Chapter Thirty
LUCIA
The DNA results arrive eight days after my birthday.
I’m in the kitchen with Angela when Evelyn calls. Angela is cutting basil into thin green ribbons, and the room smells like tomatoes warming on the stove.
Matteo Moretti is my father.
I sit at the table with the telephone pressed to my ear, staring at the small glass horse in the center of Angela’s windowsill. Sunlight passes through its body and leaves a distorted patch of light across the wood.
“Lucia?” Evelyn says.
“I’m here.”
“Would you like me to send the results?”
“Yes.”
“To your email?”
“And a printed copy.”
“Of course.”
“Did Matteo receive them?”
“The laboratory released both copies simultaneously.”
As if summoned by the question, another call comes through.
Matteo.
“I have to go.”
“Call me if you need anything,” Evelyn says.
I switch calls.
Neither of us speaks at first.
Then Matteo exhales.
It sounds like a man who has been holding his breath for twenty-four years.
“Lucia.”
“Hi.”
“It’s confirmed.”
“Yes.”
“You’re my daughter.”
My throat tightens.
There’s wonder in his voice.
Grief too.
“I suppose I am.”
“I never doubted it.”
“You knew me for one day.”
“I knew your mother for years.”
I look at the horse.
“She should have told you.”
“Yes.”
The word is harder than I expect.
Then his voice softens.
“But you’re here now.”
Here.
Not with him.
Alive in the same world.
“Yes.”
“I’d like to see you.”
“When?”
“Today.”
I glance toward the clock.
“I have a meeting at the Rossi building.”
“Cancel it.”
The answer comes too quickly.
“I can’t.”
“Why?”
“I’m meeting with contractors.”
“They’ll reschedule.”
“I don’t want them to.”
A brief silence follows.
“Tomorrow, then.”
“I could have dinner.”
“Here?”
“At Belmont.”
His hesitation is slight.
I hear it anyway.
“I thought we could dine privately.”
“We can go to a restaurant.”
“Your security will follow.”
“So will yours.”
Another pause.
“Seven,” he says. “I’ll send a car.”
“I have a car.”
“Then my driver can collect you.”
“I’ll meet you there.”
“Lucia—”
“Send me the address.”
I end the call before the conversation becomes an argument.
Angela sets a cup of coffee in front of me. The saucer makes a quiet sound against the table.
“Good news?”
“He’s my father.”
She sits beside me.
“You’re certain?”
“Ninety-nine point nine nine nine eight percent.”
“That seems certain enough.”
I laugh weakly.
Angela takes my hand.
“How do you feel?”
“I don’t know.”
“Fair.”
“I have a father.”
“Yes.”
“Another one.”
She squeezes my fingers.
“Blood only answers one question.”
“What question?”
“Who helped make you.”
She releases my hand.
“The rest takes time.”
I look around the kitchen.
Marco and Gio left while I was speaking with Matteo. The letter from the laboratory remains open on the table beside the envelope he sent four days after learning about me.
I knew your mother.
I did not know about you.
Now I know both statements were true.
It should make everything easier.
It doesn’t.
“I’m having dinner with him tomorrow.”
“Here?”
“He didn’t like that idea.”
“Why?”
“I think he wanted me alone.”
“And do you want to be alone with him?”
I consider the question.
Matteo gave me photographs of my mother no one else had seen. He returned her necklace. He told me about the glass horse on her desk.
He also looked at my wedding ring as though it offended him.
He asked about Gio with a tone that made the question feel like an accusation.
“No,” I say.
Angela nods.
“Then don’t be.”
I find Marco and Gio in the study.
They stand on opposite sides of the desk, examining the restoration estimates for Prince Street. Plans, photographs, and cost projections cover most of the polished surface.
Gio has turned one page upside down.
Marco notices.
“You aren’t reading that.”
“I’m considering it from another perspective.”
“The electrical work doesn’t improve upside down.”
“You lack imagination.”
They look up when I enter.
Marco’s attention moves immediately to the phone in my hand.
“The results?”
“Matteo is my father.”
Neither appears surprised.
Gio reaches me first.
“How are you?”
“I don’t know.”
He puts his arms around me.
The embrace is warm and familiar. I let myself rest against him for a moment, breathing in the clean scent of his shirt.
When he releases me, Marco remains behind the desk.
He doesn’t offer comfort I haven’t requested.
Somehow, that feels like comfort too.
“I’m having dinner with Matteo tomorrow,” I say.
“Where?” Marco asks.
“He’s sending the address.”
“Do you want security?”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
“Dario and Bruno.”
Marco nods.
“I’ll arrange it.”
“No.”
His expression changes.
“No security?”
“No arranging it. I’ll ask them.”
He inclines his head.
“Of course.”
Gio sets down the estimate he wasn’t reading.
“What time?”
“Seven.”
“I assume I’m not invited.”
“You are.”
He blinks.
“I am?”
“So is Marco.”
Silence follows.
Marco studies me.
“Did Moretti invite us?”
“No.”
“Does he know we’re coming?”
“Not yet.”
A smile begins at one corner of Gio’s mouth.
“Should I wear the navy suit?”
“This isn’t entertainment.”
“The charcoal one, then.”
“Gio.”
His smile disappears.
“You want us there.”
“Yes.”
“Then we’ll be there.”
Marco closes the file.
“Why?”
The question isn’t a refusal.
He wants to understand.
“Matteo said he wanted to know me.”
“He does,” Gio says.
“Then he needs to know my life. Both of you are part of it.”
A glance passes between the brothers. Gio shifts his weight. Marco’s hand stills on the closed file.
They don’t finish each other’s sentences this time.
They don’t need to.
“Where do you want us seated?” Marco asks.
The question is so practical that I almost laugh.
“At the table.”
“I meant beside you or across from you.”
“I know what you meant.”
Gio folds his arms.
“I’d like to vote for beside.”
“You don’t get a vote.”
“Then why did I come to the meeting?”
“You were already here.”
Marco ignores him.
“Moretti may interpret our presence as a challenge.”
“That sounds like his problem.”
“Yes,” Marco says.
It also sounds like approval.
“I don’t want either of you provoking him.”
Gio presses one hand to his chest.
“I’m deeply offended.”
“You should be.”
“I can behave.”
Marco and I look at him.
“For an entire dinner,” Gio adds.
“Can you?” Marco asks.
“I’m beginning to reconsider supporting your marriage.”
My husband.
His brother.
There are no words for what we are to one another yet.
Perhaps there don’t need to be.
But Matteo doesn’t get to erase either of them because their place in my life makes him uncomfortable.
I take out my phone.
Matteo has sent the name of a restaurant in Back Bay and the address beneath it.
I type my response.
I’ll be there at seven. Marco and Gio will be joining me.
The reply doesn’t come immediately.
Three minutes pass.
Then five.
Gio pretends to read the restoration estimates.
Marco doesn’t bother pretending not to watch me.
At last, my phone vibrates.
I had hoped we could speak privately.
I type back.
They’re coming.
This time, Matteo’s answer arrives within seconds.
If that’s what you want.
I look at the words.
Not an agreement.
A concession.
For now.
“It is,” I say aloud.
Marco’s gaze remains on me.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
I close the message.
“He understands.”
Gio glances at Marco.
“I doubt that.”
So do I.
Matteo reserves a private dining room.
#
I asked for a restaurant because I didn't want to be alone with him. He chose a place filled with people, then put a closed door between us and all of them.
The room is elegant.
Dark wood.
White linen.
A fireplace no one needs in July.
A single round table waits beneath a chandelier. Four place settings are arranged at exact intervals, each surrounded by more silverware than any meal should require.
Matteo stands near the windows when we enter.
He wears a dark suit and an expression that changes the moment he sees me.
“Lucia.”
He crosses the room and kisses my cheek.
His hand remains on my shoulder as he looks at me.
Not threatening.
Not quite possessive.
Something close enough that I notice.
Then he looks at Marco.
“Catenzio.”
“Moretti.”
His attention moves to Gio.
“And the brother.”
“Gio,” I say.
Matteo’s eyes remain on him.
“I know who he is.”
I take the chair facing the windows.
Marco waits until I choose before sitting on my right.
Gio takes the chair on my left.
Matteo watches the arrangement.
He doesn’t like it.
A server enters with wine.
“I ordered the Barolo,” Matteo tells me. “Your mother preferred it.”
“I’ll try it.”
The server fills my glass.
He reaches for Gio’s.
“No, thank you,” Gio says.
Matteo raises an eyebrow.
“You don’t drink wine?”
“I do.”
“Not tonight?”
“I thought one of us should remain charming.”
Marco opens his menu.
“That eliminates you.”
I look down before either of them sees me smile.
Matteo doesn’t appear amused.
The server gives us menus, though Matteo apparently considers them unnecessary.
“I ordered several of the restaurant’s specialties,” he tells me. “The osso buco was Maria’s favorite.”
“I don’t eat veal.”
His expression shifts.
“Your mother did.”
“I’m not my mother.”
The words come out more sharply than I intend.
Matteo looks at the server.
“Give her whatever she wants.”
The server turns to me.
I order the gnocchi.
Marco orders fish.
Gio chooses the osso buco, probably because he believes wasted food is a crime.
Once the server leaves, silence settles over the table. Music from the main dining room reaches us only as a faint vibration through the wall.
I lift my wine.
Matteo watches the movement.
“You wear the pendant.”
“Yes.”
“I wondered whether you would.”
“It belonged to my mother.”
“She wore it almost every day during the summer in Rhode Island.”
I touch the crescent moon at my throat.
“Why did she leave it?”
“I don’t know. She was gone before I realized it was there.”
Pain moves across his face.
Brief.
Real.
Whatever else Matteo is, he loved my mother.
That makes him harder to dismiss.
It does not make him right.
“She left other things,” he says. “Books. Clothing. A pair of shoes she hated but refused to throw away because they had cost too much.”
I smile faintly.
“She did that with a coat.”
“Brown wool?”
“Yes.”
“It scratched her neck.”