Chapter 20 #2
‘You already know that the Russians and my grandfather wanted to strike a blow at your family. And Maddie has told you how we came to be there. Mama had gone to light a candle when the shooting started. I… I didn’t know where to run, whether to hide.
’ The recollection chills my blood and shames me a little.
‘I was frozen when your… when Isabella saw me standing there,’ I say.
‘She was holding those flowers, and she… held out her hand to me, told me we needed to find a safe place. But… before I reached her, one of the Russians shot her.’
Faces harden. This part they know. Or think they do.
‘But it wasn’t fatal. She was still moving.
Talking. She would’ve survived if…’ Chilled horror dredges through me as the scene plays out in macabre 3D.
‘When Madre Superiora appeared, I thought she was there to help us. But instead, she had a gun. She fired the fatal shot,’ I continue.
‘Without a word or explanation. She just… fired.’
A sound rips out of someone. I don’t look to see who.
‘She turned the gun on me. Asked if I wanted to die. Of course I didn’t want to die. When I said no, when I begged for my life, she put the gun in my hands. Told me if I told anyone about it I would be next. That it would be my word against hers.’
My chest tightens. I breathe through it.
‘Then I noticed Isabella was still alive. I kneeled next to her, trying to stop the bleeding while still holding the gun because I was terrified of what the Madre would do if I…’ I say.
‘I was holding Isabella when she died. Then I think I… got a little hysterical. After that I don’t remember anything…
until I woke up in the convent, here in Italy. ’
Renzo’s hand curls into a fist at his side. But he doesn’t interrupt or look away. Nobody does.
‘You know the rest of the story. All I can hazard is that after Maddie found me with the gun and told me to run, I must have run straight to the Madre again.’
I lift my chin, meet Rafa’s eyes. Then Cesare’s. Then Dante’s.
‘Whatever her part in the events of that day, my memory returning is the last thing Madre Superiora and whoever she was working for wants,’ I finish.
Silence crashes down.
Rafa breaks it.
‘That’s not all. Maddie says she saw you whispering to my… to Mama,’ he rasps, his brown eyes, so like those of the older woman who I know saved my life that day, burning with sorrow and rage. ‘What did she say?’
The question guts me.
Tears rise fast. I don’t wipe them away. I won’t cheapen this by hiding from the pain. Besides, these tears… they deserve to fall for a great woman.
‘She said she was sorry she couldn’t stick around,’ I say. ‘She said to tell you how she longed to see your fat grandbabies, teach her granddaughters how to make cannellonis.’
A sound leaves Rafa that hurts to hear. He laughs once, broken, then presses his fingers hard into his eyes.
‘She said it over and over,’ I whisper. ‘Tell my babies I’m sorry. Tell them I love them. Tell them I’m sorry.’
Sofiya moves, wraps herself around Rafa, holding him steady. Cesare pulls Maddie into his chest, murmuring something low I can’t hear.
Renzo steps into me and I let myself fall against him. He holds me like I might disappear if he loosens his grip.
Dante clears a throat thick with emotion, but when he speaks his voice is desert dry. ‘Okay,’ he says. ‘Can someone tell me one thing?’
We all turn.
‘What the fuck is Madre Superiora’s beef in this,’ he says flatly, ‘and how are we going to make the bitch pay?’ He pauses. ‘And while we’re at it,’ he adds, ‘what does this pazzo Vittore want?’
Rafa answers after a stone-in-millpond silence. ‘The freshest intel I have on Vittore is that he’s desperate to get into bed with the Russians. Especially one Liv Ivanovski,’ he says.
Dante curses under his breath as Renzo frowns. ‘That motherfucker. Again?’
‘Who… who is he?’ I ask.
‘An old dog who’s desperate to learn new tricks that will definitely get him wiped off the face of the earth once and for all is who he is,’ Renzo snarls, wrapping his arms tighter around me.
‘As for the Madre, she’s very effective at hiding, but get this – someone fitting her description was last seen at a very curious location.’
‘Where?’ Renzo barks.
‘Northern Estonia, very close to the Russian border.’
Impossible as it seemed a minute ago, a deeper chill invades the room. Cesare’s face turns to stone and he exhales once. ‘Northern Estonia? That’s a hop, skip, and St Petersburg’s dick out ready for a blowjob.’
One of the capos snort-laughs. Rafa glares at him and the man audibly swallows.
‘So either the Naughty Madre has Russian connections we don’t know about or this fucking thing never truly went away?
Ivanovski, and possibly his uncle Sergei Palinski are back in play?
’ Cesare says what everyone’s thinking. The same Russians who have been a pain in our asses for years.
When no one answers, he sighs. ‘Have we heard from Nightowl?’
Rafa shakes his head, his already savage face twisting into a macabre mask of fury and resolution. ‘Fucker’s gone dark. But I have other resources. We’ll have more intel before morning,’ he says with deathly certainty.
Cesare looks down at Maddie, and a silent conversation passes between them.
‘Bene. We’re not staying in this goddamn place, waiting for the weasel to take another pissant pop at us.
We’re going home to Fallbrook, come up with a plan to wipe these fuckers off the face of the earth.
’ At Maddie’s wince, he exhales harshly, then presses a kiss to her temple.
‘Sorry, bedda. But I won’t pussyfoot around anyone who harms my family, even if their blood runs through your veins. ’
She pats his chest but doesn’t say anything.
He looks around the room, authority brimming from his grey eyes. ‘Wheels up in an hour. With every one of you on board. Capisci?’