Chapter 4 - A Deadly Debt My Mother Never Owed
For one absurd second, all I could think about was Carl shouting at me for delivering sea bass three minutes late.
Now he stood in a freezing warehouse with a pistol pressed against a child’s head.
“You work for DeLuca,” I said.
Carl smiled. “I work for whoever pays.”
Jenna’s chair scraped the floor.
“Tessa, get Noah out.”
Carl pushed the gun harder against the boy’s temple.
Noah whimpered.
“Quiet,” Carl snapped.
Matteo stepped into view with his hands slightly raised.
His weapon remained hidden beneath his coat.
“Let the child go.”
Carl laughed. “The famous Matteo Moretti. You look less impressive in person.”
“You are holding a seven-year-old boy.”
“That makes me practical.”
“That makes you dead.”
The words were calm.
Carl’s smile faltered.
Two men emerged behind us.
One aimed at Matteo.
The other pointed his gun at me.
I looked toward Jenna. Her wrists were tied behind the chair, but she was slowly turning one hand. A broken piece of metal glinted between her fingers.
She was cutting the rope.
Carl noticed my gaze.
“Eyes on me.”
“You wore the cuff link.”
“What?”
“At Jenna’s apartment. You dropped Salvatore’s cuff link so Matteo would blame his uncle.”
Carl’s mouth tightened.
“You always did talk too much.”
“You planted it badly.”
“It worked.”
“Only because powerful men prefer complicated conspiracies over admitting the restaurant manager fooled them.”
Matteo glanced at me.
“Is insulting everyone part of your strategy?”
“I’m creating tension.”
“It exists already.”
Carl’s gun shifted away from Noah for half a second as he looked toward Matteo.
Jenna moved.
She drove the metal shard into Carl’s thigh.
He screamed.
Noah dropped to the floor.
Matteo pulled his weapon.
Three shots exploded almost at once.
The man behind me fell.
Carl fired wildly.
A bullet struck the wall above my head.
I grabbed Noah by the back of his shirt and dragged him behind a steel table.
Jenna threw herself sideways with the chair.
Matteo shot the second gunman in the shoulder before he could fire again.
Rocco and two men stormed through the opposite door.
Within seconds, the room went silent except for Carl’s groans.
Matteo kicked the pistol away from him.
“Where is DeLuca?”
Carl pressed both hands against his bleeding leg.
“Go to hell.”
Matteo raised his weapon.
I stepped between them.
“Do not kill him.”
Carl laughed through clenched teeth. “Listen to the waitress, Matteo.”
Matteo’s eyes stayed on him. “Move, Tessa.”
“No.”
“He held a gun to Noah’s head.”
“I know.”
“He helped kill your father.”
The room seemed to stop.
I turned slowly.
Carl’s expression revealed the truth before he spoke.
“What does he mean?” I asked.
Carl looked toward the floor.
Matteo grabbed his collar and hauled him partly upright.
“Tell her.”
“I wasn’t there.”
“You knew Daniel Romano?”
“I was a kid.”
“How old?” I demanded.
“Seventeen.”
“You worked for DeLuca?”
“His father.”
“What happened to mine?”
Carl’s breathing came fast.
“We followed him from a meeting. I was driving the second car.”
“Who cut his brakes?”
“I don’t know.”
Matteo struck him across the face.
Blood sprayed onto the concrete.
“Wrong answer.”
Carl spat.
“Salvatore arranged the garage.”
Everyone looked at Matteo.
His face became still in a way that frightened me more than rage.
“My uncle?”
“He was already working with DeLuca. Daniel found out.”
“So Salvatore betrayed my father too,” Matteo said.
Carl grinned weakly. “Your father never trusted his own brother after that. But he couldn’t prove it.”
“Where is Salvatore now?”
“With DeLuca.”
“At Pier 19?”
Carl hesitated.
Matteo pressed the muzzle against his injured leg.
“Wait,” I said.
Carl’s eyes widened.
Matteo fired into the floor beside his shoe.
The sound made Noah scream.
I covered the boy’s ears.
“Enough!”
Matteo did not look at me.
“Where is he?”
“Pier 19,” Carl gasped. “Office above the loading cranes.”
“How many men?”
“Ten. Maybe fifteen.”
“Why take Jenna to Pier 21?”
“To force you to split your people.”
“And the key?”
“DeLuca thinks Tessa has it.”
I touched the chain beneath my shirt.
The brass key rested against my skin.
Carl saw the movement.
His eyes sharpened.
Matteo noticed.
He stepped between us.
“Rocco, take them to the vehicle.”
Jenna had freed one hand and was working on the other rope.
“I’m not leaving Tessa.”
“You and your son are going somewhere secure,” Matteo said.
Jenna looked at the bodies on the floor.
“Secure according to whose definition?”
“Mine.”
“That is not comforting.”
I almost laughed despite everything.
“She has a point.”
Matteo cut the ropes around Jenna’s wrists.
“You can argue in the vehicle.”
Jenna hugged Noah so tightly he protested.
Then she looked at me.
“This is because you served that table?”
“It became more complicated.”
“You always say that when something is a disaster.”
“I do not.”
“You said it when you dated the drummer.”
“That was different.”
“He stole your microwave.”
Carl groaned on the floor.
Jenna kicked his wounded leg.
He screamed.
“That’s for pointing a gun at my son.”
Rocco guided her toward the exit.
Noah reached for me.
I hugged him.
“Are you coming?”
“Soon.”
“Promise?”
I looked at Matteo.
He answered before I could.
“She will.”
After Jenna left, Matteo ordered his men to take Carl alive.
“Why?” I asked.
“He knows names.”
“You were ready to kill him.”
“I changed my mind.”
“Because I asked?”
“Because killing him quickly would be generous.”
I stared at him.
“There it is.”
“What?”
“The man everyone fears.”
“He threatened a child.”
“That does not give you permission to become worse.”
“You think prison will hold him?”
“If the evidence in Florence is real, maybe.”
“And if the judge is on DeLuca’s payroll?”
“We expose the judge too.”
He stepped closer.
“You still believe systems can be repaired.”
“You believe fear is the only system that works.”
“I believe fear works immediately.”
“And leaves damage that lasts for generations.”
His jaw tightened.
“That sounds like your mother.”
“It sounds like me.”
He turned away.
“We need Pier 19 before DeLuca leaves.”
“No. We need Jenna and Noah safe.”
“Rocco will handle it.”
“I want to see them leave.”
Matteo almost objected, then nodded.
Outside, dawn had begun coloring the river gray.
Jenna sat in an armored SUV with Noah wrapped in a blanket.
I climbed beside her.
“Where are they taking us?” she asked.
“To a guarded house.”
“Whose?”
“His father’s.”
She stared at me.
“You found Matteo Moretti’s father in one night?”
“It has been a busy shift.”
Noah held my hand.
“Are bad men coming?”
I knelt in front of him.
“The men taking you away are going to keep you safe.”
“Are they good men?”
The question silenced me.
Matteo stood outside the open door.
Noah looked at him.
Matteo removed his pistol and handed it to Rocco before crouching.
“Some of us are trying to become better men,” he said.
Noah considered that.
“Did you save my mom?”
“Tessa did.”
“That’s not true,” I said.
Matteo ignored me.
“She ran toward you when everyone else was told to wait.”
Noah gave me a small, serious nod.
“I knew she would.”
Jenna’s eyes filled, but she did not cry.
She squeezed my hand.
“You come back.”
“I will.”
“Do not fall in love with the crime boss while I’m gone.”
I pulled my hand away. “What?”
She looked toward Matteo. “I’ve seen how he looks at you.”
“He looks at everyone like he is deciding where to bury them.”
“Not you.”
Matteo raised an eyebrow.
I closed the SUV door.
As it drove away, he said, “Your friend speaks too freely.”
“That is why we get along.”
We returned inside.
Carl sat against the wall with his hands bound. A medic had wrapped his leg.
I crouched in front of him.
“Why did you hire me?”
He laughed bitterly.
“You think you got that job by accident?”
My stomach turned.
“What do you mean?”
“DeLuca knew Elena was dying. He wanted someone near you.”
“You watched me for two years.”
“I gave you shifts when you needed them.”
“You stole from my tips.”
“I needed the arrangement to look real.”
“You threatened to fire Jenna.”
“To push you toward Moretti’s table.”
The pieces moved into place.
“You knew Matteo was coming.”
“Yes.”
“You expected him to recognize me.”
“We expected you to recognize him.”
“I had never met him.”
“Your mother kept photographs.”
“What photographs?”
Carl smiled.
“Check the Dante book.”
I stood.
“My apartment.”
Matteo looked at me. “We go after Pier 19.”
“The book may contain information we need.”
“So may DeLuca.”
“And if we charge into the pier without understanding what he wants, we repeat every mistake our parents made.”
Carl’s smile widened.
“You should listen to her.”
Matteo struck him hard enough to knock him sideways.
“I thought we were avoiding violence,” I said.
“He irritates me.”
“That is not a legal defense.”
“It has worked before.”
We left Carl under guard and drove to my apartment.
The front door had been forced open.
Drawers had been emptied. Cushions were cut apart. My mother’s recipe box lay broken on the kitchen floor.
I stopped beside it.
Matteo began issuing orders behind me.
“Search every room. Do not remove anything.”
I knelt and picked up one of my mother’s recipe cards.
Tomato sauce.
Her handwriting curved across the paper.
Add basil at the end. Never let impatient people rush the sauce.
My vision blurred.
Matteo crouched beside me.
“I’m sorry.”
“You didn’t do this.”
“My family helped begin it.”
“That is not the same thing.”
“It does not feel different.”
I looked at him.
His voice was quieter than I had ever heard it.
“Where is the book?” he asked.
“Storage closet.”
The closet had been searched too, but badly. Boxes were overturned without being opened.
I found the damaged copy of The Divine Comedy beneath winter blankets.
The cracked leather cover felt heavier than I remembered.
Matteo locked the apartment door while I carried it to the table.
I opened the front cover.
My mother’s handwriting filled the margin.
Tessa, language is never only what is spoken. Look at what people choose not to say.
Beneath the sentence was a photograph.
My mother stood beside a younger Vittorio Moretti in Naples.
Daniel Romano stood on her other side.
And behind them, half hidden near a doorway, was Salvatore.
He wore the same silver lion cuff links.
I turned the photograph over.
A date and address were written on the back.
Matteo read it.
“This warehouse burned the night your father died.”
“There’s another note.”
In faded ink, my mother had written:
Salvatore carries DeLuca’s debts, but the debt was never mine. Find Canto Thirty-Four. The traitor is always closest to the center.
I flipped to the final canto of Inferno.
Several lines were underlined.
Between two pages, someone had cut a narrow compartment into the book.
Inside was a tiny cassette tape and a bank receipt from Florence.
Matteo picked up the tape.
“We need a player.”
I pointed toward my mother’s old storage box.
“She never threw anything away.”
Ten minutes later, a dusty cassette recorder sat on the kitchen table.
I inserted the tape.
Static filled the room.
Then my father’s voice spoke for the first time in twenty-seven years.
“Elena, if you are hearing this, Salvatore knows.”
Matteo closed his eyes.
The recording continued.
“He has been working with Carlo DeLuca’s father since before Vittorio left Naples. He arranged the shipments, bribed customs, and gave them the route for tomorrow’s meeting. I do not know who else is compromised.”
My mother’s voice answered faintly.
“Then cancel it.”
“I can’t. The evidence leaves Florence tomorrow.”
“You have a daughter.”
“I’m doing this for her.”
“No, Daniel. You are telling yourself that because it makes the risk easier.”
“I love you.”
“Then stay alive.”
There was a pause.
My father said, “If I don’t, take Tessa and disappear. The full archive is in the Bianchi box. Do not trust Vittorio unless he gives up his empire.”
The tape clicked off.
The apartment fell silent.
Matteo stared at the recorder.
“My father knew.”
“Maybe not.”
“Daniel warned your mother not to trust him unless he abandoned everything.”
“Vittorio never did.”
“No.”
I looked at Matteo.
“And neither have you.”
He met my eyes.
“No.”
A phone rang.
Not mine.
Not Matteo’s.
The sound came from inside the damaged book.
We both looked down.
A small device hidden in the spine began vibrating.
Matteo grabbed it and answered.
Carlo DeLuca’s voice filled the room.
“I wondered how long it would take you to find Daniel’s recording.”
“You planted a phone in my mother’s book?” I asked.
“Carl did, months ago.”
Matteo’s face hardened.
Carlo continued. “You have learned enough. Bring the key to Pier 19.”
“Jenna and Noah are safe,” I said.
“Yes. Matteo won that round.”
“Then you have no leverage.”
Carlo laughed.
“You’re wrong.”
A video appeared on the device.
Vittorio Moretti sat in his wheelchair inside the pier office.
Salvatore stood behind him with a gun.
May you like
Matteo went completely still.
Carlo said, “Bring the key, Tessa. Or Matteo watches his father die for the betrayal that began all of this.”
