Chương 7
“I can see that.”
Salvatore smiled without warmth. “No greeting for your father?”
Luca placed the bank envelope behind his back, then handed it to Elena without looking at her.
“Take that to the office,” he said.
Salvatore’s eyes followed the movement.
Elena left with the envelope.
The nurse checked Matteo’s monitor. “His oxygen saturation dipped briefly, but it recovered. No fever.”
“Thank you,” Luca said. “Give us the room.”
She hesitated.
Salvatore patted Matteo’s leg. “Go. We’re family.”
The nurse left.
Luca closed the door but did not lock it.
“You went out early,” Salvatore said.
“Yes.”
“With the housekeeper.”
“Elena is Matteo’s caregiver.”
“She was hired to manage the house.”
“She does more.”
“I’ve noticed.”
Salvatore’s thumb moved slowly over the edge of Matteo’s blanket. “You should be careful about dependence. Employees mistake grief for intimacy.”
“Why are you here?”
“It’s my grandson’s birthday.”
“That was yesterday.”
“I called. You didn’t answer.”
“I was occupied.”
“So I came.”
Luca looked at his father’s hand on the blanket. “You knew about the meeting with Dr. Kaplan.”
Salvatore’s eyes remained on Matteo. “The hospital keeps me informed.”
“They have no authorization to do that.”
“I chair the foundation that supports the pediatric program.”
“That is not authorization.”
“No. It is gratitude.”
Luca moved to the other side of the bed.
“What did she tell you?”
“That the treatment failed.”
The sentence was delivered with the same measured gravity Salvatore used for quarterly losses.
“And?”
“That you brought him home.”
“What else?”
“That you looked defeated.”
Luca felt something cold settle behind his ribs.
Salvatore finally looked at him. “You should not make permanent choices while drowning.”
“Is that advice?”
“It is experience.”
“Did Sofia ever accuse you of dumping chemicals at Kearny?”
Salvatore did not react immediately. The delay was less than a second, but Luca had spent his life studying the man’s pauses.
Then Salvatore sighed.
“So that is what Elena gave you.”
Luca’s body became very still.
“I did not say Elena gave me anything.”
“No. You did not.”
“Why did you assume she did?”
“Because Sofia filled that woman’s head with suspicion before the accident.”
“What suspicion?”
“Old records. Old enemies. Stories about the company before you took control.”
“You knew she left something.”
“I knew she was collecting documents.”
“Where?”
Salvatore glanced toward the door. “This is not a conversation to have beside a sick child.”
“It is exactly where we will have it.”
Matteo moved in his sleep.
Both men stopped speaking.
Luca adjusted the blanket. Salvatore watched him with an expression that might once have been tenderness.
“When you were three,” Salvatore said quietly, “you developed pneumonia. Your mother sat beside you for four nights. I walked the halls because I could not bear the sound of your breathing. Helplessness makes men cruel, Luca. It makes them suspicious. It makes them want a person to blame.”
“You taught me to blame people.”
“I taught you to find causes.”
“Did you cause Sofia’s death?”
Salvatore’s face changed then, not with shock but with disappointment.
“You ask me that in my grandson’s room?”
“Yes.”
“No.”
The answer came cleanly.
Luca almost believed it.
Salvatore stood with help from the cane. “Sofia was frightened, angry, and determined to punish this family for being what it was long before she married into it. She believed records were the same as truth. They are not.”
“She wrote that Angelo accessed her car.”
“Angelo ran security.”
“She wrote that you told him to solve a problem.”
“I told him to stop confidential documents from leaving the company.”
“How?”
“Lawfully.”
“Did you threaten to take Matteo from her?”
Salvatore’s eyes hardened. “She threatened to take him from you.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
“She was preparing to leave.”
The room seemed to tilt.
Luca gripped the bed rail.
Salvatore observed the movement. “She had spoken to a divorce attorney. She intended to use allegations about the company to control custody.”
“How do you know?”
“Her lawyer contacted ours.”
“When?”
“Two weeks before the accident.”
“You never told me.”
“You had just learned she was investigating the company. You were furious. I did not want you confronting her while angry.”
It sounded reasonable. That was Salvatore’s gift. He could build a shelter from selected facts and make anyone who stepped outside look insane.
“Show me the communication.”
“I will.”
“Today.”
“Of course.”
“From the original server.”
“If it still exists.”
Luca laughed once. “Records are not truth unless they help you.”
Salvatore’s grip tightened around the cane.
“You think that envelope changes what she was doing? She was leaving you.”
“Maybe she should have.”
The words surprised both of them.
Salvatore looked toward Matteo. “Everything I protected will become his.”
“No.”
“He is a Moretti.”
“He is a child.”
“He is both.”
Luca stepped closer. “Stay away from the hospital. Stay away from his doctors. Stay away from Elena.”
“You are exhausted.”
“I am clear.”
“Those are not the same.”
Salvatore moved toward the door, then paused.
“Angelo followed you because I asked him to keep you safe.”
“From what?”
“From decisions made in grief.”
After he left, Luca locked the door and stood beside it until the sound of the cane disappeared down the hallway.
Matteo opened his eyes.
“Grandpa mad?”
“No.”
“Daddy mad?”
Luca sat on the edge of the bed.
“Yes.”
Matteo considered this. “Cake?”
Luca looked at the clock. It was almost noon.
“You were promised cake.”
He carried Matteo downstairs without calling for the wheelchair. In the sitting room, the red velvet cake remained beneath a glass cover. The candles had burned down unevenly. Elena stood beside the marble table with the bank envelope locked inside a metal document case.
She saw Luca’s face.
“He knew,” she said.
“He knew there was a letter.”
May you like
Her shoulders lowered as if a weight she had expected had finally arrived.
Luca set Matteo in the wheelchair and cut a thin slice of cake. He removed the candles first, placing all three on the silver tray. Matteo watched closely.
