Page 46 of Ruthless Sin
“Every drop.” Nonna turns back to the sink. “Then she went up the back stairs to her room.”
“She say anything?”
“To me? No.” Nonna rinses a cup. “But she stood at the threshold for a long minute before she came in. Like she was deciding whether she had a right to be in my kitchen this morning.”
I set the cup down too hard.
“Nonna.”
“Cher.”
“If she comes back through here. Don’t ask her anything. Don’t push.”
“I never push.” She wipes her hands on the dish towel. “But I’m going to watch her. That’s not the same as pushing.”
“I know it isn’t.”
“And one more thing.” She turns now and looks at me, full on. “I’ve known you since you were born. The girl is twenty-one. She came from a place you and I are not going to talk about at this counter.”
“I know that too.”
“Then go slow,cher.”
“I’m going slow.”
“Go slower.”
I drink the coffee standing by the window. The yard is gray-blue with early light. The jasmine on the south wall has gone wild again. It always does in summer. The magnolia at the edge of the property is beginning to drop its flowers. The compound is still. The men on overnight are trading with the morning shift at the gate. The murmur of voices carries in the wet air.
I put the cup down and walk out.
The folder is on the study desk where Marco left it, plain cardboard with no label. That’s Marco’s system. The more anonymous the cover, the worse the contents.
I open it standing.
She laughed.
Bratva surveillance has shifted off the port.
I read the line twice.
The door behind me clicks. Marco doesn’t knock at this hour.
He crosses to the desk. He doesn’t sit.
“Tito picked the pattern up Friday. We backtracked four weeks. Multiple vehicles, rotating, all unregistered.”
“Frequency?”
“Tuesday and Friday. Three weeks running. They’re watching Casa Lucia drop-offs.”
“They know it’s our clinic?”
“They’ve made the family connection. They’re not interested in the patients. They’re interested in who goes in and out.”
“Sokolov?”
“Sokolov was named. This is the next hand. Newer. Quieter.”
