Chapter 5 - THE MAN BESIDE ADRIAN
Raymond Costa had served the DeLuca family for twenty-six years.
That was the first thing Adrian told me.
The second was worse.
“He practically raised me.”
We left Restorante Orelio after midnight.
Leo stayed asleep against me until Adrian’s sister, Camille, arrived.
When I handed him over, he woke.
His face crumpled.
I braced for crying.
Instead he reached toward me.
Camille stared.
Adrian looked away.
I touched Leo’s tiny fingers.
“I’m still here.”
He calmed enough for Camille to take him.
Adrian noticed those words.
So did I.
Still here.
Maybe that was all babies understood about family.
Presence.
Adrian brought me to a DeLuca warehouse office near the river.
I almost refused.
Then I looked at my father’s watch.
I went.
Raymond Costa arrived twenty minutes later.
Sixty-two.
Silver hair.
Perfect suit.
No panic.
He nodded to Adrian first.
Then Frank.
Then me.
His face changed.
“Marisol.”
“My name is Elina.”
He recovered.
“I know.”
That angered me.
“You know me?”
“I know who you are.”
“Since when?”
“Tonight.”
Frank laughed bitterly.
“No.”
Adrian turned.
Raymond’s eyes sharpened.
Frank continued.
“Serena went to you two months ago.”
Adrian became very still.
Raymond sighed.
“She did.”
Adrian’s voice dropped.
“My wife came to you about Elina.”
“Yes.”
“And you said nothing to me.”
“She asked me not to.”
“That sentence is getting old.”
Raymond looked almost ashamed.
“She was trying to protect you.”
“Everybody keeps protecting me by lying.”
No one answered.
Adrian placed Mateo’s watch on the desk.
Raymond saw the initials inside.
R.C.
His composure cracked.
“You found it.”
“Explain.”
Raymond sat.
Not because Adrian asked.
Because his legs seemed to need the chair.
“Fifteen years ago, Pier Nine was about to lose the Valenti contract.”
“We know.”
“Anthony wanted the agreement passed. Mateo Valdez opposed it.”
“We know that too.”
Adrian leaned forward.
“What we do not know is why my consigliere’s initials are beside six bought votes.”
Raymond looked at me.
“I paid them.”
The answer came cleanly.
It still knocked the air from the room.
Adrian stared.
“On whose order?”
“My own.”
Frank stood.
“You let my brother destroy Mateo for something you did.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because DeLuca trucking was about to lose twenty percent of its volume if that warehouse agreement failed.”
Adrian looked stunned.
“My father knew?”
“No.”
“You bought union votes without permission.”
“Yes.”
“Then let Valenti take the blame.”
Raymond shook his head.
“Anthony did not take the blame.”
“My father did,” I said.
Raymond looked at me.
“Yes.”
I hated the softness in his voice.
Do not be sorry after fifteen years.
Be honest before.
“Did you frame him?”
“No.”
“Then who put the envelopes where people would find them?”
“Anthony.”
Frank’s face changed.
Raymond continued.
“Your father discovered six men had changed their votes. He confronted Anthony. Anthony already suspected DeLuca money was involved.”
“So he sacrificed Mateo.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you stop him?”
Raymond looked toward Adrian.
“Because exposing me would have exposed the DeLuca involvement.”
“And?”
“Your father had just taken leadership.”
Adrian frowned.
“My father?”
“Gianni was trying to stabilize the family after your grandfather’s stroke.”
Raymond’s voice became firmer.
“If Pier Nine collapsed, DeLuca trucking collapsed with it. Valenti lost warehouse contracts. Moretti moved in.”
Frank said coldly, “So Mateo became cheaper than a war.”
Raymond closed his eyes.
“Yes.”
I stood.
“I need air.”
Adrian followed me outside.
The river smelled like metal and rain.
Trucks moved beneath sodium lights.
For several minutes, neither of us spoke.
Then I said, “He destroyed my father to protect your family.”
Adrian looked at the water.
“Yes.”
“Are you going to keep him?”
“I don’t know.”
I turned.
“You don’t know?”
“Twenty-six years does not disappear in twenty-six seconds.”
I wanted to hate that answer.
Instead, I understood it.
That was worse.
Adrian continued.
“He held my mother’s hand when my father died. He taught me which captains were loyal and which only looked loyal. He stood beside Serena at our wedding.”
His voice tightened.
“And apparently he lied to all of us.”
“You can love someone and still hold them responsible.”
Adrian looked at me.
“Who taught you that?”
“Rent.”
That almost made him smile.
We went back inside.
Raymond was standing now.
“I did not know Anthony would blacklist Mateo.”
I laughed.
“You thought a Mafia capo would accept losing face gracefully?”
“No.”
Raymond’s face tightened.
“I thought he would blame Moretti.”
“Instead he blamed one union steward.”
“Yes.”
“And you let him.”
“Yes.”
“Did my father know before he died?”
Raymond looked at the watch.
“He figured it out.”
I stopped.
“How?”
“He recognized my handwriting on the tally.”
That explained the watch.
“What happened when he confronted you?”
“He asked me to clear him.”
“And?”
“I told him I needed time.”
I felt sick.
“How much?”
“Two weeks.”
“He died the next night.”
Raymond nodded.
There was genuine grief in his eyes.
Not enough to absolve him.
Enough to prove regret had lived with him.
“What did Serena discover?” Adrian asked.
Raymond looked at him.
“The same truth.”
“And?”
“She told me I had forty-eight hours to tell you.”
Adrian’s face changed.
“When?”
“The week she died.”
Silence.
“Did you?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“I was trying to find a way to protect Pier Nine.”
Adrian laughed without humor.
“Of course.”
Raymond stepped closer.
“Serena did not want the docks destroyed either.”
“But she wanted truth.”
“Yes.”
“What happened after she died?”
“I decided the secret should die with her.”
That was the mistake.
Not murder.
Not conspiracy.
Something more ordinary.
Cowardice.
Adrian looked at Frank.
“Who knows?”
“Five Valenti captains suspect.”
Raymond added, “Three DeLuca capos know pieces.”
Adrian’s expression hardened.
“So if Mateo is cleared publicly—”
“The old alliance may split,” Frank said.
“Union men may demand a new vote.”
“Moretti will challenge Pier Nine.”
“And hundreds of jobs become uncertain,” Raymond finished.
My father’s dignity on one side.
Hundreds of families on the other.
Exactly the choice powerful men had used to justify silence for fifteen years.
I looked at Adrian.
“What did Serena plan?”
Raymond hesitated.
Then removed something from his inner pocket.
A small photograph.
Serena stood beside six warehouse workers.
One man held a sign.
TRUTH DOESN’T CANCEL PAYCHECKS.
I stared.
Raymond said, “She wanted a new vote.”
Frank frowned.
“When?”
“Next month.”
“Under whose protection?”
Raymond looked at Adrian.
“His.”
Adrian’s jaw tightened.
“My wife planned a union reset under my name without telling me?”
“No.”
Raymond shook his head.
“She planned to ask you.”
“When?”
“The night after she came to Orelio looking for Elina.”
Adrian closed his eyes.
She had run out of nights.
Then Frank looked at the photograph more closely.
His expression changed.
“Who took this?”
Raymond frowned.
“I assumed one of the workers.”
Frank pointed toward the reflection in the warehouse glass.
A man holding the camera.
A Valenti family ring visible on his hand.
Not Frank.
Not Anthony.
Adrian recognized him.
“So did Raymond.”
I looked between them.
“Who?”
Adrian’s voice became hard.
“Carlo Valenti.”
Serena’s cousin.
The man currently controlling Pier Nine.
And suddenly the person with the most to lose from a new vote was not an old consigliere.
May you like
It was the man already running the dock.
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