Chapter 21
21
Nero
I n Luca’s office, I sit down in his chair and survey the artfully decorated room. The expensive wooden desk. I only knew Luca for a short time, but he always wanted the best of everything. Money. Cars. My name.
My life.
My wife.
From what Rieta has said, he didn’t even appreciate what he had. In fact, he seemed to go out of his way to be cruel to her, forcing her to submit to him every month, despite his vasectomy, as a sick and evil punishment. He took revenge on her for something I did. Now she flinches when I move too quickly around her. Her beautiful eyes are filled with fear as she looks at me. She’s afraid to touch me.
I left behind a smiling, blissfully happy woman clutching a bouquet of daisies, and in the months Luca had her, he broke her.
While I was gone, I fantasized about everything I was going to do to my brother. I imagined returning and saving Rieta from him, but she didn’t need saving. I watched Rieta from a distance, expecting to see her and Luca playing happy newlyweds, but there was no sign of Luca. Disappearing without a trace was suspicious. Rieta was suspicious. I found the bloody shovel. I heard from Mrs. White about the dirty house the morning after “my” disappearance.
I was looking for every way possible to hurt her. I terrorized her and stalked her. I saw that her believing that I’d had a vasectomy was agony, so I let her believe it. I let my jealousy and pain torment her. I needed Rieta to tell me what she’d done with my brother’s body so I’d have irrefutable proof she killed him, and she led me straight to the scene of the crime.
I craved to take revenge on my brother for everything that he’d done to me, but Rieta stole that chance.
For that, Rieta was going to pay.
But I’m beginning to wonder if Rieta had more reason to kill Luca than I did.
I type the password into Luca’s computer and start trawling back through Luca’s emails and bank account records. I write down names that appear over and over and search for their phone numbers. I’ve bought a burner phone, and I start making calls.
When Luca’s former business associates answer, all I say is, “It’s Nero Lombardi. I’m back.”
I let them exclaim and ask where I’ve been. I say firmly that I can’t tell them anything right now, followed by, “I want to get back to business.”
And then I let them talk, trying to figure out from context what they and my brother were up to. I make notes about each person. I skim email chains for keywords and other names while they speak, hunting clues about the illegal activities they’re involved in. A few of the contacts are cagey, which makes me suspicious, but I discover nothing promising.
What was the name that Rieta mentioned? Costa. I can’t find any emails or bank account transactions with that name. Costa met Harriet, so I’m not giving up so easily.
I start calling everyone back. “I need to talk to Costa. Do you have his number?”
No one knows who I’m talking about. I call every number with increasing frustration until finally someone replies, “Do you mean Andrew Costa?”
“Obviously,” I snap, channeling my brother’s impatience, which is coming easily to me right now. “Give me his number.”
I write the number onto my notepad, and hang up without saying goodbye. It must be the same Costa. For a moment, I just stare at the number. The other calls were just a warm-up. This one feels like the real thing.
I take a deep breath and make the call. When a man answers, I say, “It’s Nero Lombardi. I’m back.”
Instantly, Andrew Costa is suspicious. “Why are you calling me from a different number?”
“I lost my phone.”
“How did you get this number?”
“It doesn’t matter. Listen. I want to get back to business.”
There’s a beat of silence, and I realize I’m sweating. I think I’ve found the person who can unlock my brother’s secrets, but maybe he’s going to hang up the call and hold on to what he knows.
When Costa speaks again, there’s a smile in his voice. “I was hoping you’d say that. Can we meet?”
“Will this do?”
I’ve been waiting at the bottom of the stairs for twenty minutes for Rieta to appear. I haven’t felt so tense since I watched my wife from the shadows as she dug up my brother’s body.
Rieta is descending the stairs toward me, and I’m transported back to our wedding day. The world faded away and breath was stolen from my lungs as I saw my bride walking down the aisle toward me. All I wanted was for Rieta to give herself to me and then guard her jealously.
Tonight she’s wearing a tight-fitting black lace dress that ends just above her knees. On her legs are sheer black stockings, and she wears stiletto heels. Clutched in one hand is a small bag. She stops on the bottom step, and we’re nearly at eye level. Her lashes are luxuriously thick and dark as she flicks an uncertain glance at me. “You looked at me this way on our wedding day as I walked down the aisle toward you.”
Stunned speechless with adoration? I can believe it. “You no longer doubt that it was me?”
She shakes her head. “Luca could never manage an expression like the one you’re wearing. I keep marveling that there were two of you, and I didn’t realize. I should have guessed because of how different you were.”
“Sometimes I tried to be cold like Luca, but it never stuck for very long.” I caress her cheek with my knuckles.
Rieta’s eyes flutter closed, and she angles her head toward my hand. “If Luca had ever pretended to be you, I would have known right away. Nothing feels like the way you touch me.”
Then she really did know the difference between me and Luca. I’m the man who wants her. I’m the man who fell for her. I’m the man who would do anything for her.
Rieta opens her eyes and gazes up at me. A small, confused line appears between her brows, and she steps back. “I mean, um—anyway, are you going to tell me why I have to be dressed this way?”
“You’ll find out. If what you see tonight upsets you, don’t worry about trying to hide it. Just keep quiet and stay close to me.”
“Why even bring me along if I can’t do anything or say anything?”
“I didn’t say you have to keep your mouth shut the whole night. Are you coming?”
Curiosity getting the better of her, she follows me out to my car. “What does that mean?”
I open the passenger door for her. “You’ll see.”
Thirty minutes later, we pull up at a nondescript building with dozens of expensive cars in the lot. There are five bouncers in suits with earpieces, which seems excessive for a nightclub without a line at the door, but this is no ordinary club.
I lead Rieta inside and down a corridor. We can hear music and voices up ahead, and I reach for my wife’s hand and hold it firmly.
She falters and stares down at our joined hands. “Are you sure you should do that here? Luca never held my hand.”
People might think that Nero is acting strangely if he holds his wife’s hand, but I don’t care. “I’m not risking anyone taking you away from me.”
With a nervous glance toward the room up ahead, Rieta asks, “Is it safe in there?”
“No.” I start forward again, gently tugging my wife so she follows me. “That’s why you must stay close.”
The room we enter looks like an ordinary bar, filled with a few dozen people drinking cocktails and sipping champagne. Mostly men whose expensive suits can’t hide the brutality in their faces, but also a few hard-eyed women.
A man approaches us through the crowd, tall and lean with reddish-blond hair and a thin nose with prominent nostrils.
I hear Rieta’s sharp intake of breath as she recognizes him. “That’s Costa,” she whispers under her breath.
I affix Luca’s cold, businesslike expression on my face and give Andrew Costa a terse nod.
“Nero, good to see you after so long.” Costa smiles at me but frowns when he realizes who I’m with. “Why is she here?”
I wrap my arm possessively around Rieta’s waist. “To show my wife what happens to unprotected women. Sometimes I don’t think she appreciates how good she has it with me.”
Rieta lowers her head and fiddles with her bracelet, the picture of an unhappy, submissive wife.
“Do you think that’s wise?” Costa asks.
“Do you think that’s any of your business?”
Costa laughs nervously and holds up his hands in mock surrender. “Just so long as she doesn’t go running her mouth off to her friends about what she’s seen here.”
“Don’t worry, I have her well trained, and she’s not very bright.” I stroke her arm with my thumb, apologizing silently for my cruel words.
Costa has already lost interest in Rieta and beckons for me to follow him. “Buying tonight, or just looking?”
“Buying, but only if I find exactly what I’m looking for.”
“Let’s hope they can satisfy you. Come on, they’re starting now.”
As we move through the crowd, I notice several of the men openly staring at my woman, and I pull her closer against me.
We enter a different, larger room just as a bell rings. It seems to be a sign that things are getting started, and the room fills up around us. It’s a dim space, lit at one end where there’s a raised platform.
A door opens, and four women wearing very little are led in by four security guards and pushed to the front of the platform. A disembodied voice comes through the speakers, announcing the women like lots with numbers instead of names. There’s no fanfare or preamble. What’s unfolding before us has the air of routine. Business that needs to be gotten on with.
The women’s eyes are hollow and scared, darting around the room as though hunting for a way to escape, or dilated and unfocused. Drugged, presumably.
“Are those women sex slaves?” Rieta seems to ask the question without meaning to.
Costa gives her a patronizing smile. “Of course not. They’re all here willingly for a chance at a new life.”
Does anyone believe that? More importantly, does anyone care? The people around me continue to sip their champagne and study the “merchandise” without a trace of doubt or discomfort in their faces.
We watch several rounds of bidding. Women are dragged onto the stage and off again. I keep my expression neutral, but inside I’m fuming, picturing my brother coming here and bidding on women. We agreed that we would trade in illegal goods, not human suffering. As children, he and I had no say in being separated and moved from one place to another. Treated like objects to be split in a divorce, not people. This display should have turned his stomach as it’s turning mine. Yet what I’m looking for is worse than this.
“This is a waste of time,” I mutter.
Costa eyes me curiously. “What is it you were hoping for? Nero Lombardi can have anything he wants, for the right price.”
Should I just come out with it, or should I spend more time gaining Costa’s trust? The thought of standing here one minute longer makes my skin crawl. My palm feels sweaty in Rieta’s, but I say with as much cold indifference that I can manage, “I want something younger. Like the one I found you.”
Costa’s face slackens in shock, and he glances around quickly. In a whisper, he replies, “Keep your voice down, even here. We agreed that I should have listened to you. I made a mistake choosing a girl who’d be so obviously missed.”
He has to be talking about Harriet. Her face still appears in the news, and the police investigation is ongoing.
“I thought I could have anything I want,” I challenge him.
Costa hesitates, and I sense he’s suspicious of me. That I’m too different than the man he knew. “You never used to partake in those kinds of luxuries. Have your appetites changed?”
I wonder what the right answer is. If I had to guess, Luca got off on controlling people, like emotionally torturing Rieta. Costa probably knows that. “I’m here on behalf of a special friend of mine. He can’t show his face in a place like this, but his funds are almost limitless.”
That seems to satisfy Costa, and the mention of limitless money has piqued his interest. “Then you should have said. We can talk at my place.”
Rieta looks sickened, but seeing as it was my stated intention to upset my wife, Costa takes no notice of her.
He walks on ahead of us, and Rieta whispers to me, “You’re so good at pretending to be Luca it’s frightening. I keep thinking he’s risen from the grave.”
While Costa’s back is turned, I press a kiss to her forehead. “Not much longer, I promise, cara mia .”
Rieta’s lips part as she gazes up at me, a pink blush spreading through her cheeks.
“What is it?”
“I…I missed you. Promise me that I won’t wake up and find myself alone again, and this is all a dream?”
I open my mouth to promise, but Costa is waiting by the front entrance. In Luca’s cold voice, I tell Rieta, “Shut up. We’ll go home when I say so.”
She flinches and looks away, and my heart shrivels at speaking so cruelly to her.
As we follow Costa’s car to his home, I tell Rieta, “If something happens to me, there’s a gun holstered under my arm.”
Rieta chafes her bare upper arms. “Nero, I don’t like this.”
“Neither do I. But it’s our best chance to get answers.” It’s only a matter of time, and probably a very short time, before Luca’s associates realize that there’s something very strange about the Nero Lombardi who returned after vanishing for so long. I doubt anyone will suspect that we’re twins both calling themselves Nero Lombardi, but every criminal worries, sometimes with good reason, that one of their associates has turned police informant. If I don’t find out what happened to Harriet tonight, it’s likely that every man I called is going to pretend not to know me.
Costa lives in a luxury apartment overlooking the river. He ushers us inside with the air of a man anticipating a wonderful evening.
“Does she have to be here?” he asks, exasperated as he sees Rieta.
“I’m not interested in answering that question a second time. Are we going to talk business, or am I going home?”
Costa waves my question away. “Yes, all right. Sit down and tell me what you’re looking for. I’m sure we can find just the right thing for your friend.”
I walk over to the sofas with Rieta, but before we can sit down, she seems to reach her limit. Her body stiffens and she says in disgust, “Thing. The right thing .” Lifting her eyes to Costa, who is seated comfortably on the sofa, she says, “I remember you. You were there that day in the restaurant. You told Harriet that she was a good artist.”
Annoyance crosses Costa’s expression, but he ignores Rieta and gestures for me to sit.
Rieta’s ankle is trembling, and her fists are clenched. “Did you tell my husband that you wanted to steal her while we were right there across the room? Did you ask him to kidnap her for you, and you collected her from his office like she was a parcel?”
Still not looking at her, he says, “Stupid women who see too much and say too much get a bullet in the head. Don’t you agree, Nero?”
Rieta lunges for the gun hidden under my jacket and aims it at Costa. It shakes in her grip as she points it at his chest, but her finger is steady on the trigger. “She fought you in Nero’s office, didn’t she? Young and small as she was, she wasn’t going to let a monster like you get your hands on her without a fight.” Rieta’s voice trembles with tears. “What have you done with Harriet?”
“Nero, get a hold of your wife.”
My wife. I love the way that sounds. I’ll get a hold of my wife. I wrap my arm around Rieta’s waist and plant a kiss on her throat.
Costa looks back and forth between us, clearly confused. “Is this a game? What the hell is going on?”
I shrug casually. “Torture. Revenge. We haven’t decided.”
“You’re not going to kill me.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure,” Rieta seethes. “I’m already a killer. I killed my own husband, so how hard do you suppose it would be for me to put down a sick and twisted person like you?”
Costa is even more confused. “Your husband is standing right there. Nero, what the hell is she going on about?”
I tuck a strand of Rieta’s hair lovingly behind her ear and drop the Luca act entirely. When I look at Rieta, it’s with my eyes, not my brother’s. “You can shoot him if you want, cara mia , but don’t hit anything vital. I want to question him.”
“You’re not Nero,” Costa accuses. “Who are you? Who is she? What the fuck is going on?”
“I’m Nero. The real Nero. And this woman is mine. She’s always been mine.”
“Where’s Harriet?” Rieta demands.
Staring down the barrel of the gun, Costa replies flatly, “She’s dead. She died months ago. I wanted to keep her, but you heard what I said before. There was too much public interest in her disappearance.”
“No,” Rieta cries, but it’s a wail of despair, not of disbelief.
I tighten my grip on her waist, comforting her as much as I can. I expected as much, but it’s still devastating for Rieta to hear it.
Through her tears, she says, “Then tell me where her body is. Her mother should at least get to bury her.”
“I don’t know. Now get out.”
The gun trembles in Rieta’s grip. Costa is relatively relaxed for a man being held at gunpoint, like he doesn’t believe she’s really going to shoot.
Rieta aims the gun lower and fires. A bullet hits Costa’s thigh, and he screams in pain.
Over his gasps of pain, Rieta says, “I followed my husband, and I found out what he was up to, and do you know what the most disgusting part was? He wanted me to be silent about what I knew. Complicit. I’ve shut my mouth and put up with horrible people my whole life, but not anymore. You make me sick.” She lowers the gun and steps back. “He’s all yours, Nero.”
“You’re not Nero,” Costa says through gritted teeth. He has both hands pressed over the bullet wound, and blood seeps from between his fingers. Getting to his feet, he orders, “Get out of my house, both of you.”
“Make me,” I reply.
The man actually swings a punch at me. I evade his fist easily, and while he’s off-balance, I shove him to the floor.
“Where’s Harriet?”
Costa’s hair is falling into his eyes. “I told you, I don’t know.”
I grind my foot against his bullet wound, and Costa screams again. “Try again.”
“I let some men take her away. I don’t need that kind of trouble in my—”
“What men? What are their names? How do you know them?”
“I didn’t know them,” Costa pants. “Nero found them for me. The other Nero, or whoever the fuck he was.”
Costa was probably in a panic over Harriet and trusted my cold and collected brother to make his problems disappear. That sounds about right, but it means we’ve reached a dead end.
I turn away from Costa, and he sighs in relief. I don’t know what makes him think he’s getting out of this alive. I reach for the gun that Rieta’s holding, but she won’t let it go.
She’s staring at Costa with a bleak expression. “I should be the one to do it.”
“You have me.” Gently tugging the gun from her grip, I turn back to Costa. “Look away, cara mia .”
Costa puts up both his hands as a shield, as if that’s going to save him from a bullet. “No, don’t—”
I don’t want to hear another word. I fire two shots into his head, and then holster the gun under my arm.
Rieta didn’t look away. She’s staring at Costa’s dead and bloodied body with a shaking hand over her mouth and tears streaming down her face.
“So this has all been for nothing? Harriet’s dead, and we won’t ever find out who killed her and what they did with her body because of me?”
I take her face between my hands. “That’s not true. Look at me, Rieta.”
“Yes, it is. I killed Luca, and all his secrets died with him.”
“He was going to kill you. You had no choice but to defend yourself. If anyone’s to blame, it’s me. If I’d seen who my brother was a long time ago and done everything I could to get both of us far, far away from him, none of this would have happened.” I stroke my thumbs over her cheeks as I gaze into her eyes, the full weight of regret crashing over me. “I wish I never had to leave you.”
“Why did you leave? I still don’t understand. Please, just tell me where you were.”
There can be no forgiveness for what I’ve done. Rieta’s life has been destroyed, and so has Harriet’s.
“All right. I’ll tell you.” I fold Rieta in my arms one last time, holding her tight against my chest, where I should have kept her always.