21. Chapter Twenty One
Chapter Twenty One
Lorenzo
The quarterly operations meeting has been underway for twenty-three minutes, and I have heard perhaps half of it.
This is unusual enough that I find it irritating.
I sit at the conference table with a financial report open in front of me while one of our division managers explains why renovation costs on a recently acquired property have exceeded projections.
There are twelve people in the room.
Mario sits to my right, listening with a stillness that often makes people nervous. Ricardo is across from him, one hand resting beside his untouched coffee. Diego is bored and wishing he were anywhere else.
I should be paying attention.
Instead, I am thinking about Donna standing in her kitchen, her fork moving through food she had lost all interest in eating.
There is always another house.
She said it with a small smile, as though we were having a light conversation. As though being sent from one relative to the next was merely an odd feature of a large family.
I recognized the deflection at once.
Donna uses humor the way other people use locked doors.
It does not keep anyone from seeing the house. It simply tells them they are not welcome inside.
“Lorenzo?”
The room has gone quiet.
I look toward the division manager. Jeremy.
He stands beside the screen with one hand resting on the back of a chair. The figures behind him show labor costs, revised projections, and a completion date that has slipped by three weeks.
“What caused the delay?” I ask.
No one reacts to the fact that the question was likely answered while my mind was elsewhere.
Jeremy does not embarrass me by pointing it out.
“The electrical work,” he says. “The original inspection missed damage behind the west wall. Once the contractor opened it, they found the wiring had to be replaced through most of the floor.”
“Was the inspection performed by our people?”
“No. It was completed before acquisition.”
“Have legal review the inspection agreement. If the damage should have been discovered, I want to know what remedies are available.”
He nods and makes a note.
The discussion resumes.
I lower my gaze to the report.
For nearly thirty years, I have been able to divide my attention without effort. Business remains business. Family remains family. The work requiring discretion is kept separate from both.
But Donna does not remain where I put her.
She enters every part of my thoughts without permission.
I see her in bed, leaning over me, hair covering us like a curtain while she rides me.
I see her on the porch in her robe, wine in hand, watching me throw a filthy ball across her yard for Mocha.
I see her at the kitchen table after breakfast, looking down because I had told her that leaving first had become a pattern.
She did not deny it.
That unsettles me more than an argument would have.
Donna argues when she feels secure in her position.
The knowledge gives me no satisfaction or triumph.
I am accustomed to finding weaknesses. I find them in negotiations, in security plans, in men who believe confidence can conceal fear. Once identified, a weakness becomes useful.
Donna’s are different.
I do not want to use them.
I want to understand them.
That distinction should concern me.
“Labor costs will increase another eight percent if we move to the accelerated schedule,” someone says.
I look up.
The division manager has advanced to the next page. His tie has shifted slightly off center, and there is moisture gathering at his temples.
He knows he has brought us a problem without a solution.
“What do you recommend?” I ask.
He hesitates. “We could maintain the current timeline and absorb the delay.”
“That is an option. I asked for your recommendation.”
His eyes flick briefly toward Mario, then return to me.
“Accelerate the schedule. The additional labor costs are lower than the penalties we risk if the opening moves into the next quarter.”
“Then why are we still discussing it?”
His mouth opens.
Mario turns one page of his report.
The sound is quiet, but the manager straightens.
“We’ll authorize the accelerated schedule,” he says.
“Send the revised numbers to my office before the end of the day.”
“Yes, sir.”
He sits.
Ricardo looks at me across the table.
His expression gives nothing away, but he has known me too long.
He noticed.
I turn my pen once between my fingers and focus on the next report.
Security staffing.
Two delayed shipments.
An unresolved permit issue.
These are ordinary complications. Each has a practical response. A person identifies the cause, applies pressure where required, and moves forward.
Donna cannot be handled that way.
She has spent years building a life around her ability to leave.
Her relatives sent her away enough times that she learned permanence was conditional. Then the Bureau placed her in the same position and confirmed everything she had already decided about people and institutions.
She survived by anticipating abandonment and acting first.
It is an effective strategy.
It is also the reason she expected me to leave her bed before morning.
She had not asked whether I was staying.
She had simply assumed I would go.
I remained because I wanted to.
That should have been the only reason necessary.
Now I understand that my presence meant more to her than she allowed herself to show.
When she came downstairs and found me making coffee, she watched me as though I had disrupted an established order.
Perhaps I had.
“Lorenzo.”
Mario’s voice cuts through my thoughts.
The room is quiet again.
This time, he does not pretend the interruption is ordinary.
I glance at the figures on the screen and find a projected staffing increase for one of the distribution operations.
“Why are we adding twelve positions?” I ask.
The director answers immediately. “The new contract increases volume by almost twenty percent. We can manage the first month with overtime, but after that, it becomes more expensive than adding staff.”
“What happens if the volume falls below projection?”
“We hire in phases. Six now. The rest after sixty days if the numbers hold.”
“Do that.”
The director nods.
Mario continues watching me.
I ignore him and move the meeting forward.
The remaining agenda takes another forty minutes. I force my attention onto each issue and make the decisions expected of me.
The meeting ends with the usual scrape of chairs and shuffle of papers.
Ricardo leaves with Diego, already discussing one of the revised projections. I remain seated long enough to finish the note I am making in the margin of the staffing report.
“Lorenzo,” Mario says. “Stay.”
I look up.
His tone is even, but there is nothing casual in it.
The door closes behind the last person, leaving Mario and me alone in the conference room.
I set down my pen.
“What is it?”
Mario does not answer immediately. He gathers the reports in front of him into a single stack, aligning the edges with deliberate care.
“You have been spending a great deal of time with Donna.”
I lean back in my chair. “She was investigating Alessio’s case.”
“I am aware.”
“Then what is the issue?”
“The amount of time you spent with her went beyond what the investigation required.”
I feel my patience shorten.
“According to whom?”
His eyes lift to mine.
“According to me.”
I give a quiet breath through my nose. “You were not there.”
“No. But I know you accompanied her to interview Elaine Monroe.”
“She was following a lead.”
“She is a private investigator. Following leads is her job.”
“And protecting this family is mine.”
Mario studies me across the table.
“She did not require your protection to interview an elderly woman.”
“That was fortunate, because the elderly woman was not the danger.”
His expression does not change.
“Rachel followed us from the motel,” I continue. “Because I was there, we recognized the tail, redirected her, searched her car, and found the evidence that cleared Alessio. So yes, I accompanied Donna. It was a good thing I did.”
“I am not denying that, but it doesn’t change my point.”
I hold his gaze.
Mario rarely circles a subject. He has already decided what he sees and is waiting to learn whether I will admit it.
I have no interest in making this easy for him.
“What exactly is your point?”
“That your involvement with Donna is more than professional.”
I make sure to keep my expression the same.
“You reached that conclusion because I accompanied her on an interview?”
“I reached it because I know you.”
I lean back in my chair.
“Is there an issue?” I ask, choosing not to confirm or deny.
“That depends on you.” Mario rests one hand on the closed report in front of him.
Defensiveness rises in me.
I suppress it.
“How, exactly?”
“We discussed Donna being hired to find who Rachel was working for.”
“Yes.”
“Have you spoken to her?”
The answer should be simple.
It is not.
“No.”
One of Mario’s brows rises.
I bite back the response that comes first.
I don't bother feeding him a lie. We both know the reason I haven't discussed it with her yet.
“Therein lies the issue, Lorenzo,” Mario says.
I hold his gaze. “I will ask her.”
“When?”
“Today.”
Mario studies me for another moment, then he nods once.
“Good.”
He rises and gathers the reports.
I remain seated.
At the door, he pauses.
“I am not objecting to whatever is happening between you and Donna.”
“Nothing is happening that concerns you.”
His mouth moves slightly, though it is not quite a smile.
“Of course.”
I narrow my eyes.
“But,” he continues, “whatever is happening cannot delay this investigation.”
“It will not.”
“See that it doesn’t.”
He opens the door and leaves.
The latch clicks behind him.
I stay where I am.
The conference room is quiet now, the long table scattered with abandoned water glasses and the impressions left behind by folders and notepads.
Mario is right.
I have had plenty of opportunities to ask Donna whether she will continue working for us.
I could have brought it up after we left the station. During dinner. While we stood in her backyard with Mocha. That morning over breakfast.
Instead, I spoke to her about Gemma, her mother, her relatives, the FBI.
Anything except the new job we have for her.
I told myself the timing was wrong.
That she needed space after the case.
That Alessio’s name had barely been cleared and she deserved one night without another Conti problem placed in her hands.
All of that is true.
None of it is the real reason.
The reason is that I do not know what happens when she works for us again.
Donna has rules.
She already used them once to retreat from what happened between us, insisting she did not sleep with clients. The fact that the investigation had ended removed that barrier.
Hiring her again puts it back.
She may decide the personal part ends the moment she accepts the job.
She may insist on distance.
Professional boundaries.
No more nights at her house. No more mornings in her kitchen. No more sitting across from her while she opens up and reveals pieces of herself she has kept buried for years.
The thought bothers me enough that I delayed a conversation we need to have for the sake of my family.
I lean back and look toward the darkened screen at the front of the room.
There is only one time in my life personal concerns have ever interfered with family business.
It was in the weeks leading up to Gemma’s death. Nothing before and after that. Ever.
Raising Edoardo and Alessio did not hinder my responsibilities. Grief, exhaustion, fear—none of it changed what the family required from me.
In fact, all the responsibility helped me. It gave me less time to sit and wallow.
But now, I've allowed Donna to interfere.
The realization does not sit well with me.
Worse, because this is not merely business.
This is about my son.
Someone studied his movements, used Rachel’s obsession with Genevieve, altered the hotel footage, and moved a dead woman’s body into a room where Alessio had been.
Rachel did not build that plan alone.
Whoever helped her is still free.
Still hidden.
Still has bad intentions toward us.
My hesitation has given them time.
I stand and collect my phone from the table.
Whatever Donna decides about us, the investigation cannot wait.
If she ends what has started between us, I will deal with it.
If she demands boundaries, I will respect them.
If she refuses the work… I cannot allow her to.
The family needs her.
And the people who targeted Alessio need to be found before they make another move.
I leave the conference room with my phone already in my hand.
I have to speak to Donna today.