Chapter 5 - THE COAT WITH THE BLUE STITCHING
"Before impact?"
Vincent read the words twice.
Then he looked at his mother.
"You knew this wasn't an ordinary tow request."
Sofia shook her head.
"Not when I signed it."
"Then when?"
"After the funeral."
The corridor had grown quiet.
From the ballroom, I could hear distant music and polite applause.
It seemed obscene that people were drinking champagne while our families unraveled fifteen years of lies.
Sofia took the dispatch paper from Vincent.
"Dominic showed me a copy. He said the police might mistake the timing. He said I could be blamed."
"Did he threaten you?" I asked.
She hesitated.
"He reminded me I had a son."
Vincent's jaw tightened.
"And you believed him?"
"I'd just buried your father. You were twenty-three, angry, and already fighting men twice your age for control of his businesses."
Sofia began crying again.
"I believed anything that might keep you alive."
I wanted to hate her.
Instead, I remembered my own mother sitting beside my bed after Dad's funeral.
How she'd held me through the night.
How she'd insisted we could survive anything as long as we had each other.
She'd meant it.
She'd simply never told me what we were surviving.
June folded the old dispatch record.
"There may be another way to find out what happened."
She looked at Vincent.
"Do you remember your father's navy-blue overcoat?"
Vincent frowned.
"He wore it every winter."
"Your father left it in my office that night. He asked me to keep it until he returned."
"Why?"
"He said it held something important."
Sofia looked startled.
"June, you never told me."
"I was frightened of what Dominic might do."
The older woman looked down.
"I kept it because Enzo had once paid for my husband's rehabilitation after a work injury. I couldn't bring myself to throw away the last thing he entrusted to me."
Vincent was silent for several seconds.
Then he said, "Take us to it."
By noon the next day, we were standing inside June's modest apartment on Chicago's South Side.
Vincent had insisted on driving himself.
His security followed in a separate car.
I sat beside him in a black SUV that probably cost more than my first house.
For most of the journey, neither of us spoke.
Finally, I asked, "Are you okay?"
He gave a humorless smile.
"Define okay."
"Still capable of offering strangers chicken sandwiches?"
He glanced at me.
A faint smile appeared.
"Possibly."
Then it vanished.
"My uncle helped raise me after Dad died."
I looked at him.
"He was the one who taught me how to manage the businesses. How to recognize a threat. How to survive."
"That doesn't mean he told you the truth."
"I know."
Vincent tightened his hands around the steering wheel.
"That's what hurts."
At June's apartment, she opened a narrow closet.
Wrapped in a protective garment bag was a navy-blue wool coat.
The collar was worn.
One button had been replaced with a slightly different shade of blue.
Vincent touched the fabric.
His expression changed.
"I remember this."
June nodded.
"Your father had it repaired a week before he died."
She pointed to the inside lining.
"Look at the stitching."
A line of bright blue thread ran beneath the left pocket.
It didn't match the rest of the coat.
Vincent carefully loosened several stitches with June's sewing scissors.
Inside was a folded sheet of thin paper.
My heartbeat accelerated.
Vincent opened it.
It was a list of payments.
Names.
Dates.
Amounts.
At the top, in unfamiliar handwriting, were the words:
Safe Harbor Fund — Reimbursement Schedule.
Several entries had been circled in red.
June leaned closer.
"That's your father's handwriting, Vincent."
One payment stood out.
Forty thousand dollars.
Issued to Baird Fleet Services.
But the money hadn't come from the Safe Harbor Fund.
The check number identified a private Marino family account.
Vincent turned toward Sofia.
"Mom, whose account was this?"
Sofia looked at the number.
Then closed her eyes.
"Mine."
I felt my stomach sink.
"You paid the towing company?"
Sofia whispered, "Yes."
Vincent stared at her.
"For what?"
She reached for the kitchen counter.
"I thought I was paying someone to preserve evidence."
"What evidence?"
"The damaged vehicle parts."
Vincent took a step back.
"Then where are they?"
Sofia's face crumpled.
"I don't know."
He stared at the payment record.
Then June pointed toward a handwritten note beneath it.
Payment received. Disposal authorized.
Vincent read the signature at the bottom.
May you like
His face went white.
The authorization had been issued in his own name.
