Chapter 6 - Blood Before LoyaltyLorenzo’s uncle arrived at noon.
Salvatore Costa did not look like a traitor.
That was Nora’s first thought.
He looked like somebody’s favorite older relative.
Silver hair.
Soft cashmere coat.
Warm brown eyes.
The kind of man who probably remembered birthdays and complained when young people skipped meals.
He entered Lorenzo’s downstairs office carrying a paper bag from a bakery.
“Cannoli.”
Salvatore placed it on the table.
“Your kitchen makes everything too healthy.”
Then he noticed Nora.
His expression became curious.
“So this is the accountant.”
Nora looked at Lorenzo.
Lorenzo looked murderous.
Apparently nobody had told Salvatore that subtlety existed.
“Uncle.”
“Lorenzo.”
Salvatore smiled.
“You look terrible.”
“Sit.”
The older man glanced around.
Vincent stood near the door.
Thomas had returned from Ohio several hours earlier and now remained beside the far wall.
Two additional men waited outside.
Salvatore’s smile faded.
“What happened?”
Lorenzo placed a printed transaction record on the desk.
“Bellweather Consulting.”
The silence that followed was small but noticeable.
Salvatore looked at the paper.
Then at Lorenzo.
“I own several consulting companies.”
“This one transferred nineteen thousand dollars yesterday.”
“So?”
“To a shell company.”
Lorenzo slid another page forward.
“That shell company paid Evan Cole.”
Salvatore’s face changed.
Nora watched carefully.
Surprise.
Then confusion.
Then anger.
It looked convincing.
“Who is Evan Cole?”
“The man who opened the service gate last night.”
Salvatore stared.
“Opened it for whom?”
“The Bertinellis.”
The room became cold.
Salvatore slowly removed his coat.
He sat.
“Start again.”
Lorenzo did.
No dramatics.
No accusation beyond facts.
Cole.
The gate.
The abduction attempt.
The cash.
The transfer.
Bellweather.
When he finished, Salvatore looked twenty years older.
“I did not authorize that transfer.”
Vincent spoke.
“Your signature token did.”
“Then someone used it.”
“Who has access?”
“My controller.”
“Name.”
“Patrick Nevin.”
Thomas wrote it down.
“Anyone else?”
“My wife has access to emergency accounts, but she wouldn’t know how to use the corporate system.”
Salvatore rubbed his forehead.
“My assistant.”
“Diane.”
Lorenzo watched him.
“Who knows the company exists?”
“Half the finance department.”
Nora finally spoke.
“Who knows which accounts are actively funded?”
Salvatore looked at her.
“Excuse me?”
“Bellweather isn’t a trading company.”
Nora pointed toward the records.
“It’s dormant most months.”
“You use it for occasional consulting transfers.”
“Who knows there would be enough money inside it to move nineteen thousand without triggering attention?”
Salvatore studied her.
“My controller.”
“Anyone else?”
A pause.
“My daughter.”
Lorenzo’s face hardened.
Vincent muttered something under his breath.
Nora looked between them.
“Who is his daughter?”
“Isabella.”
Lorenzo answered.
“Your cousin?”
“Yes.”
Salvatore stood.
“No.”
Lorenzo’s eyes remained cold.
“I did not accuse her.”
“You thought it.”
“I think about every possibility.”
“She is twenty-eight.”
“Age does not prevent betrayal.”
“She loves you.”
Lorenzo’s expression barely shifted.
“So did my father.”
The room stopped.
Salvatore’s anger vanished.
Nora looked at Lorenzo.
He had said almost nothing about his family.
Now the sentence seemed to have escaped without permission.
Salvatore lowered his voice.
“That is not the same.”
“No?”
“Lorenzo.”
The older man glanced toward Nora.
Then Vincent.
“This is family business.”
Lorenzo’s mouth hardened.
“Everything in this room is family business.”
Nora understood she had become part of something she was never supposed to hear.
Salvatore looked back at his nephew.
“Your father made choices in a different time.”
“My father put a gun against my mother’s head.”
Nora stopped breathing.
Lorenzo’s voice remained completely flat.
“He made a choice.”
Salvatore closed his eyes.
Vincent looked at the floor.
Thomas did not move.
Nora’s mind returned to the restaurant.
Lorenzo looking at her bruises.
That hollow stare.
Someone who had survived this before.
Not himself.
His mother.
Maybe both.
Salvatore spoke quietly.
“You were fifteen.”
“I remember my age.”
“You remember one night.”
“I remember every night.”
The sentence landed like stone.
Salvatore’s face collapsed.
Lorenzo stood.
“Do not tell me blood prevents betrayal.”
His eyes turned toward the transaction record.
“Blood makes betrayal easier because it lowers the locks.”
Salvatore remained silent.
Lorenzo turned to Thomas.
“Find Patrick.”
“Already moving.”
“To Vincent.”
“Bring Isabella here.”
Salvatore stepped forward.
“No.”
Lorenzo’s gaze snapped to him.
“You will not drag my daughter in like a suspect.”
“If she is innocent, she leaves.”
“And if she isn’t?”
Lorenzo did not answer.
Salvatore’s fear surfaced.
“If she isn’t?”
Lorenzo looked at him.
“Then you should hope I remember she is family.”
Nora left before Isabella arrived.
Not because Lorenzo told her to.
Because she could no longer breathe in the underground office.
She went upstairs.
The estate was quiet again.
Almost peaceful.
Sunlight spread over the garden where she had nearly been abducted.
The blood had been cleaned from the stone path.
Nothing remained.
Nora hated how efficiently dangerous men erased evidence.
She entered the kitchen.
A woman in her sixties was preparing soup.
She introduced herself as Maria.
“You’re too thin.”
Those were her first words.
Nora almost smiled.
“I’m average.”
“Not for healing.”
Maria placed bread in front of her.
“Eat.”
Apparently commands were part of the house culture.
Nora sat.
“Have you worked here long?”
“Twenty-one years.”
That caught her attention.
“For Lorenzo?”
“For the family.”
Maria’s hands slowed.
“Then for Lorenzo.”
Nora tore a piece of bread.
“Did you know his mother?”
Maria stopped completely.
“You ask dangerous questions.”
“So everyone keeps telling me.”
The older woman looked toward the doorway.
Then lowered her voice.
“Lucia Costa was the kindest person in this house.”
“What happened?”
Maria’s eyes hardened with old grief.
“Her husband happened.”
Nora did not move.
“Lorenzo’s father.”
“Yes.”
“Did he hit her?”
Maria looked at Nora’s bruised face.
“He broke what he could not control.”
The words landed too close.
“What happened to him?”
“Dead.”
“How?”
Maria returned to cutting vegetables.
“You ask too many questions.”
“People keep answering half of them.”
Maria almost smiled.
Then footsteps approached.
Lorenzo entered.
Conversation ended instantly.
He looked from Nora to Maria.
“What?”
Maria kept chopping.
“Your guest needs food.”
“She has food.”
“She needs more.”
Lorenzo glanced at Nora.
“For once, someone else is ordering you around.”
“Enjoying it?”
“Immensely.”
Maria made a sound that might have been amusement.
Lorenzo opened the refrigerator.
Nora watched him.
For a mafia boss, he spent a surprising amount of time in kitchens.
“Did Isabella come?”
He became still.
“Yes.”
“And?”
“She did not authorize the payment.”
“Patrick?”
“Missing.”
Nora’s attention sharpened.
“Your uncle’s controller.”
“Yes.”
“He disappeared?”
“His apartment is empty.”
“Family?”
“Wife died three years ago.”
“Children?”
“None.”
Nora thought.
“What about the assistant?”
“Diane is being questioned.”
“By questioned you mean—”
“She is sitting in an office drinking tea.”
Lorenzo looked at her.
“No instruments of medieval persuasion are involved.”
Nora raised an eyebrow.
“Growth.”
His mouth almost moved.
Maria placed a bowl in front of Nora.
Soup.
Then one in front of Lorenzo.
“Sit.”
Lorenzo stared at her.
Maria pointed at the chair.
The most feared man Nora had ever met sat.
She nearly laughed.
Maria returned to the stove.
For several minutes they ate silently.
Then Nora asked, “How did your father die?”
Lorenzo’s spoon stopped.
Maria turned.
“Nora.”
“I can leave.”
She stood carefully.
Lorenzo looked at her.
“You asked.”
“Yes.”
“Sit.”
She sat.
He placed the spoon down.
“My father controlled the Costa organization before me.”
Nora waited.
“He believed fear was more reliable than loyalty.”
“Was he right?”
“For a while.”
Lorenzo looked at the table.
“My mother tried to leave him three times.”
Nora’s stomach tightened.
“The first time, he found her at her sister’s house.”
“The second, at a hotel.”
“The third time she almost reached Canada.”
His voice remained emotionless.
“He brought her home.”
Maria quietly left the kitchen.
Lorenzo continued.
“I was fifteen.”
“My brother was twelve.”
“You have a brother?”
“Had.”
Nora went still.
“One night, my father was drunk.”
“He accused my mother of planning to leave again.”
“She denied it.”
“He hit her.”
Lorenzo stared at nothing.
“My brother tried to intervene.”
Nora already knew she did not want the next sentence.
“My father threw him down a staircase.”
She closed her eyes.
“He died?”
“Not immediately.”
The words were worse.
“Three days later.”
Nora could not speak.
“My mother stopped trying to leave after that.”
Lorenzo’s mouth hardened.
“She stopped doing almost everything.”
“What happened to your father?”
“Four years later, someone shot him twice in his office.”
Nora watched him.
“Who?”
Lorenzo met her eyes.
“Me.”
Silence.
Nora’s heartbeat became loud.
He did not look ashamed.
He did not look proud.
Only tired.
“Why are you telling me?”
“Because you keep looking for the line between Greg and me.”
Lorenzo leaned back.
“There it is.”
He pointed toward himself.
“I am not a good man.”
“I have killed people.”
“I run businesses that would put me in prison for the rest of my life.”
“I use fear.”
“I use violence.”
His eyes held hers.
“But I watched a man turn my mother into a shadow and call it love.”
His voice lowered.
“I will never confuse ownership with love.”
Nora forgot the food.
“So what do you confuse love with?”
Something flashed across Lorenzo’s expression.
“Nothing.”
“You’ve never loved anyone?”
“I loved my mother.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“I know.”
He stood.
The conversation was over.
Nora watched him walk toward the doorway.
“Lorenzo.”
He stopped.
She did not know what she wanted to say.
Sorry sounded insulting.
Thank you sounded wrong.
Finally:
“I don’t think killing your father made you like him.”
Lorenzo remained still.
Nora continued.
“I think spending your whole life afraid that it did probably hurt you more than the bullet hurt him.”
His back tightened.
Then he left without answering.
At 6:40 that evening, Vincent found Patrick Nevin.
Dead.
He had been shot once behind the ear inside a rental car near the airport.
In his pocket they found a boarding pass to Miami.
In his phone they found fourteen calls to Dante Bertinelli.
And in his hotel room they found financial records.
Not nineteen thousand dollars.
Three point four million.
Money moved over eighteen months.
Money stolen from Costa companies.
Money routed through Bertinelli fronts.
Money paid to guards, drivers, contractors, and one city official.
Nora spent six hours following the numbers.
At midnight, she found the most important transaction.
She printed it.
Walked upstairs.
Found Lorenzo alone in his office.
He looked up.
“You should be asleep.”
“You should stop saying that.”
Nora placed the paper in front of him.
“What is it?”
“Patrick wasn’t the top of the chain.”
Lorenzo read.
His face changed.
Nora pointed toward a recurring payment.
“Every month, Patrick moved money from Bellweather.”
“Then divided it between four companies.”
“Three lead to the Bertinellis.”
Lorenzo looked at the fourth.
Nora swallowed.
“The fourth company owns a private security firm.”
Lorenzo already recognized the name.
His chair moved backward.
Nora continued.
“They provide guards to your restaurants.”
“To your warehouses.”
“And this house.”
His eyes became lethal.
“Who owns it?”
Nora turned the page.
The name was there.
Vincent Moretti.
Nora looked toward the closed office door.
Lorenzo’s underboss.
His closest man.
May you like
The person who had stood two steps behind him every night.
“I think Vincent has been stealing from you.”
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