Chapter 7 - THE HAND THAT USED THE WATCH
Roman took the watch from his pocket.
The cracked crystal reflected the chandelier.
“My watch was under Leo.”
Beatatrice nodded.
“So how did my father get it?”
Vittorio answered.
“He went back after the ambulance left.”
Roman turned.
“You knew?”
“I saw him speaking to one of the officers.”
“And you said nothing.”
“I was already doing what I had always done.”
“What was that?”
Vittorio’s voice became bitter.
“Letting your father decide what survival looked like.”
Roman stared at him.
Harper could see how badly he wanted to hit something.
Instead, he placed the watch carefully on the table.
That restraint mattered.
Beatatrice saw it too.
Roman asked, “Why take the watch?”
Nobody answered.
Harper understood first.
“Because it put Roman at the scene.”
Roman looked at her.
She continued.
“If police found a Moretti watch underneath Leo’s body, reporters ask questions.”
Vittorio closed his eyes.
Harper’s voice hardened.
“Questions about why Roman was there. Questions about your family. Questions about the car.”
Roman finished the thought.
“Questions that might lead to the brakes.”
Beatatrice nodded.
Roman looked toward Vittorio.
“So my father erased me.”
“Yes.”
“And blamed Angelo.”
“Yes.”
“And convinced Harper’s family that everything had been handled.”
Vittorio hesitated.
“I don’t know what he told them.”
Harper felt the old anger rise.
“My mother spent fifteen years believing nobody cared.”
Beatatrice signed.
I cared.
Harper looked at her.
“I know.”
Beatatrice’s face crumpled.
The quiet response seemed to hurt more than anger.
Harper sat beside her.
For a moment, the Moretti men disappeared.
There were simply two women holding opposite ends of the same dead boy’s memory.
Beatatrice touched Leo’s drawing.
He was funny.
Harper smiled through tears.
“He cheated at cards.”
Beatatrice’s eyes brightened.
He cheated me.
“He cheated everyone.”
They both laughed.
Roman looked away.
Harper saw his eyes shine.
Vittorio lowered himself into a chair.
“I sent money.”
Harper turned.
“What?”
“To St. Clare. Every year after.”
Her anger returned instantly.
“You thought donating made it better?”
“No.”
“Then why?”
“Because I couldn’t find your family.”
“You had the Moretti name. You could find anybody.”
Vittorio accepted the accusation.
“You’re right.”
Harper waited.
He looked ashamed.
“I was afraid of meeting you.”
The honesty disarmed her for half a second.
Only half.
Roman walked toward the window.
“We reopen everything.”
Vittorio stared at him.
“Roman.”
“The accident. Angelo. The brake line. My father.”
“You don’t understand what that will do.”
Roman turned slowly.
“Try me.”
“The port authority contracts could be reviewed. Old union cases reopened. Every rival your father ever made will use it.”
“Good.”
Vittorio stood.
“You have six thousand people drawing paychecks from companies with your name on them.”
Roman’s expression hardened.
“You think that gives me permission to bury a dead child?”
“No.”
“It sounds like yes.”
“It means your decisions reach farther than your anger.”
Harper looked at Roman.
For the first time that night, she wondered what he would choose when truth became expensive.
Roman looked at her.
That almost made it worse.
He said, “I need proof before I accuse a dead man publicly.”
Harper laughed once.
There it was.
The Moretti instinct.
Control first.
Truth second.
“You have your mother.”
“I believe my mother.”
“Then what proof are you waiting for?”
“Something no one can dismiss as grief or memory.”
Beatatrice flinched.
Harper stood.
“You mean something people like you consider respectable.”
“That isn’t what I said.”
“It’s what you meant.”
Roman stepped toward her.
“Harper—”
“No.”
She picked up Leo’s drawing.
“My brother died while all of you protected each other.”
“That is not what I’m doing.”
“Not yet.”
The words stopped him.
Harper looked at Beatatrice.
“I’m sorry.”
Beatatrice caught her hand.
Do not disappear again.
Harper almost broke.
She squeezed Beatatrice’s fingers.
“I’ll try.”
Then she left.
Roman did not stop her.
That surprised her.
An hour later, Harper sat on the floor of her tiny Queens apartment surrounded by Leo.
Not literally.
His things.
Her mother had given Harper one plastic storage box when she moved out.
Harper had not opened it in years.
Inside were school photographs.
A broken toy train.
Three blue glass beads.
An old hearing-aid case.
A Mets ticket.
A St. Clare fundraiser program.
Harper sat up.
The date matched.
She opened the program.
A folded newspaper clipping fell out.
Harper recognized her mother’s handwriting on the back.
THE MAN WHO CAME TO THE HOSPITAL.
Harper turned it over.
The photograph showed Salvatore Moretti leaving St. Vincent’s Emergency Department shortly after midnight.
His face was turned away from cameras.
One arm blocked the flash.
Harper barely noticed any of that.
She looked at his right sleeve.
A wide black stain marked the white cuff.
Grease.
Her pulse jumped.
Then she noticed something else.
A chain hung from his closed fist.
At the bottom was a dark stone.
A sapphire.
Beatatrice’s necklace.
Harper grabbed her coat.
Twenty-eight minutes later, she was back at the Moretti townhouse.
Roman opened the door himself.
She held up the clipping.
“You wanted something nobody could dismiss.”
Roman looked at the photograph.
His face changed.
Behind him, Beatatrice came closer.
Harper pointed toward the cuff.
Then the necklace.
Roman closed his eyes.
For several seconds, he said nothing.
Finally he whispered, “He went to the car.”
“Yes.”
Vittorio appeared in the hall.
He saw the photograph.
And went pale.
Harper looked at him.
“What?”
Vittorio did not answer.
Roman turned.
“What do you know?”
Vittorio stared at the necklace in Salvatore’s hand.
Then at Beatatrice.
“He didn’t go back for the necklace.”
Roman’s voice dropped.
“What did he go back for?”
May you like
Vittorio looked at the broken watch on the table.
“To make sure he had something he could use against your mother.”
