Chapter Thirty-Five
GIO
Dario reaches the house shortly after seven.
There’s a bruise along his jaw and dried blood at the corner of his mouth. Bruno follows with one sleeve torn at the shoulder and his arm held close to his body.
Neither appears seriously injured.
That doesn’t stop me from wanting to hit someone.
“Where is she?”
Dario looks toward Marco’s office.
“I already told your brother.”
“I want to hear it.”
“Gio,” Marco calls.
I ignore him.
“How many men were inside?”
“Eleven that I saw.”
“That you saw?”
Dario’s expression hardens.
“Four outside. Three in the foyer. Two upstairs. Two with Moretti.”
“Where did they take her?”
“I don’t know.”
“You were inside the house for four hours.”
“I was watching Lucia, not mapping the exits.”
“You were supposed to protect her.”
“I know.”
“You left her there.”
His face changes.
Not anger.
Guilt.
I know I should stop.
I don’t.
“Lucy ordered me to stand down.”
“And you listened?”
“If I had drawn my weapon, Bruno and I would be dead. Lucia would still be inside, and no one would know what happened.”
I know that.
Somewhere beneath the panic, I know it.
But Lucy is gone again, and I need it to be someone’s fault.
“Enough,” Marco says.
He stands in the office doorway. His suit jacket is gone, and the sleeves of his white shirt have been rolled to his elbows.
“Dario followed Lucia’s order.”
“He shouldn’t have left her.”
“He didn’t have a choice.”
“There’s always a choice. Isn’t that what we keep telling her?”
The words strike harder than I intend.
Marco’s expression tightens.
Dario looks at me.
“I’m sorry.”
The apology takes the fight out of me.
I drag a hand over my face.
“No. I am.”
He doesn’t tell me it’s all right.
It isn’t.
We gather around the table in Marco’s office.
Armando has spread out property records, aerial photographs, and the few available plans for Moretti’s estate. The desk lamp casts a hard circle of light over the shoreline while the rest of the room darkens around us.
Dario takes us through the final minutes again.
Lucy asked to leave at four twenty.
Moretti’s men blocked the front door.
Moretti took her phone.
When Dario tried to move between her and the guards, one of them hit him.
Bruno resisted outside until Lucy ordered both men to stand down.
“What were her exact words?” I ask.
“Tell Marco what happened. You can’t help me if you’re dead.”
Nothing hidden there.
No clue.
Only Lucy trying to keep Dario alive.
“She knew we wouldn’t make it out,” Dario says.
“And she knew you would come back to us.”
“Yes.”
Marco sends Dario and Bruno to the kitchen so Angela can examine their injuries.
I remain at the table.
Marco understands buildings.
Guard rotations.
The way a man like Moretti protects what he considers his.
I understand Lucy.
At least, I thought I did.
“She won’t wait for us,” I say.
Marco looks up from the plans.
“She may not have a choice.”
“She’ll make one.”
“Based on what?”
“Nearly six years with Mikhailov.”
Locked doors don’t make Lucy stop looking for a way out.
They make her pay attention.
Ivan answers on the fourth ring.
“Gio?”
“I need information.”
“What happened?”
“Moretti has Lucy.”
Silence.
Then his voice changes.
“Where?”
“His estate in Barrington.”
“What do you need?”
“Anything you know about the property.”
“I’ve never been inside.”
“Has Mikhailov ever looked at it?”
Another pause.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“He considered using Moretti’s docks three years ago.”
“Were you involved?”
“I drove one of the surveillance teams.”
Marco pulls the phone closer.
“What did you see?” he asks.
Ivan recognizes his voice.
“Catenzio.”
“Lucia is being held inside the house. We need a way to reach her.”
“The main gate is fortified,” Ivan says. “The shoreline is less secure, but Moretti watches the primary dock.”
“Can you get the surveillance report?”
“I may be able to access Viktor’s files.”
“Will he know?”
“Not immediately.”
“What happens when he finds out?” I ask.
“That’s my problem.”
The answer comes without hesitation.
Ivan failed to stop Lucy when she escaped Mikhailov.
That doesn’t mean he wants to see her locked away again.
“How long?” Marco asks.
“Give me an hour.”
The line goes dead.
The files arrive forty-three minutes later.
They contain surveillance photographs, old guard estimates, and notes on maritime deliveries.
Armando opens an aerial photograph.
“There are two docks,” he says. “The main one south of the house and a smaller boathouse on the eastern property line.”
“Security?” Marco asks.
“The main dock has cameras and motion sensors. Ivan’s report says the boathouse is connected to a separate system.”
“Why?”
“Different parcel. Moretti bought it through another company.”
I point to a stone wall extending from the house toward the water.
“What’s that?”
“Boundary wall. There’s a garden path beside it.”
“Exposed?”
“Completely.”
Marco studies the plans.
“There’s a reference to utility access beneath the east wing, but no details.”
“Could it reach the boathouse?” I ask.
“Possibly.”
“Then we go in that way.”
“We don’t know where the entrance is,” Marco says. “Or whether it still exists.”
“Then we find out.”
“And if Moretti moves Lucia when he sees us coming?”
The question stops me.
He taps the main house.
“We know where she is. We don’t know where he’ll take her if he believes the estate is compromised.”
“So we leave her there?”
“No.”
His voice is quiet.
“We wait until we can reach her without making her situation worse.”
Every part of me rejects that.
But Lucy is alive.
For now, that has to be enough.
#
Her bedroom door remains open.
Her robe hangs over a chair. Two books sit beside the bed. A glass of water rests on the nightstand.
The swimsuit she wore at the pool hangs over the bathroom rail.
That night, she was in my arms.
The next morning, she promised she wasn’t leaving.
I know this isn’t what she meant.
But it still hurts.
I sit on the edge of her bed.
I should be downstairs helping Marco.
Instead, I stare at all the small ways Lucy has made a place for herself.
Her shoes beneath the chair.
Her handwriting on a scrap of paper.
The sweater she wears when Marco keeps the house too cold.
I spent years making certain women didn’t matter.
Then Lucy walked into our lives and became part of everything.
I pick up her sweater.
It smells faintly like her shampoo and the roses Angela leaves in the upstairs rooms.
Something inside me gives way.
Not loudly.
There’s no shouting.
Nothing gets broken.
I sit alone in her room and press the sweater against my face because, for a few minutes, I can’t breathe without it.
I remain there until sometime after midnight.
By the time I leave, no one in the house is sleeping.
Marco is still in his office.
Armando is still studying the estate.
Angela is still carrying her phone.
But the call doesn’t come that night.
#
Moretti allows Lucy to call again after breakfast the next morning.
We reach Marco’s office before the call connects.
Marco answers before the first ring finishes and puts the call on speaker.
“Lucia.”
“Are Dario and Bruno safe?”
“They’re both here. They’re safe.”
“Are they hurt?”
“Bruised. Nothing serious. Are you okay?”
“Yes.”
I lean closer to the phone.
“Lucy?”
“I’m here.”
The sound of her voice nearly undoes me.
“Where are you?” Marco asks.
“My mother’s room.”
“Are you alone?”
Her answer takes a second too long.
“No.”
“Can you speak freely?”
“No.”
I close my eyes.
“Did you sleep?” I ask.
“A little.”
“Is the door locked?” Marco asks.
“Yes.”
Something moves near her.
Then Moretti’s voice enters the line.
“That’s enough.”
“Lucia—” I begin.
The call ends.
Forty-three seconds.
Armando checks his watch and writes down the duration.
I call again.
It goes to voicemail.
#
Rosa contacts Angela later that day.
She works in Moretti’s kitchen and calls from a number Armando can’t connect to anyone in the Moretti organization.
“Did you speak to Lucy?” I ask.
Angela shakes her head.
“Rosa said she couldn’t risk putting her on the phone.”
“What was the message?” Marco asks.
Angela looks at the paper where she wrote it down.
“She said, ‘Tell Angela I’m sorry I missed dinner. Ask her to save me some lasagna.’”
“That’s all?”
“She also said she’s unharmed and still in her mother’s room.”
Marco looks at Armando.
“Can we trust Rosa?”
“We don’t know enough about her.”
“What if Moretti arranged it?” I ask.
“Then he has confirmed Lucia is still in the west wing,” Marco says. “Either way, the information is useful.”
It doesn’t feel useful.
Lucy is alive.
Lucy is locked in a room.
We already knew both.
Still, Angela writes down Rosa’s number and carries her phone with her for the rest of the day.
#
Moretti permits another call the following afternoon.
It lasts thirty-one seconds.
“Are you eating?” Angela asks.
“Yes.”
“Are you sleeping?”
“A little.”
“Lucy,” I say.
There’s a pause.
“I’m here.”
Moretti takes the phone.
The call ends.
Two words.
They get me through another night.
#
By the third day, no one in the house is sleeping.
Marco works in his office until dawn. Armando sleeps on the sofa for an hour at a time. Dario has gone over the estate twenty times and still begins again whenever someone asks.
Angela cooks enough food for twice the number of people in the house.
No one eats it.
I sleep in Lucy’s room.
I don’t make a decision to do it.
The first night, I sit on her bed until morning.
The second, I lie down because the room is spinning.
By the third, Angela leaves clean clothes for me on the chair and stops pretending she expects me to use my own room.
Marco finds me there shortly after sunrise.
The curtains are still open, letting a thin strip of morning light reach across the carpet. I haven’t bothered turning off the lamp.
“You should eat.”
“So should you.”
“I did.”
“Coffee isn’t food.”
“Neither is whiskey.”
I glance at the untouched glass on the nightstand.
“I didn’t drink it.”
“That isn’t better.”
He sits in the chair near the window.
For a while, neither of us speaks.
“Do you think she’s frightened?” I ask.
“Yes.”
His honesty hurts.
“Do you think she believes we’re coming?”
“Yes.”
This answer comes without hesitation.
I look at him.
“How do you know?”
“Because she told us not to give Moretti what he wants.”
“That doesn’t mean she expects us to get her out.”
“No.”
Marco looks around her room.
“It means she expects us to remember who she is.”
I stare at the ceiling.
“What if we’re waiting too long?”
“We’re not doing nothing.”
“It feels like nothing.”
“I know.”
Moretti has already lost three shipping contracts.
Two banks have begun reviewing Moretti accounts.
A union representative in Providence has discovered sudden concerns about working conditions at one of Moretti’s warehouses.
Marco is tightening his hand around the Moretti organization.
Carefully.
None of it opens Lucy’s door.
“I can’t lose her again,” I say.
Marco looks toward the hallway.
“Neither can I.”
#
Rosa calls again that afternoon.
Lucia is eating.
She is allowed to walk in the garden with two guards.
Moretti brought in an attorney to explain why her marriage could be annulled.
She refused to sign anything.
There is no clue.
#
On the fourth day, Rosa calls shortly before eight.
Angela brings the phone into Marco’s office. Flour dusts the front of her apron, and she still holds the pen she used to write down the message.
“What did she say?” I ask.
Angela consults the note in her hand.
“She said, ‘Tell Angela I’m sorry I missed dinner. Ask her to save me some lasagna.’”
“Again?”
“Yes.”
Marco waits.
“There was something else,” Angela says. “She said, ‘Tell her I’ll help water the roses after dinner, when Marco comes home.’”
I look at my brother.
He is already looking at me.
“What?” Armando asks.
“The roses are beside the pool,” I say. “On the east side of the house.”
“And we don’t water them after dinner,” Angela adds. “Lucia knows that.”
Marco pulls the aerial photograph of Moretti’s estate toward him.
The eastern side contains part of the kitchen wing, a service drive, and a stone wall extending toward the water.
Beyond the wall is the smaller boathouse.
“She’s telling us where,” Marco says.
“And when,” I say.
Armando looks between us.
“How?”
I remember one of Lucy’s first dinners in the house.
She asked what time we normally ate.
Eight, I told her.
Ten if Marco was joining us.
Marco had been working late every night then. Lucy laughed and accused him of holding the entire household hostage with a financial report.
“Dinner is at eight,” I say. “Unless Marco is there.”
Marco understands.
“Then it’s at ten.”
East side.
Ten o’clock.
The message is simple because it doesn’t need to tell us everything.
Only where she intends to be and when.
“She found a way to the east side,” I say.
“We don’t know whether she can reach the boathouse,” Marco says.
“She thinks she can.”
Marco studies the plans from Ivan’s files.
The old survey mentions utility access beneath the eastern wing, but not the interior entrance.
“Call Ivan,” he tells Armando.
Ivan answers immediately.
“We need the entrance to the service passage,” Marco says.
“I gave you everything in the file.”
“Find someone who knows more.”
A pause follows.
“The report names a contractor who worked on Moretti’s wine cellar. I may be able to reach him.”
“How long?”
“I’ll call you back.”
The answer comes eighteen minutes later.
The passage begins behind a storage rack in the old wine cellar. A locked gate separates it from the boathouse.
“Can it be opened from inside?” Marco asks.
“The contractor remembers a manual release.”
“What kind?”
“A lever beside the gate.”
Marco looks at the clock.
Eight thirty-seven.
“Ten,” he says.
“Yes.”
“You’re certain that’s what Lucia meant?”
“No.”
I’m afraid, and I’m using an old joke about Marco’s working hours to decide where Lucy intends to be in less than ninety minutes.
But she helped Angela tend the roses before she left.
She knows they grow beside our pool on the east side of the house.
She knows Angela would never water them after dinner.
And she remembers that dinner waits until ten when Marco works late.
There is no reason for that message unless she is telling us something.
“She’s going to reach the east side of Moretti’s property at ten.”
“And if she can’t?”
“Then we make certain she gets another chance.”
Marco studies me.
For once, he doesn’t question whether I understand her.
He turns to Armando.
“Put a boat in the bay. No lights. No approach until we confirm movement near the boathouse.”
Armando reaches for his phone.
“I’ll call the men.”
“No one goes near the main gate,” Marco continues. “If Moretti sees us coming, he’ll move her.”
The room comes alive.
Plans unfold.
Calls are made.
Weapons are checked.
Marco begins building a way into the estate.
I look at the eastern wall running from the house to the water.
Marco understands Moretti’s defenses.
I understand the woman trapped behind them.
Lucy isn’t asking us to find her.
She’s telling us where to meet her.