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Silence follows.
That is the first thing said tonight that does not make me want to put my fist through something.
Diego shifts in his chair. “You intended to respond to him.”
Mario’s jaw tightens.
Diego watches him carefully. “Just like you wanted, Lorenzo cleared the path. The channel is there. But you haven’t used it.”
“No,” Mario says. “I haven’t.”
The truth is that he has not answered Luca because answering Luca changes things. It pulls Atlantic City closer. It makes the old Naples truth harder to keep at arm’s length.
Mario has delayed because he is Mario. Because he measures every bridge before he steps on it.
Because he knows bridges can become roads.
And roads can become obligations.
I look at him.
“Well, now is the time.”
Chapter Thirty Five
Julia
I wake up alone in Ricardo’s bed.
For a moment, I let myself ride on the bliss of not remembering.
The sheets beneath my cheek are fine and smooth, carrying the faint scent of expensive detergent and Ricardo’s skin. The room is dim, curtains drawn against morning, but not completely. A narrow line of pale light cuts across the carpet near the window.
Then, brutally, memory returns.
Dante on the floor.
Blood under my hands.
Ricardo’s face in the hospital.
White roses in a vase.
I sit up too fast, and my stomach churns.
I throw the covers back and stumble toward the bathroom with one hand pressed over my mouth. I barely make it to the toilet before I’m sick.
There isn’t much in me to lose.
Water. Bile. The bitter, empty taste of a body that has gone through too much in the last day.
My knees hit the tile. I grip the edge of the toilet and breathe through the next wave, waiting for it to pass. It takes too long. Long enough for sweat to gather along the back of my neck. Long enough for my arms to start trembling from holding myself up.
When it finally eases, I lower the lid and sit back against the wall.
Ricardo’s bathroom is beautiful, I think absently. Dark stone. Soft towels. A shower large enough to belong in a hotel suite.
I close my eyes.
