you found him?”
“Diane recognized him on security footage from a hotel.”
“When?”
“Yesterday.”
“Is he still there?”
“We don’t know.”
Mara paused.
“But that isn’t why I called.”
I walked toward the living room.
“What?”
“The hotel is beside Thirtieth Street Station.”
A train station.
Track Twelve.
And planes low enough to hear.
Diane’s memory.
Nico came closer but waited.
I put the call on speaker.
Mara continued.
“Pike checked in under another name. He left yesterday afternoon.”
“Destination?”
Nico asked.
“Unknown.”
“Was he alone?”
Mara hesitated.
“No.”
Something in her voice made my stomach drop.
“With whom?”
I asked.
“A woman.”
“Celia?”
“We don’t know. Her face was partially covered.”
“Then why does it matter?”
“Because she was carrying a green document case.”
My mother looked confused.
I wasn’t.
I had seen one before.
In my family boxes.
A faded green case that had belonged to my father.
I had assumed it contained old insurance records.
But when the boxes were returned, the case was missing.
“Nico.”
He looked at me.
“The green case.”
“What about it?”
“It wasn’t in the boxes.”
His face changed.
“You’re certain?”
“Yes.”
My mother stepped forward.
“What green case?”
“Dad’s.”
All color left her face.
“Elena.”
“What?”
She sat.
Slowly.
“What was inside it?”
“I don’t know.”
She looked toward Nico, then back at me.
“That case wasn’t your father’s.”
“What?”
“It belonged to your grandfather.”
I frowned.
“My grandfather?”
My mother rarely spoke about him.
He had died before I was born.
At least, that was what I had always been told.
“What was in it?”
“Property records.”
“What property?”
She closed her eyes.
“Lucia.”
I had never heard Nico use my mother’s first name.
She opened her eyes.
“My father owned warehouses near the Brooklyn waterfront.”
I stared at her.
“What?”
“Decades ago.”
“How many?”
“Three.”
“Where?”
“One was demolished. One was sold.”
“And the third?”
She looked at me.
“I don’t know.”
Nico became very still.
“What was your father’s name?”
“Samuel DeLuca.”
Nico’s expression changed so sharply that I noticed immediately.
“You know that name.”
He did not answer.
“Nico.”
“Yes.”
“How?”
He looked at my mother.
“Samuel DeLuca was a silent partner in a shipping company my father purchased twenty-eight years ago.”
Nobody moved.
My mother whispered, “Moretti Shipping.”
“Yes.”
The room seemed to tilt.
I stared at Nico.
“My family was connected to yours?”
“Apparently.”
“You didn’t know?”
“No.”
I believed him.
That frightened me more.
My mother stood.
“My father disappeared when I was nine.”
The air left my lungs.
“You told me he died.”
“I told you what my mother told me.”
“Disappeared how?”
“He left for work one morning.”
“And?”
“He never came home.”
I stared at her.
“You never told me.”
“I was a child.”
“You still knew.”
“I knew rumors.”
“What rumors?”
Her eyes moved to Nico.
“That he stole money.”
Nico shook his head.
“Samuel DeLuca didn’t steal from Moretti Shipping.”
“How do you know?”
“Because my father spent years trying to find where his ownership shares went.”
My mother gripped the back of a chair.
“What shares?”
“Twenty percent.”
Silence.
I thought about Celia.
The storage boxes.
My passport.
My mother’s maiden name.
The mysterious accounts.
The green case.
Maybe Celia had never been searching for identities.
Maybe the identities were only a path.
“What would twenty percent have been worth?”
I asked.
Nico did not answer.
“Nico.”
“Then?”
“Yes.”
“A few hundred thousand dollars.”
“And now?”
He looked at me.
“If the ownership survived restructuring?”
My heartbeat accelerated.
“How much?”
“Potentially tens of millions.”
My mother sat again.
I almost laughed.
Not because anything was funny.
Because my mother clipped grocery coupons.
Because I had counted cash in a cheap hotel room.
Because three months earlier, I had worried about affording rent.
And somewhere, perhaps, existed paperwork suggesting my family once owned part of the empire belonging to the man I had loved.
“This is why Celia took the boxes.”
Nico nodded slowly.
“It could be.”
Mara was still on the phone.
“I’m sending the hotel footage.”
My phone chimed.
I opened the video.
Jonas Pike crossed a lobby carrying a black suitcase.
Beside him walked a woman in a gray coat.
Her face remained turned away.
Under one arm was a green document case.
My mother made a sound.
“That’s it.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
The video continued.
At the revolving door, the woman turned slightly.
For less than one second, her face appeared.
Nico froze.
I looked at him.
“You know her.”
He stared at the screen.
“Yes.”
“Celia?”
“No.”
“Then who?”
May you like
His answer changed everything.
“My sister.”
