Page 171 of Freed
“He found Cesaro before I did.”
The blood drains from my face. “No.”
Lorenzo’s voice drops. “He went after him after you called. There was a firefight at the hotel. I got there before it was over, but not soon enough.”
No.
No no no.
“He’s dead?” The words come out in a whisper.
Lorenzo doesn’t look away.
“Yes.”
Something in me folds.
Not because I loved Dante the way Lorenzo once thought. But because he was kind to me. Because he offered me safety when I had none. Because he answered every time I called.
Tears spill before I can stop them.
Lorenzo rises, only to sit beside me and pull me into him.For once, I don’t fight it. I cry into his shoulder for a man who didn’t deserve this end, while the man holding me is the one who had to witness it.
“He knew the truth,” Lorenzo says quietly into my hair. “About the baby. About you. He told me he was helping you survive.”
That almost makes me cry harder.
I pull back enough to look at him. “Did you kill him?”
The question hangs there.
His eyes darken with something like grief. “No.”
I nod once and a strange, ugly kind of relief moves through me. Because that would have been unforgiveable.
“There’s more. Cesaro was sleeping with Fran. He was the father of her baby,” Lorenzo says. “Not me.”
For one stunned second, I can only stare at him. Then I think of Francesca’s face. The numbness. The way she looked at this bright place with such quiet pain.
“Oh my God.”
“I offered her a divorce. Protection for her and the baby.”
That surprises me enough to steal my next breath.
“You did?”
“Yes.”
I look at him. His eyes look ten years older than they did yesterday. And yet somewhere in all of this, he did something kind.
As if he knows what I’m thinking, his mouth twists. “Don’t make me noble. I’m not in the mood.”
A laugh escapes me through tears and his face softens for one second at the sound. Then he stands and puts a little distance between us, as if what comes next requires room.
“Elizabeth.”
Something in his voice makes me go still. He reaches into hiscoat pocket and pulls out an envelope. Sets it on the marble table in front of me.
