After a few minutes of observing everyone, Morana felt someone else come to stand beside her. She glanced up and saw Lorenzo Maroni there, alone, without her father.
“Walk with me, Morana,” he demanded and walked uphill towards the cars without giving her a chance to respond.
Cautious but curious, Morana sent Tristan a quick text and followed after the older man, finding him standing alone near his town car as he waited for her. Morana quietly moved to him.
He opened his jacket and brought out a cigar, sniffing it once before cutting it.
“The cigars were a gift from one of my associates,” he began without preamble. “That associate was, just the other day, telling me about someone looking deep into our business.”
Keeping his eyes on the casket far below, he lit up the smoke. “That wouldn’t be you, now, would it? After the way you threatened me, I’m inclined to believe that.”
Morana watched the large silver ring on his index finger that hadn’t been there before, the skull face polished and detailed and considering he was attending his son’s funeral, oddly jarring. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
The older man watched her with eyes that saw too much. “Where’s Dante?”
Morana blinked in surprise and looked down at the casket pointedly.
He chuckled. “I’ve been doing this for far longer than you’ve been alive, little girl. I know that,” he indicated the wooden box, “isn’t my son.”
Morana stayed silent, not sure what he was playing at, and why he was asking her.
Lorenzo Maroni’s eyes crinkled, his handsome face creasing with lines of age as he looked at her with dark eyes that held stories beyond her imagination. She could feel the full force of his experience in that one pointed look and it took everything she had to keep her spine straight and head high as she regarded him back neutrally.
“I can see why Tristan is smitten,” he commented, his voice almost soothing. “You have fire. I respect fire. But there are greater powers at play here, little girl. Bigger than you or me. I don’t think you even realize the things you set in motion for your selfish needs.”
Morana bit the inside of her cheek to keep from asking him any questions.
“You tell me what my son is up to,” Maroni took a deep pull of the cigar, “and I’ll tell you why you were returned.”
Morana was tempted to find out why, but not that tempted. Blinking innocently, she played along. “So, you admit to having a hand in my return to my father?”
Maroni laughed, exhaling a cloud of smoke, his thick neck cording above his shirt. She could see where Dante got his looks from.
“You were a pawn to control your father,” Maroni took a deep inhale of his cigar and blew out a puff of smoke, the minted tobacco scent invading her lungs. “I never imagined you’d become a problem.”
Morana laughed without humor. “My father never loved me enough for you to control him.”
“Oh, he loved you,” Maroni smiled, the malice in his eyes evident. Morana stared at him, confused at his words.
“Why did you call me here?” she simply asked, shoving her hands in her coat pockets.
“To offer you the deal,” Maroni threw down his cigar, stubbing it with his toe. “You’re living in my city, on my compound, with my soldier. I’m not threatening you, just telling you. You don’t want to make an enemy of me.”
Morana stayed silent as she watched him get into the car and stepped back, not understanding half the shit he’d spewed. One thing was for certain though – Lorenzo Maroni was scared, of whom she didn’t know. Otherwise, there was absolutely no way he would stoop down low enough to offer someone like Morana any kind of deal.
She found that very, very interesting.
The beeping of her laptop as soon as she entered the cottage in the afternoon startled her. Quickly hurrying to the systems she’d left running, Morana took her laptop outside to the porch, taking a seat in the chair, with a beautiful view of the lake and the surrounding hills in front of her and the mansion on the right in the distance.
Sliding off her flats that she’d worn for the funeral, Morana curled up on the chair and logged into the system, trying to locate where the beeping was coming from.
And what she saw on her screen stunned her.
It was the codes.
Her codes.
What the hell?