Chapter 6 - The House Without Ghosts
Victor, Mercer, and Isabella were all indicted within weeks.
The evidence was overwhelming.
Tampering with the vehicle.
Illegal payments.
Medical fraud.
Conspiracy.
Assault.
Witness intimidation.
Dante testified privately before a grand jury.
Marco handled the business.
For the first time, Dante did not interfere.
His only fight was physical therapy.
Three weeks later, he took four steps between the bars.
Lily counted every one.
“One.”
Dante moved his right foot.
“Two.”
His knee nearly buckled.
“Three.”
Shaw stood nearby.
“Don’t lock your knees.”
“I’m aware.”
“Then stop doing it.”
“Four!”
Dante gripped the rail.
Lily clapped.
Rachel covered her mouth.
Dante lowered himself into the wheelchair.
Shaw checked his pulse.
“Good.”
“Good?”
“You want fireworks?”
“I walked four steps.”
“You nearly fell on three of them.”
Dante looked offended.
Lily whispered to Rachel:
“She’s mean.”
Dante nodded.
“She is.”
Shaw rolled her eyes.
By December, Dante could walk across the greenhouse using a cane.
The wheelchair remained nearby.
Some days were worse than others.
But he was walking.
The wedding to Isabella was canceled.
The Bellucci estate changed too.
Fewer armed men filled the halls.
Meetings moved away from the house.
Dante separated legitimate companies from the criminal operations Victor had expanded.
Marco watched the process carefully.
“You’re changing everything.”
“Yes.”
“People will say the accident made you soft.”
Dante looked at him.
“Do you think it did?”
Marco smiled slightly.
“No.”
“Then let them talk.”
One evening, Rachel brought Dante his tea.
Lily was asleep upstairs.
Dante looked toward the empty chair beside the fireplace.
“Sit.”
Rachel hesitated.
“I’m working.”
“You’ve been working for ten hours.”
“That never stopped you.”
“Sit.”
She did.
Dante handed her a second cup.
Rachel looked at it.
“You planned this?”
“No.”
“You don’t have to lie about tea.”
Dante smiled.
They sat quietly for a moment.
Then Rachel said:
“Why did you hire me?”
Dante frowned.
“What?”
“When I first came here.”
“You had good references.”
“That’s all?”
“Yes.”
She smiled.
“You’re terrible at compliments.”
“I wasn’t complimenting you.”
“Exactly.”
He looked toward the greenhouse.
“Lily changed this house.”
Rachel’s expression softened.
“She does that.”
“She changed me.”
Rachel looked at him.
Dante seemed almost uncomfortable saying it.
“She believed something everyone else had stopped believing.”
“What?”
“That you’d walk?”
Dante shook his head.
“That I was still here.”
Rachel said nothing.
Then:
“You were.”
“I wasn’t acting like it.”
“You had reasons.”
“That doesn’t make it better.”
Rachel looked at him for a long moment.
“You’re different now.”
Dante raised an eyebrow.
“Better or worse?”
“Still deciding.”
May you like
He laughed quietly.
It was the first real laugh she had heard from him.
