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"I think this is another painting," she said, bringing his attention back to her.She pointed to the painting on the wall a few feet away from her."That will make four.You can find the other one on your own.We won't tell anyone, Stefano.You can let us go.I'll return to the US and my mother will pretend she was never here."
Stefano ignored her pleas."Which one is the painting?"
"That one."She pointed to what might be one of the priceless paintings, but she had no idea if it was or not.
Stefano moved past her to take a look.Then he froze at the sound of footsteps coming up the front stairs.He lifted his weapon once more as another man rounded the corner and strode down the hall, a light on the scope of a gun aimed at all three of them.
"What—" Stefano began, his words cut off by the blast of that gun.
She grabbed her mom and pulled her back against the wall, shocked that once again the target was not her, but Stefano.He collapsed on the ground, clutching his side with bloodied hands as he screamed in pain and then cursed at the gunman in Italian.
As the shooter moved closer, her mother pushed her behind her.She would be no defense against bullets, but the man didn't seem in a hurry to take them out.Instead, he stopped in front of them and gave them a long look.That's when she saw that there were no gloves on his hands.But there was a glint of silver.A silver ring with the letterP.
He had a hood over his head and dark glasses over his eyes, but when he pulled down the hood and shoved his glasses on top of his head, she recognized him immediately.It was Matthew Pierre, Dario's associate.
"You," she gasped in surprise, stepping around her mother."You're involved with this?Why?Where did you get that ring?"
"From my mother—Juliette.You know who she is, don't you?"
Everything clicked into place."Juliette is a Falconeri.And you must be her unnamed son."
"That's the perfect way to say it," he replied, a hard edge to his voice."Unnamed.Unimportant, until now.I see you found some of the paintings."
"Why did you shoot Stefano?"she asked, noting that Stefano was still writhing in pain on the floor."Aren't you working together?"
"He was going to cut me out," Matthew said harshly."That won't happen.The paintings are mine.They belong to my family.And they've been gone a long time."
Another terrible fact presented itself."If they belong to your family, why did you kill your sister?Didn't Catherine deserve to have the paintings, too?"
"She was too soft, just like my mother," he said, without a hint of care in his voice.
"I don't think your mother was soft.She was a criminal like her brothers, like her husband, and I guess like her son and daughter, too.Why did she even have that ring?She wasn't one of them."
"She pretended to be.Until she had second thoughts about betraying her friends."
She licked her lips, needing to keep him talking."Why did you wait so long to find the paintings?"
"I didn't know about them until year and a half ago when my mother confessed her sins as she lay dying.That's when she told my sister and I the truth about who we were and where we came from."
"What exactly did she tell you?"
"Everything," he said."She told us about her brothers, my father,La Mano Nera,and theProtettori, the artists who were determined to ruin my family.She was sent to find out what they were up to, and she provided valuable information after joining their group.She even drugged Tomas and Lucinda so her brother could get into the house and find the counterfeits."
"Juliette drugged them?"she echoed in astonishment."She was part of their murder?"
"She didn't know Roberto was going to kill them and burn the studio down.At least, that's what she told us.She said my father was in on it, too, and that terrified her.She was surrounded by evil.After that, she took my sister and ran away.I was born five months later.We lived a life of poverty.I had nothing, no money, no father, no history."
"She was trying to get you a better life."
"She wasn't succeeding," he said bitterly."But even without the Falconeri lineage in my head, I was following in their footsteps by stealing what we needed, and sometimes more.When she told me who I really was, I finally felt like I belonged in my family.I knew what I needed to do.I needed to finish the job my uncles had started.I needed to get the paintings back.Because they're mine, and I will have everything I deserve."
She could hear the obsessive madness in his voice."I still don't understand why you killed Catherine.Didn't she help your men get into the museum?"
"Yes, but then she wanted to call everything else off.She got squeamish when her security guard was hurt.I knew she would betray me.I couldn't give her that chance."
He was completely without remorse.He would kill them, too.They were only alive now because he needed two more paintings.She looked at Stefano, whose breath was more labored now, and his eyes had closed."How did you get involved with Stefano?"
"My mother told me Stefano's father worked for her brothers.He was their inside man in the police department.When I learned Stefano was his son and was someone eager to make more money, it seemed only fitting that both of us should continue a relationship begun a very long time."
