Chapter 28
SOFIA
The attack doesn’t come that day, and it doesn’t come the next either. I’m going out of my mind with worry, however, the fact that I’m still alive doesn’t mean much. I wonder what kind of wheels have been set in motion that I don’t know about. Is there a price on my head?
I stay inside. I’m down to a few cans of tuna in the cabinet and half a bottle of nearly expired milk.
I don’t want to go grocery shopping, and I’m even afraid to order takeout.
I spend all my time walking from the living room to the kitchen, gazing out the windows and wondering when destiny will strike.
I keep my phone charged, although Frankie hasn’t texted. I know right away that Francisco has shared the story of our meeting in his study with his son. There’s no other reason Frankie wouldn’t have texted me by now.
I wonder if Frankie will kill me himself, or if he will send one of his father’s goons to do it for him.
Conversely, I wonder if my punishment will be something even worse, like my parents being killed or my bank account being targeted.
There is a whole spectrum of horrible things I can imagine, and the time they are giving me to wallow in my nightmares is almost worse than the real thing.
Monday comes, and I realize I can’t live this way. I’m becoming a hermit, and I’m endangering the lives of those I care about. I need to get out of the city fast. I decide that the best way to do that is to pay cash for a bus ticket, but I need to stop by the office first.
I can’t disappear without telling Mr. Harlan what’s happened.
I don’t trust my phone or the landline in the rental office.
I need to go in person. I take a shower because I don’t know when I’ll have the opportunity to do that again.
I open the tiny fireproof safe I have in my closet and withdraw all my cash.
I grab the ledger that I stole from Francisco’s office and stick it in my pocket. Glancing at my phone, I reluctantly leave it on the counter. It won’t help me where I’m going. I can spend a little bit of my nest egg on a burner phone at the bus station. At least I’ll be able to contact my parents.
It feels strange not to have my phone with me.
The whole time I’m driving, I worry about getting into an accident and not being able to call for help.
It also feels strange to be outside of my apartment.
Every person I see looks like a mafia hitman in disguise.
I’m not sure where the fatal blow will come from, so I’m hypervigilant the whole time.
I wonder if I will have to ditch my car.
How deep do Francisco Corello’s roots run?
Pretty deep as far as I can tell. There are no names attached to the numbers in the ledger, but that doesn’t stop me from speculating.
There are probably police officers or even city officials who are on Corello’s payroll.
“One thing at a time,” I remind myself out loud.
I pull into the parking lot across the street from the newspaper office.
I have a keycard that I swipe to get in and out of the lot, and that makes me nervous.
What if I trip a sensor somehow, and Corello knows it’s me?
I’m just going to have to put one foot in front of the other because this whole second-guessing thing is driving me crazy.
I straighten my shoulders, trying not to look like a person on the run.
Walking in the front door, I show my badge at the front desk.
No problems there; they just wave me through like normal.
I ride the elevator up to my floor, running through the game plan in my head.
I’m going to barge into Mr. Harlan’s office no matter who he’s with.
A few minutes later, I’ll stop by my desk, grab a few things, send a few final emails, and then I’ll be off.
All my plans go down the tube, however, when I step out of the elevator. There, leaning against my desk with a full view of the entire floor, is Frankie. Our eyes meet and lock. There’s no turning back.
My legs feel like cement blocks as I cross the room. It doesn’t look like he has a gun, and besides, there are at least a dozen other people in the office. He can’t be here to kill me.
I approach him cautiously, my reptilian brain ready to fight or flee at any moment. Frankie straightens up, meeting me halfway. His eyes are cold, and I know I’ve hurt him. Somewhere deep in my heart, I mourn the love he once felt for me. It’s clear, however, that he doesn’t love me anymore.
“Hello,” I say.
“Hello,” he responds.
He gives me a peck on the cheek and puts his hand on my elbow. It’s a gentle touch, but his objective is clear. I can’t run anymore. I glance over at the door to Harlan’s office. It’s closed; I have no allies in this fight.
“Can we go somewhere to talk?” Frankie asks, but it doesn’t sound like a question.
I glance around. Of course, he doesn’t want to talk here where other people can hear us, but I don’t want to leave. If he gets me alone, there’s no telling what he will do. I think about my car, safely parked across the street. There’s no way I can get back there without creating a scene.
I look over at one of the conference rooms that is available for anyone in our building to use. It features a glass window so that everyone can see inside.
“This way,” I say, leading him toward the conference room.
Frankie sees where I’m going and takes control. He almost forces me along with him, his grip on my elbow tightening to the point of discomfort. Once we’re inside, he releases me and shuts the door.
“Was any of it true?” he demands frostily.
“Of course,” I reply, looking down at my shoes.
“Which part?” he snaps.
“I really did like you,” I respond, feeling tears well up in my throat.
Frankie turns away, pacing the length of the conference table before coming back to face me. “Did you really just run into me in the library, or was that all part of your plan?”
“I was there to do research,” I begin.
“On my family?” he guesses.
“That’s right,” I confirm. “I didn’t know I would run into you.”
“But when you did, you seized the opportunity,” he accuses.
“That’s right,” I repeat.
“The whole time you were just using me,” he moans, running a hand through his hair.
“No,” I plead. “That time at the park, and when you spent the night at my house—”
“Stop!” he yells.
I glance over at the glass wall to see if anyone is paying attention.
The few people on this floor are hard at work on their computers.
They don’t even look up. I know that the conference room is soundproof because we aren’t the first people to want a private place to talk.
But Frankie’s actions are getting closer to what I might call threatening.
I hope that if he puts his hands on me, someone will intervene.
“What are you going to do to me?” I ask in a small voice.
“I don’t know,” he admits with a sigh. “I’ve spent the last few days thinking about it.”
I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. I realize that despite the month we spent together, there’s a lot I don’t know about Frankie Corello.
“Have you ever killed anyone?” I whisper.
He laughs, not giving me an answer. He looks away again, as if my words have hurt him. I don’t think he’s the kind of guy who would hurt me physically, but I can’t be sure. And does it really matter if he threatens me himself or has someone else do it?
“Your punishment for the moment will be not knowing when or where I’m going to take my revenge,” he says, stepping close so that I can feel the hatred in his words. “I loved you,” he says roughly. “I was honest about that.”
“I know,” I reply sadly.
He shakes his head, looking down at me from the moral high ground. “Give me back my father’s ledger.”
I open my mouth to deny the fact that I have it, but I can see there’s no point.
I pull it out of my pocket and hand it over.
“I haven’t managed to decode any of the entries,” I tell him.
I’m not sure why it’s important to me to let him know that I don’t have proof.
Maybe I’m suffering from some kind of Stockholm Syndrome, and I’ve fallen in love with the wrong person.
I tell myself that’s absurd. I’m not in love with Frankie. Yet, in that moment, I would do anything to erase the harm I’ve caused.
“I don’t know if that’s the truth or not,” he says, nailing one final insult into my self-made coffin.
He opens the door, putting his back to me for the last time. I watch him go to the elevator and push the button. There’s nothing I can do to stop him, and nothing I can say that will make a bit of difference.
Now, on top of the grief I experienced in losing my brother, I have another heavy burden to bear. I’ve hurt Frankie worse than I could have imagined. It might take him a long time to recover to the point where he can express love again, to trust again, and it’s all my fault.
I press my eyes shut, hoping to stop the tears from falling.
When I open them again, he’s gone. I try to pick up the pieces of my desperate plan, but find that I have no strength anymore.
I sit down on one of the chairs in the conference room and put my head in my hands.
I didn’t think there was anything worse than being murdered and dumped in a shallow grave, but this feeling might be in the running.
It seems like the whole world is shattering around me, and I have no one to blame for it but myself.