Page 16 of Ricardo

“Yes, but Papà says that too, and then he sends three men with clipboards.”

“Your father has wisdom.”

“My father has trust issues.”

“Your father has sons.”

Tomasso considers that. “Fair.”

I look toward the headless soldier. “What is that?”

“Art.”

“No.”

“It’s classical.”

“It is headless.”

“That’s how you know it’s old.”

I stare at him.

He smiles wider.

I point at the lamp. “Where is that going?”

“My room. Edoardo objects, but he does not get a say in what goes in my room.”

From somewhere inside, Edoardo’s voice cuts through the open door. “I suppose if you wanna look like you live in a brothel from 1978.”

Tomasso lifts his hand toward the house. “Maybe I do.”

I walk past him toward the front steps.

The inside is worse.

Not structurally. The house itself is beautiful. High ceilings. Dark wood beams. Pale stone floors. Ironwork along the staircase. Arched doorways. A wide foyer that opens into a sitting room on one side and a larger formal room on the other. Whoever designed the house understood old Italian influence without turning it into theater.

The boys, unfortunately, are doing their best to correct that.

Boxes are everywhere. Open, half-open. A crate of dishes sits beside what appears to be a set of boxing gloves. Someone has placed a stack of folded towels on a bar cart. A very large television leans against the wall beneath an antique mirror. There is a mattress in the foyer, blocking half the walkway, and a framed poster of a vintage race car propped against the bottom stair.

Matteo stands in the center of it all with a clipboard, of course.

He looks up when he sees me, and relief flashes over his face quickly.

“Zio Ricardo.”

“Matteo.”

“Thank God.”

Tomasso comes in behind me. “Dramatic.”

“You labeled four boxes ‘Important Stuff,’” Matteo says without looking at him.

“It was all important.”