Chapter 4 - BROKEN GLASS
The next morning, Dominic did not deny the license plate.
“That was my car.”
We sat in Nicholas’s library.
Not his office.
He had asked me where I wanted the conversation.
I chose the room with two doors.
He noticed.
He said nothing.
Dominic sat across from us.
The brass flower remained in my pocket.
“Why did Sam write your plate number?” I asked.
“I don’t know.”
“You seem to not know a lot about a dead man who kept your car information inside a locked box.”
Dominic rubbed his jaw.
“I gave him rides.”
“Where?”
“Once to East Boston. Twice to the harbor.”
Nicholas stared.
“You said he asked you for a car once.”
“He did.”
“You left out the rides.”
Dominic’s patience thinned.
“Because I did not catalog every errand I ran for an accountant.”
I leaned forward.
“Did you see him the night he died?”
“No.”
“Did you kill him?”
Nicholas turned toward me.
Dominic did not.
His face simply emptied.
“No.”
The answer came without hesitation.
I wanted to believe that meant something.
It didn’t.
“Then why was Sam afraid of you?”
“He wasn’t.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I do.”
“How?”
Dominic stood.
“Because he came to me for help.”
I froze.
Nicholas’s gaze sharpened.
“What kind of help?”
Dominic looked at his nephew.
“Protection.”
“You gave it?”
“I tried.”
“From Corsetti?”
Dominic paused.
“From everyone.”
That was where the conversation ended.
Nicholas ordered him out.
Dominic went willingly.
But before he left, he looked at me.
“Your brother was not a thief, Clara.”
My throat tightened.
Nicholas stood.
“What did you say?”
Dominic opened the door.
“I said he wasn’t a thief.”
“Then where did six hundred twelve thousand dollars go?”
Dominic’s expression was tired.
“That is the question Sam was trying to answer.”
Then he left.
For the rest of the day, Nicholas made calls behind closed doors.
I returned to the shop.
At four, Rosa brought soup.
At five, one of Nicholas’s men brought a heavier lock for the back entrance.
At six, Nicholas arrived without warning.
“I need you to come somewhere.”
“No.”
He nodded.
“All right.”
That made me suspicious.
“Where?”
“Corsetti wants to meet.”
I stared.
“You were going to take me to see Anthony Corsetti?”
“I was going to ask.”
“Why does he want me?”
“He says he can prove Sam didn’t steal from him.”
My pulse jumped.
“That sounds useful.”
“It also sounds like bait.”
“Will you go?”
“Yes.”
“Then I’m going.”
Nicholas’s jaw tightened.
“That was not the answer I preferred.”
“You promised not to decide where I go.”
“Yes.”
“Are you breaking that promise?”
“No.”
He looked exhausted by me.
“Wear shoes you can run in.”
“I’m not wearing sneakers to a mafia meeting.”
“Clara.”
“I own boots.”
His eyes closed briefly.
“Fine.”
The meeting took place at an old private club near the Common.
Dark wood.
Heavy curtains.
The kind of place where the waiters seemed born already sixty.
Corsetti waited in a private dining room.
Gray-haired.
Perfect suit.
Same man who had sent his people into my flower shop.
He stood when I entered.
“Mrs. DeMarco.”
“My name is Clara.”
Nicholas pulled out my chair.
“Then call her Clara.”
Corsetti smiled.
“You really did marry her.”
Nicholas sat beside me.
“You asked for a meeting.”
Corsetti looked at me.
“Your brother did not steal my money.”
Nicholas’s body became still.
I almost laughed.
“You sent two men to threaten me over money you know he didn’t steal?”
“I know now.”
“When did you learn?”
“Three days ago.”
“How?”
Corsetti placed a folded sheet of paper on the table.
Nicholas did not reach for it.
Neither did I.
Corsetti sighed.
“Sam’s access code was used for every transfer.”
“We know.”
“But Sam was not present for at least four.”
My flower records.
The same thing I had discovered.
“Who was?”
Corsetti looked toward Nicholas.
“That is where this becomes unpleasant.”
Nicholas’s face did not change.
“It was already unpleasant.”
Corsetti continued.
“The money moved through a harbor account connected to an agreement between one of my people and one of yours.”
“Name.”
Corsetti’s smile disappeared.
“I don’t have it.”
Nicholas leaned back.
“You brought my wife here to say you don’t know?”
“I brought your wife here because Sam knew.”
He looked at me.
“And he was trying to prove it.”
My hands turned cold.
“Why didn’t he tell you?”
“He didn’t trust me.”
“Smart.”
Corsetti almost smiled.
“He trusted someone at DeMarco’s table.”
Nicholas’s eyes hardened.
“Who?”
“Ask your uncle.”
Before Nicholas could respond, the dining-room door opened.
A waiter entered with water.
Behind him, voices rose in the hallway.
Not shouting.
Movement.
Fast.
Nicholas stood immediately.
One of Corsetti’s guards reached inside his coat.
The waiter startled.
His tray tipped.
A crystal pitcher hit the tile.
Glass exploded.
I stepped backward.
Pain shot through my foot.
Then another.
I had worn thin-soled boots.
Of course I had.
“Clara.”
Nicholas crossed the room.
“I’m fine.”
“You’re bleeding.”
“I said I’m fine.”
Blood had already darkened the edge of my boot.
The hallway noise settled almost immediately.
False alarm.
A guest had collapsed near the bar.
Nothing to do with us.
Nicholas crouched.
“Can you walk?”
“Yes.”
I tried.
I lied.
His hand went toward my waist.
He stopped before touching me.
“May I?”
I stared.
Now?
Here?
He was asking permission while Corsetti watched.
“Yes.”
Nicholas lifted me.
Not dramatically.
One arm beneath my knees.
One behind my back.
He carried me past three staring men.
The ladies’ room had been closed while staff helped the collapsed guest.
Nicholas pushed open the men’s restroom instead.
He set me on the marble counter.
“Boot.”
“I can do it.”
“Then do it.”
I pulled it off.
A thin piece of glass had gone through the sole near my heel.
Two smaller pieces glittered beneath the arch of my foot.
Nicholas took off his jacket.
Rolled his sleeves.
Then dropped to one knee on another man’s bathroom floor.
I stared.
“Nicholas.”
“Hold still.”
He soaked a clean hand towel with warm water.
His hands were careful.
Almost absurdly so.
This man controlled half the waterfront.
Men lowered their voices when he entered restaurants.
And he was kneeling beneath fluorescent lights washing blood from between my toes.
“There’s glass.”
“I know.”
“You don’t have to do this.”
He looked up.
“Neither did you.”
“What?”
“Come here.”
His voice was quiet.
“You came because Sam mattered more than your fear.”
He picked out the first shard.
“I understand that.”
The second hurt.
I gripped the edge of the counter.
Nicholas immediately stopped.
“Sorry.”
“You didn’t put it there.”
“No.”
“But I still hurt you.”
The sentence hung between us.
He removed the final piece.
Then wrapped my foot in gauze from the club’s first-aid kit.
When he finished, he remained kneeling for one second too long.
I looked down at him.
“Why did you really marry me?”
His eyes held mine.
“Because the last time someone asked me for protection, I made him prove he deserved it.”
Sam.
My throat tightened.
“And he died.”
Nicholas stood.
Before I could answer, the restroom door opened.
Corsetti stood there.
He looked at Nicholas on the floor.
Then at me.
For once, Anthony Corsetti seemed genuinely surprised.
“I brought something else.”
Nicholas stood slowly.
“What?”
Corsetti held out a small brown envelope.
Inside was a silver wristwatch.
Sam’s.
I knew it instantly.
The crystal was cracked.
The leather strap dark with age.
I reached for it with shaking fingers.
“Where did you get this?”
Corsetti looked at Nicholas.
Then me.
“It was delivered to my office the morning after your brother died.”
My blood went cold.
“By who?”
“No name.”
Nicholas examined the envelope.
Corsetti continued.
“But there was a message.”
He turned it over.
Three words were written across the back.
DEBT IS CLOSED.
May you like
And beneath them was a single handwritten letter.
D.
