Chapter Twenty-Eight Guinevere #2
I chafed my hands together, breath white in the frigid air as we entered the office, and I hustled over to my workstation. The neat pile of papers I’d had at my desk was strewn across the tabletop and floor, probably because of a breeze from the opened window.
But when I went to type in my password, I realized the computer was already unlocked.
I frowned at the documents open on the screen, layer upon layer of open tabs. The financial documents, notes I’d taken, and even the websites I had searched to delve deeper into each business the Romano Group and Lupo Nero owned and operated.
“I didn’t leave this like this,” I whispered to Martina, though we were the only ones in the office.
“What do you mean?” she asked, leaning over my shoulder.
It was then I noticed the little flash drive stuck into the side of my laptop.
“What is this?”
Martina froze behind me, then cursed softly. “It’s a spyware flash drive. Ludo programs them and gives them to us when we need to break into someone’s hard drive or spy on their online activities.”
“Someone wanted to see what I was working on.”
Which meant someone knew I was combing through the Romano Group’s financials.
“This is why he set the fire,” I realized. “He looked into what I was doing for Carmine and discovered I was onto him.”
“Merda,” she spat. “I cannot believe that piece of shit.”
Guilt sucker punched me. If I had been more discreet, none of the family would have been at risk. Everyone was going to be fine, but the kids, Zacheo especially, were probably going to be traumatized for life.
“Don’t blame yourself,” Martina said. “It’s that figlio di puttana who deserves all the guilt for this and everything else he has done.”
“True.” I straightened my shoulders and chafed my cold hands together again. “Okay, well as a royal fuck-you to Leo, I am going to spend the next few hours discovering exactly how deep his conspiracy goes. Pull up a chair and make some coffee, would you? We’ll be here awhile.”
Martina snorted but drifted away, hopefully to the kitchen to make coffee while I got to work.
It only took me twenty minutes to realize I didn’t have the full picture from the Romano Group.
Whatever had been sent to Carmine had been doctored, because there were huge gaps in their financial statements.
I studied the little flash drive beside my computer and sucked on my teeth before pocketing it and creeping down the hallway to Leo’s office.
The early-morning light warmed my sore feet as I crossed the study to the desk and sat at the multimonitor computer. It took me a moment to find the USB port and then another to figure out how to use it to crack Leo’s password protection.
I gained access to the computer, but his files were encrypted with a password too.
My dad and I used to play encryption games and solve riddles, so I figured I had just as good a shot as anyone at guessing what Leo’s password could be.
I tried a variation of his birthday and the first nine numerical digits because I knew those were the most common password choices, but I was still locked out, with a warning that I only had three attempts left.
So I tried to think about Leo as a man instead of a stranger. The conversations he had been a part of at the dinner table, the jokes he had shared with Raffa and the crew, the proclivities he’d shown without meaning to.
But nothing particularly stood out except for his betrayal and the surreal fact that he had been dating my sister.
My sister.
I loved a foreigner once . . .
I chewed on my lower lip as I considered the possibility that Leo, despite having betrayed his best friend and pseudo family, might have enough of a heart to give it over to another person.
Gemma.
My fingers trembled lightly as I used one finger to type the letters and numbers into the keyboard.
G-E-M-M-A-1-9-9-7.
Files exploded open on my screen: building plans, construction codes, green tech development specs, and financial projections for countless agricultural businesses. I recognized many of the names from the shipping manifests and many more from the files Carm had given me from the Romano Group.
But there were even a few for holdings I knew Raffa owned under Lupo Nero, like Imelda’s Fattoria Casa Luna.
Obviously, Leo had stolen information about them to use for his own gain.
I pulled up Leo’s banking application, my heart knocking so hard against my chest it bruised my ribs. It was the way I always felt when I was onto something.
The application was blocked by another password protection, and this one would not respond to the same Gemma password.
I’d sighed, ready to find Martina to ask for her help, when a masculine noise came from the door, startling me so badly I shot out of my chair, banging it hard against the wall behind me.
“I’m sorry,” Dad said, hands open palms up as if in surrender.
“I didn’t mean to startle you, Jinx. I saw you walking over out the bedroom window and I just .
. . I wanted to make sure you were okay.
” He huffed out a bitter breath and scrubbed a hand over his face.
“Of course you aren’t okay. It’s been one thing after another since you got to this fucking hellhole. ”
“Dad.” I sank back into my chair, feeling suddenly so exhausted that each of my bones was too heavy to hold upright. “This place is not a hellhole. I hope you know that by saying that, you are insulting my love for it and the peace I’ve found here.”
“Peace?” he scoffed, eating up the space between us on long legs to reach over the desk for my hands. When I did not give them to him, his fingers curled into loose fists. “Guinevere, how can this violent series of unfortunate events have brought you anything close to peace?”
“I found love here, and community. A sense of belonging that I never had back in Michigan. For the first time in my life, I know who I am, and I like it. To me, that is the definition of peace,” I explained as I turned my attention back to the computer.
I could feel Dad’s gaze on me, heavy as a brand, as I entered Leo’s full legal name and sent a “forgot password” notification to his email, which I had access to through his main account.
“You almost died again yesterday,” Dad said softly.
“I’m fine.”
“You could have ended up not fine at all,” he pushed.
“I know this is the life you’ve chosen, and I wish you hadn’t—God, do I wish you hadn’t.
Believe it or not, though, I am trying to be understanding.
I just need you to understand that you are my baby, Jinx.
The moment I held you in my arms, I knew we would have a special bond, and that bond has been tested by terrifying trips to the emergency room and kidney transplants, by my secrets and lies, and by your choices here in Italy.
It’s been tested because I have never been more afraid to lose someone than I have been to lose you, especially after your sister’s death. ”
I looked up from the prompts for resetting Leo’s banking password to see Dad’s dark eyes limned with tears, almost silver in the heavy morning shadows.
It was hard to breathe through the emotion his speech evoked, through the tension that had been stretched between us for the last few months when all my life, he had been the person I’d felt most myself and safest with.
“I’m just asking for you to understand me as I try to understand you,” he finished with a limp shrug. “I want to support you—I will support you—but I just have to get out of the way of my own fears first.”
“Okay,” I said immediately, finally reaching across the desktop for his hand.
It was warm and thick with muscle in my grip.
“I can do that. If anyone can understand taking some time to digest all this, it’s me.
I didn’t exactly decide this was the life for me overnight, Dad.
I am not that impulsive. I’ve spent many, many sleepless nights weighing the pros and cons. ”
“And the pros outweigh the laundry list of cons?” he asked with a wry smirk.
“Raffa alone would tip the scales,” I admitted. “And that’s not factoring in his family and our friends.”
Dad rubbed his free hand over his mouth and nodded.
“Okay then. I know your mother told you we plan to stay for some time, and she meant it. I can do most of my work from here and schedule videoconferences according to the time difference. I won’t leave you until I’m sure you’re settled.
Until we feel good about our relationship again. ”
My heart tripped lightly, suddenly unburdened of the weight of my father’s disappointment.
“I love you,” I told him, squeezing his hand.
“I know you thought I would judge you for your past in the Mafia, but even if I hadn’t had my own experiences with it, I could never think you were anything less than the best dad in the world.
You taught me how to take the true measure of a man, and it has everything to do with his heart and mind and very little to do with his social conformity. ”
Dad laughed, and the exhaustion that had sandblasted his face broke open to reveal his handsomeness. “I tried to conform for almost thirty years, and look where it got me!”
I smiled at him. “Right back where you started. Which means maybe you want to help me with this?”
He got up from the chair and rounded the desk to peer over my shoulder as I finished resetting Leo’s password.
“How did you do that?” he asked.
“I had all his personal information right here,” I said, indicating the computer. “And the Romano Group’s information from Carmine. It was easy.”
Pride suffused Dad’s face as he smiled at me. “I never knew, all those hours we spent playing math and pattern-recognition games, that I was preparing you for a life of crime . . . but whatever you do in the future, I am very proud to be your father. You are quite the woman, Guinevere.”