Chapter 8 - What Our Fathers BuriedI didn't sleep that night.
Victor didn't either.
At two in the morning, we sat at our kitchen table with the old photograph between us.
The house was silent.
The twins had been asleep for hours.
Snow tapped softly against the windows.
Two years earlier, silence between Victor and me had been a wall.
Now it was different.
Now we knew how to sit inside it together.
Still, I hated what the silence contained.
"My father wouldn't have hurt her."
Victor looked at me.
He didn't agree.
He didn't disagree.
And because he didn't, anger flashed through me.
"You think he did?"
"I think we don't know what happened."
"She accused him."
"She said he made her leave."
"That's an accusation."
"Yes."
I folded my arms.
Victor watched me.
"What?"
"Nothing."
"Don't."
"Don't what?"
"Become careful because you're afraid I'll think you're attacking my father."
He was quiet.
Then:
"Okay."
I appreciated that.
I hated it too.
"What are you thinking?"
Victor looked down at the photograph.
"I'm thinking your father died before either of us was old enough to ask him."
"Convenient."
"Nora."
"I know."
I rubbed my forehead.
"I'm sorry."
"You don't need to apologize."
"Yes, I do."
I stood.
Walked to the sink.
Then returned.
"I spent years turning my parents into something simple."
Victor waited.
"My father was loving. My mother was strong. The bakery was happy. Then Dad died, Mom struggled, and everything fell apart."
I looked at the photograph.
"But every box we open adds another version."
"People are complicated."
"That's a very therapist sentence."
"I paid for it."
I almost smiled.
Almost.
At seven, I called Elena.
She arrived forty minutes later carrying coffee.
Daniel came with her.
Apparently Victor had called him while I was showering.
When I raised an eyebrow, Victor said, "He's part of this."
Daniel looked between us.
"Should I leave?"
"No," I said.
Then to Victor:
"Next time tell me."
"Agreed."
Progress was often irritatingly unglamorous.
Elena read Rose's name twice.
Then sat down.
"I've heard it."
I stared at her.
"Where?"
"I don't know."
"Elena."
"I'm serious."
She closed her eyes.
"Your mother."
My pulse jumped.
"What about her?"
"I remember hearing your mother say the name once."
"When?"
"We were teenagers."
"Context?"
Elena frowned.
"She was arguing with your father."
I sat down.
"You heard them?"
"Part of it."
"What did they say?"
"I don't remember exactly."
"Try."
She thought.
"Your mother said something like, 'You can't keep pretending Rose never existed.'"
Victor went still.
"And Dad?"
"I don't remember."
"Nothing?"
"He was angry."
"At Mom?"
"I think he was frightened."
That word bothered me.
My father frightened.
Of what?
Daniel picked up the photograph.
"Maybe Rose didn't mean David physically forced her to leave."
I looked at him.
"What else could she mean?"
"Money. Threats. Information. A deal."
Victor nodded slowly.
"Or protection."
I looked at him.
"Protection from whom?"
"I don't know."
At nine, I called Rose.
She answered immediately.
"I want to meet."
"I expected you would."
"Today."
"Yes."
"No games."
"I am too old for games, Nora."
Hearing my name in her voice unsettled me.
"You know who I am."
"I've known since the bakery reopened."
"How?"
"Your photograph was in the newspaper."
"Why didn't you contact me then?"
"I wasn't ready."
"And now?"
A pause.
"I saw your daughter."
"What does Mia have to do with this?"
"More than you know."
My skin went cold.
"Where?"
Rose named a diner on the north side.
No private house.
No office.
Public.
Victor and I arrived together.
Rose was waiting in a booth.
Without the coat and gloves, she looked smaller.
Older.
More vulnerable.
But her eyes were sharp.
She looked at Victor first.
Then me.
"You look like Margaret."
My mother.
"You knew her."
"Very well."
"How well?"
"She was my friend."
That hurt strangely.
My mother had never mentioned her.
Victor sat beside me.
"Start at the beginning."
Rose almost smiled.
"You really are Carlo's son."
Victor's expression remained flat.
"I'm hoping that's not an insult."
"It isn't."
She folded her hands.
"I met Carlo when I was nineteen."
She told us about a Chicago that existed before either of us.
Carlo repairing cars for cash.
Anthony working warehouse shifts.
My father delivering flour.
My mother experimenting with pastries in the tiny apartment she shared with her sister.
Four people becoming five when Rose entered their lives.
Then six when Lucia appeared years later.
"Lucia knew you?" Victor asked.
Rose nodded.
"Not well."
"But she knew who you were."
"Yes."
Victor absorbed that.
"She told me she met my father years after you disappeared."
"That is true."
I leaned forward.
"What happened?"
Rose looked at me.
"Your father saved my life."
The sentence was so far from what I expected that I simply stared.
"What?"
"David did not hurt me."
"But you said—"
"I said he made me leave."
"Why?"
"Because Carlo was going to get himself killed."
Victor's face changed.
"By whom?"
"His own father."
Victor went completely still.
I knew little about Victor's grandfather.
Giovanni Rinaldi.
Dead before Victor was born.
A violent man, according to the few stories Lucia had ever told.
Rose continued.
"Carlo wanted nothing to do with Giovanni's business."
"What business?"
She looked at Victor.
"Not the companies you inherited."
Victor's jaw tightened.
"What kind?"
"The kind that doesn't put its name on buildings."
I understood.
Organized crime.
Not glamorous.
Not romantic.
Violence.
Debt.
Fear.
Rose looked down.
"Carlo spent years trying to separate himself."
"Did he?"
"Eventually."
"But?"
"I became pregnant."
Her voice softened.
"Giovanni saw a grandchild as leverage."
Victor leaned back.
"What did he do?"
"He told Carlo that if Carlo left Chicago, I would pay for it."
I felt sick.
"So Dad helped you escape."
Rose nodded.
"David and Anthony."
"Anthony knew?"
"Yes."
"Carlo?"
"No."
Victor stared at her.
"You left without telling your husband."
"I had forty minutes."
"Why not call him afterward?"
"I tried."
She looked away.
"David arranged for me to stay with relatives in Minnesota. Giovanni's people found me within two weeks."
Victor's hands curled.
"What happened?"
"I ran again."
"Where?"
"Canada."
"And the baby?"
Rose became very still.
My heart started pounding.
"The baby was born early."
Victor didn't breathe.
"A boy."
His eyes closed.
A brother.
Victor had a brother.
"What happened to him?"
Rose looked directly at Victor.
"He lived."
Victor's face drained of color.
"Where is he?"
"I don't know."
I stared at her.
"How can you not know?"
Rose's eyes filled.
"Because I gave him away."
No one spoke.
"I was twenty-four," she whispered. "I was alone. Giovanni was looking for me. I believed if he found my son, he would use him to bring Carlo back under his control."
"Adoption?" I asked.
"Private."
"Legal?"
"Mostly."
Victor laughed bitterly.
"Mostly?"
"It was 1995. I used another name."
"What name?"
"Rachel Bell."
Victor stood.
He walked away from the booth.
I let him.
Rose watched him.
"He has Carlo's anger."
"He has his own."
She looked at me.
"You're protective of him."
"He's my husband."
"That didn't protect Carlo."
The sentence irritated me.
"I'm not you."
"No."
Rose looked tired.
"You're not."
Victor returned.
"Name."
Rose blinked.
"My son's birth name?"
"Yes."
"Gabriel."
"Last name?"
"I never put Rinaldi on the certificate."
"What happened after the adoption?"
"I disappeared completely."
"Why didn't you contact my father after Giovanni died?"
Rose's face broke.
"I did."
Victor froze.
"When?"
"1999."
"What happened?"
"He refused to see me."
"I don't believe you."
"I have the letter."
She opened her handbag.
Victor stared at the envelope she placed on the table.
His father's handwriting.
Rose,
Do not come back.
Gabriel is safer if the past remains buried.
I will carry what happened for the rest of my life.
Please build something better with yours.
Carlo.
Victor read it twice.
Then pushed it toward me.
"Why would he say Gabriel was safer?"
"I don't know."
"You never asked?"
"I wrote again."
"No answer?"
"One."
She placed another letter down.
This one was shorter.
Stop searching.
There are people who still remember.
Victor looked furious.
"My grandfather was dead."
"Yes."
"So who was he afraid of?"
Rose shook her head.
"That is why I came back."
I stared at her.
"After all these years?"
"I received something."
"What?"
She took out her phone.
A photograph appeared.
A man stood outside Three Families.
Maybe early thirties.
Dark hair.
Tall.
The picture had been taken from across the street.
My bakery.
My children were visible through the window.
A message accompanied it.
You should have stayed gone, Rose.
Victor's expression changed instantly.
"When did you receive this?"
"Seven weeks ago."
The same time she started visiting the bakery.
"You thought the man was Gabriel?"
"At first."
"Is he?"
"I don't know."
Victor took the phone.
"Send me everything."
Rose hesitated.
He looked at her.
"Please."
That word changed something.
She sent the photographs.
Victor forwarded them to Daniel.
Then he called someone from corporate security.
I listened.
He didn't order surveillance on everyone.
He didn't demand Rose surrender her phone.
He didn't take control of her choices.
He asked permission.
It shouldn't have made me emotional.
But growth rarely announces itself.
Sometimes it sounds like:
May I?
Would you be comfortable?
What do you want?
When the call ended, I asked Rose, "Why watch my family?"
Her face softened.
"I wanted to know what Carlo's life became."
"You could have asked."
"I was afraid."
"Of Victor?"
"No."
She looked at me.
"Of wanting to belong to something that was never mine anymore."
I understood that more than I wanted to.
Victor's phone rang.
Daniel.
He answered.
"Yes?"
His expression sharpened.
"You're sure?"
Pause.
"Send it."
He ended the call.
"What?"
Daniel had run the photograph through one of the company's licensed security systems.
The man outside the bakery had appeared somewhere else.
Three days earlier.
Outside the twins' preschool.
My blood turned cold.
Victor looked at me.
"Nora."
"No."
"We should—"
"No."
His jaw tightened.
I knew what he wanted.
Security.
Cars.
Guards.
Control.
And this time?
I wanted some of it too.
That realization frightened me.
"Protecting them isn't the same as controlling me," I said.
Victor went quiet.
"I know."
"Do you?"
"Yes."
I looked at Rose.
"Do you know him?"
She stared at the photograph.
Then enlarged the image.
Her hand began trembling.
"What?"
"I've seen that ring."
The man's right hand rested near his coat pocket.
A gold ring.
Black stone.
Rose whispered:
"Giovanni gave those rings to five men."
Victor looked at her.
"They'd be ancient."
"The men are."
"That guy is thirty."
"I know."
Rose lifted her eyes.
"But their sons aren't."
My stomach dropped.
Victor's phone vibrated.
A message from Daniel.
He opened it.
Then turned the screen toward us.
The man had been identified.
Adrian Vale.
Thirty-three.
Chicago resident.
No criminal record.
No obvious connection to the Rinaldis.
Except one.
His father.
Marcus Vale.
Victor stared at the name.
Rose covered her mouth.
"You know him?" I asked.
She nodded.
"Marcus was the man Giovanni sent to find me."
Victor's expression hardened.
"Why would his son be watching mine?"
Nobody answered.
Then another message appeared.
This one from Elena.
Nora, call me NOW.
I called.
She answered breathlessly.
"Where are you?"
"With Victor."
"Are the twins with you?"
"No. Preschool."
"Go get them."
Every muscle in my body tightened.
"Why?"
"I found something in Aunt Margaret's old papers."
"What?"
"A letter."
"From whom?"
"Your father."
I gripped the phone.
"What does it say?"
Elena went silent.
Then:
"David knew Gabriel's adoptive family."
Victor heard.
Rose heard.
Everything inside the booth stopped.
Elena continued.
"And Nora?"
"Yes?"
"He didn't just know them."
May you like
My heart hammered.
"He chose them."
