Chapter 4 - MARCO’S VERSION
Dominic moved before Isabella could stop him.
He crossed the room and drove Marco backward into the wall.
A framed family photograph crashed to the floor.
“Where is she?”
Marco didn’t fight him.
That was almost more disturbing.
“Dominic—”
“Where is Elena?”
“I don’t know.”
Dominic slammed him against the wall again.
“You lied to my son.”
Marco’s face changed.
There.
Guilt.
Not fear.
“I know.”
“You told him he killed his mother.”
“I know.”
Dominic drew back his fist.
Isabella grabbed his wrist.
“Dominic.”
He looked at her.
“Leo needs answers,” she said. “Not another body.”
His chest rose and fell.
Finally he released Marco.
Marco straightened his shirt.
“You always did choose complicated women.”
Dominic nearly lunged again.
“Don’t.”
Marco lifted both hands.
“Fine.”
Isabella held up Elena’s letter.
“What child?”
Marco looked at it.
“You’ve been searching the wrong mystery.”
Dominic laughed once.
There was nothing amused in it.
“My wife was alive after I buried her, Maria vanished, your wife’s bracelet was placed in a burned car, and you poisoned my son against his mother.”
“Yes.”
“Start talking.”
Marco looked toward Rosa’s old dining room.
“Not here.”
“Why?”
“Because our mother listened from doorways even after she stopped pretending not to.”
Dominic stared at him.
“She’s dead.”
Marco’s expression remained strange.
“I know.”
They moved into the kitchen.
Marco sat at the old wooden table.
For a man Dominic had described as charming, ruthless and impossible to embarrass, he suddenly looked tired.
Older.
He rubbed his face.
“Maria was pregnant.”
Dominic went still.
“With your child?”
Marco smiled bitterly.
“That is what everyone assumed.”
Isabella understood first.
“It wasn’t yours.”
Marco looked at her.
“No.”
“Whose?”
Marco’s jaw tightened.
“I didn’t know.”
Dominic folded his arms.
“What does that have to do with Elena?”
“Maria came to her.”
“When?”
“Five days before the crash.”
“Why Elena?”
“Because Elena was the only person in the family Maria believed would help her.”
Marco stared at the tabletop.
“She said somebody would kill the baby if they learned who the father was.”
Dominic frowned.
“Who?”
“She refused to say.”
“So Elena helped her leave.”
“Yes.”
“And you followed.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Marco looked up.
“Because she was my wife.”
“No.”
Dominic leaned forward.
“You don’t get to use that word like it explains possession.”
Marco’s eyes flashed.
“I loved her.”
“Then why was she afraid of you?”
“She wasn’t.”
“You told a six-year-old he killed his mother.”
Marco’s face tightened.
“That happened later.”
“That makes it better?”
“No.”
Marco looked toward Isabella.
“I was angry.”
“At Leo?”
“At Elena.”
Dominic became frighteningly still.
Marco continued.
“She disappeared. You fell apart. The family nearly collapsed. Everyone blamed me for failing to protect your wife.”
“So you punished my son.”
“I told myself I was making him careful.”
“Careful?”
Marco’s voice rose for the first time.
“You want the truth? Happiness made him loud. Loud children ask questions. Loud children repeat what they hear.”
Dominic stared at him.
“What did Leo hear?”
Marco didn’t answer.
Dominic grabbed the front of his shirt.
“What did my son hear?”
Marco whispered, “A name.”
“Whose name?”
“Not mine.”
Isabella stepped in.
“What name?”
Marco looked at her.
“Samuel.”
Dominic released him.
The name seemed to mean nothing.
“Who is Samuel?”
“I spent seven years trying to find out.”
Dominic looked skeptical.
Marco laughed bitterly.
“You think I masterminded all of this.”
“You gave me every reason to.”
“I identified Maria’s bracelet because I believed Maria was in that car.”
Dominic stared.
“What?”
“When they found the body, the bracelet was there.”
“You knew it wasn’t Elena’s.”
“Yes.”
“And you still told me it was.”
Marco lowered his eyes.
“Because if the body was Maria, then Elena had taken her somewhere.”
Dominic looked disgusted.
“You let me bury another woman under my wife’s name.”
“I thought Elena was alive.”
“And you said nothing.”
“I needed her to stay alive.”
Dominic fell silent.
That reversal unsettled Isabella almost as much as the original lie.
Marco continued.
“I thought whoever killed Maria might still be watching you.”
“So you protected Elena by destroying me?”
“I protected her badly.”
“You did everything badly.”
Marco accepted that.
“Yes.”
Dominic paced toward the window.
“Where did Elena go with the baby?”
“I don’t know.”
“The ticket says Albany.”
“She never arrived.”
“How do you know?”
“I checked every train station between Providence and Albany.”
“Then how did the ticket end up here?”
Marco looked toward the sewing cabinet.
“Mother.”
Dominic turned.
Marco nodded.
“She knew more than either of us.”
Dominic’s face hardened.
“Our mother would have told me.”
“No, she wouldn’t.”
“Why?”
“Because she was protecting you.”
“From what?”
Marco hesitated.
“From Elena.”
Dominic crossed the room.
“Careful.”
“I’m not insulting her.”
“Then explain.”
Marco took a slow breath.
“Elena discovered something about our father.”
Dominic’s father, Carlo Moretti, had died when Dominic was twenty-two.
The official story was a heart attack.
“He’d been dead ten years before Elena disappeared,” Dominic said.
“His secrets weren’t.”
“What secrets?”
Marco looked at Isabella.
Then back at his brother.
“Our father had another family.”
Dominic stared.
“A woman?”
“And a son.”
“Samuel.”
Marco nodded.
Dominic sat down.
For the first time since Isabella had known him, he looked truly disoriented.
“My father had another son.”
“Yes.”
“How old?”
“Older than Leo. Younger than us.”
“And Maria was pregnant by him?”
“I don’t know.”
“But you suspected it.”
“Yes.”
Marco took something from inside his coat.
A small red bracelet.
Dominic stared at it.
Elena’s hospital bracelet.
“I found this in Mother’s room after she died,” Marco said.
“Why didn’t you give it to me?”
“Because there’s writing inside.”
He handed it over.
Dominic turned the bracelet.
Across the inner surface, faded but readable, Elena had written:
Samuel is not the threat. Look at the rosary.
Dominic looked up.
“What rosary?”
Marco gave a humorless smile.
“The one our mother was buried with.”
Silence.
Then Dominic’s face changed.
“No.”
Marco leaned forward.
“Before she died, Mother asked for one thing.”
“What?”
“She made me promise no one would open her coffin.”
Dominic stared at the red bracelet.
Isabella expected him to order Rosa’s grave opened immediately.
He didn’t.
Instead he said, “There’s another rosary.”
Marco blinked.
“What?”
Dominic stood.
“Elena had one.”
“She wasn’t religious.”
“No. But my mother gave it to her the night Leo was born.”
Dominic walked toward the staircase.
“She kept it in Leo’s baby box.”
Back at the Moretti mansion, they went directly to Leo’s room.
Dominic opened the cedar memory chest beneath the window.
Tiny shoes.
Hospital blankets.
A silver cup.
No rosary.
Leo stood in the doorway watching.
“Dad?”
Dominic forced his voice gentle.
“Do you know where Mommy’s beads are?”
Leo nodded.
“Uncle Marco took them.”
Everyone turned.
Marco went pale.
“I did not.”
Leo frowned.
“Yes, you did.”
“When?”
“After Grandma died.”
Marco stared at him.
“I never came into your room after Mother died.”
Leo shook his head.
“You did.”
“Leo,” Isabella said carefully, “are you sure it was Uncle Marco?”
Leo looked at the older man.
Then uncertainty entered his face.
“He looked like him.”
Dominic’s eyes narrowed.
“What do you mean?”
Leo touched his own cheek.
“He had Uncle Marco’s face.”
Marco whispered, “Samuel.”
Leo shook his head.
“No.”
He looked at Dominic.
May you like
“He had yours too.”
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