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“I want to hear it,” I said.
Henderson glanced at me, and I wondered if all color had drained from my face.
“Are you sure?”
Salvatore’s hand fell on my arm. I didn’t look at him, though. I only nodded once. Henderson got up and fiddled with some ancient-looking equipment.
As soon as the phone connected, Roman’s voice—laced with disgust—came through, the line clear.
“You’re one short,” he hissed.
Salvatore stiffened beside me. We both knew what he meant.
“Keep your money. You didn’t tell me who he was. Find someone else to do your dirty work, rat. When Benedetti learns who ordered the hit on his son, you’ll get what you have coming,” Jake hissed.
“And you won’t? He’d never believe you, and he’ll kill you.”
“If I had known who he was…”
Sapienti trailed off, his tone quieter.
I’d never heard Jake Sapienti’s voice, but I had to first process the fact that the man who had fathered me, the man whom my mother supposedly loved, had killed my brother. Had shot down her beloved son.
“Mr. Sapienti’s body turned up shortly after Sergio’s assassination.”
“How did you come by this recording?” I asked.
“The federal government hired the services of the agency I worked for. That’s all I am at liberty to say on that,” Henderson replied.
“Why now? Why go to my father after all this time?” Salvatore asked.
“And how do we know you’re not fabricating this? Why do you give a shit what happens to the Benedetti family?” I asked, on my feet now, pacing to stand behind my chair and glare at the old man.
“Dominic—” Salvatore started.
“People don’t do shit like this out of the goodness of their hearts, Salvatore. Get a fucking clue.”
I turned and walked the length of the room, running both hands through my hair, trying to make sense of what I’d just learned.
That my uncle had hired the man who had fathered me to kill my half-brother.
“Mr. Henderson, perhaps—”
“My son was the bystander who died that day along with your brother. He was a young man, engaged to be married in a few weeks’ time. So you see, your uncle was ultimately responsible for his death as well.”
“Why now?” I asked. “Why didn’t you go to my father then?”
Henderson sat back in his seat and turned his palms up on the desk. “Because I’m alone now. My wife passed a few months ago. There’s no one left who can be hurt or killed because of what I do now.”
“And Roman doesn’t know about the change in the will?” Salvatore asked.
“No.”
He checked his watch and stood. “We need to go, Mr. Henderson. We’ll be late for my father’s funeral.”
Henderson rose to his feet. I looked at the old man, tall but bent and tired.
“Why would he name me as successor, when it was my father who killed his most beloved son?” I wasn’t sure who I was asking.
“It was his final act perhaps to do right by you. He did love you like his own, and he regretted that final night very much. In the short time I knew him, he talked about it often. About you often.” Henderson walked around the desk. “Old age makes us see things differently, son.”
He put a hand on my shoulder. I looked at that hand, unable to speak, unwilling to feel. I shrugged it off. Salvatore and I walked toward the door.
“One more thing, gentlemen,” Henderson started. We stopped and turned to him. He straightened something on his desk before looking at us. “The guards who will be at the reading of the will are loyal to your father.”
I watched the old man’s eyes. Heard his message.
Salvatore thanked him and said good-bye. We walked out of the room.
Lucia and Gia stood. Gia’s eyes when she met mine turned angry, fierce even, and she shifted that anger to Henderson. Salvatore must have seen it too, because just as she took a step toward the old man, he intervened, taking her by the arm.
“Let’s go. We’re leaving.”
She glanced from him to me and back.
“I said we’re leaving,” Salvatore said.
Lucia took Gia’s other hand. “Come on. We’ll talk in the car.”20GiaLucia told me this morning that she’d worn the dress I wore now to her father’s funeral so many years ago. That she’d only worn it that one time. We dubbed it the funeral dress. I decided I would burn it once I finished with it today.
While we waited for the men to return, she asked me about Dominic. Asked if we were a couple. I hadn’t known how to answer that, so I shifted the conversation to her and her family. The way she spoke about Salvatore, I knew she loved him. And the way he looked at her, hell, he worshipped the ground she walked on.
I admit, I grew envious. I’d never had anything like that before. Not even close, not even with James.
