“Get in the car,” I order her. I unlock it and signal for her to go over. She stomps over with a haughty expression. I’m not sure if she’s hiding her need to cry or her need to hit me, and I don’t care. Before we can fix this, we have to find Santo.
I make a few phone calls before I join her, my mind as always working things through, like twisting a Rubik’s cube. If I turn things around the right way, the colors will line up.
Santo.
Anna.
Piero.
Jenoah.
They’re not random pieces of the puzzle. They all fit together.
How?
I could start at the morgue. My cousin’s body’s been claimed and we’ve sent him to be cremated. My family’s due to arrive in a few weeks for the funeral.
No. The morgue won’t give me the answers we need.
I pull up footage of The Castle and frown as I scroll back to the date of my wedding.
There she is. My beautiful bride, waiting at the foot of the stairs near the reception room. Her bouquet’s held up to her chest as she scans the crowd, her eyes a bit apprehensive. Then Angelina comes down the stairs, and Elise’s face lights up.
She won’t like that Angelina kept the truth about Piero to herself. She’ll feel betrayed, I’d imagine. I don’t blame her. I’d feel the same.
And even though I denied that I regret what I’ve done… I hate that I’ve caused her pain.
I was loyal to my family. I did what had to be done, and I told myself it was the right thing to do. But do I feel as if it were the right choice?
Do we ever have clear-cut right choices?
Sometimes, I suppose.
Sometimes, the answer’s clear. Other times, the answer’s neutral and still others, our choices are tangled like a rat’s nest.
And sometimes we make our choices and have to deal with the consequences.
I open the car door. Elise looks out the window, sitting as far away from me as possible in the small interior of the car.
I flip through the footage on my phone.
“So that’s what you used,” she says in a cold, detached tone.
“For what?”
“To watch me. When I was your prisoner.”
I don’t look up when I respond. “Exactly.”
She makes a sort of huffing noise, but I ignore her and continue looking through the footage.
I see the two of us, standing at the altar. Taking our vows. I bent and kissed her amidst applause, and all the while, Santo was where my brothers were—standing behind us. At one point he communicated with someone at the door, but then came back. Could’ve been damn near anything, and it doesn’t mean he’s guilty.
“Why are you looking through the wedding footage?” I hate the cold tone of her voice. I look up, startled.
“I need to find when Santo left. I’m combing through footage now.”
She swallows and looks forlornly out the window. “Oh. Sorry I interrupted."
Normally, I’d make her look at me, but I’ll give her this reprieve. I owe this to her, this distance.
For now.
"How did you know to ask me about Piero?”
She flinches when I say his name. I hate that she does.
I remember Angelina screaming at me, furiously sobbing when she knew I called the hit on Piero.
You killed the only man she ever loved.
At the time, it was only confirmation to me that I’d done the right thing. They had no right to love each other.
But now I know.
Love doesn’t always know the rulebook.
“My mother texted me,” she says, a hollow tone in her voice that breaks my heart. “She said to ask you.” She glances at me then looks away again, pinching the bridge of her nose and squeezing her eyes shut as if to block it all from her memory. “But I knew you were hiding something from me, Ottavio.”
Jesus. Not my full name. It’s too intimate between the two of us.
“What do you mean?”
“You…” she begins. “I could tell you were hiding something from me because sometimes you had this distant look in your eyes like you were holding yourself back from me.” She sighs and opens her eyes. “Were you ever planning on telling me?”
I nod. “Yeah. Of course I was.”
“When?”
When I was confident that you loved me? When I knew that the truth wouldn’t cause a rift between us that wouldn’t heal? When I knew the power of our love was strong enough to overcome the past?
I don’t answer. “Your mother told you to ask me. And you were the one that pointed out her coming may have been a diversion.” Anna Regazza has a hand in this.
One piece of the puzzle slips into place.
I speed the footage up.
We sit and drink champagne. Orlando gives us a toast. We smile for the camera.
It seems so long ago.
Then I see myself sit up straighter and head to Romeo. It’s when I realized Anna Regazza had come.