Chapter 6 - THE BLUE BOOK
“Because by then, Marco had already spent it.”
Elena felt the words physically.
“No.”
Victor didn’t look away.
“He did.”
“On what?”
“That is the part nobody ever let him explain.”
Elena pushed the blue book toward him.
“Then explain it now.”
Victor looked at the eleven names.
“These weren’t ordinary beneficiaries.”
“Who were they?”
“Families who lost someone during the dock strike.”
Dante frowned.
“The relief fund already paid them.”
“Officially.”
Victor shook his head.
“Not enough.”
He pointed at the first name.
“Anna Keller. Husband crushed during a loading accident.”
Second.
“Josephine Ramires. Son died after an untreated infection.”
Third.
“Maria Salvo. Two children.”
Elena’s throat tightened.
“Marco gave them the money.”
“Yes.”
“All one hundred eighty thousand?”
“Over three years.”
Dante looked at Enzo.
“You didn’t know?”
“No.”
Victor continued.
“He used cash whenever he could. Money orders for the rest. He never wanted the payments traced back to Moretti.”
“Why?”
“Because Salvatore’s agreement with the Russos said no additional compensation would be paid.”
Dante’s expression darkened.
“My father negotiated limits on payments to our own workers?”
“To stop lawsuits and keep the docks open.”
Enzo spoke quietly.
“Salvatore believed if one family received more, every claim reopened.”
Elena looked at the blue book.
“So Marco ignored him.”
“Yes.”
Victor almost smiled.
“That was Marco.”
Elena’s anger shifted.
Not disappeared.
Shifted.
“Then why did our savings disappear?”
Victor looked at her.
“Because the one hundred eighty thousand wasn’t enough.”
She stared.
“No.”
“He added his own money.”
“How much?”
“Almost ninety thousand.”
Elena stood.
The chair scraped hard against the floor.
“Ninety thousand dollars?”
Dante said her name.
She held up one hand.
“Don’t.”
She looked at Victor.
“That was our house down payment.”
“Yes.”
“That was Mia’s college account.”
Victor’s expression tightened.
“Yes.”
“He gave it away?”
“To those families.”
“Without telling me.”
“Yes.”
Elena turned away.
For days she had been discovering ways Marco had been honorable.
Now she finally found the part that hurt.
He had protected strangers with money that belonged to his wife and child too.
“He had no right.”
Victor said nothing.
“He had no right.”
“No.”
That mattered.
Nobody tried to make Marco into a saint.
Elena sat again.
“I would have helped.”
“I think he knew that.”
“Then why didn’t he ask?”
Victor’s answer came softly.
“Because he thought loving you meant keeping you clean from the choices he made.”
Elena laughed bitterly.
“And after he died, I got all the consequences anyway.”
“Yes.”
Dante looked at the book.
“Marco told me once that secrecy was just fear wearing a suit.”
Elena looked at him.
“He said that?”
“Yes.”
“He apparently owned a lot of suits.”
For the first time, Dante smiled openly.
It vanished quickly.
Mia had been listening from across the room.
Not understanding the money.
Only the emotion.
“Was Daddy bad?”
Elena’s heart broke.
She opened her arms.
Mia came immediately.
“No, baby.”
“But you’re mad.”
“Yes.”
“Can you be mad at somebody who died?”
Elena held her tightly.
“Very.”
Mia thought about that against her shoulder.
“Okay.”
Then she whispered, “I’m mad he didn’t say bye.”
Elena closed her eyes.
“So am I.”
Dante looked away.
Giving them privacy again.
After Mia returned to coloring, Elena examined the blue book.
Eleven names.
Ten had check marks.
One did not.
Rebecca Halloran — $24,000.
“Why wasn’t this one paid?”
Victor looked.
“I don’t know.”
Dante did.
“Halloran.”
Everyone looked at him.
“Patrick Halloran worked for the Russos.”
Enzo nodded slowly.
“He switched sides during the strike.”
Dante’s face hardened.
“His widow wouldn’t have been eligible.”
“Marco thought she was.”
Victor pointed to the amount.
“Apparently.”
Elena noticed a photograph tucked farther inside the book.
Marco stood beside a woman holding a little boy.
The boy looked six or seven.
On the back:
REBECCA DOESN’T KNOW WHAT PATRICK DID.
THE CHILD SHOULDN’T PAY FOR HIS FATHER.
Elena stared at it.
Of course Marco would write that.
“What happened to them?”
Victor shook his head.
“No idea.”
Dante asked Marco’s old investigators to locate Rebecca Halloran.
This time Elena did not object.
She understood the urgency.
By evening they had an answer.
Rebecca was alive.
Living outside Chicago.
Her son, Michael, was now twenty-two.
And four years earlier, three weeks after Marco died, Rebecca received exactly twenty-four thousand dollars.
Elena frowned.
“Then he finished the list.”
Dante looked at the payment record.
“No.”
“What?”
“The money arrived after Marco died.”
“Who sent it?”
“No name.”
Victor slowly sat down.
“Then somebody knew about the book.”
Elena looked around the room.
“Who?”
Enzo.
Victor.
Maybe Salvatore before his death.
Margaret Salvi.
And Marco.
But someone else had found the final unpaid family and completed his work after he was gone.
Dante said, “Marco wasn’t the only person repairing the fund.”
Elena stared at the final check mark.
“Maybe the person who framed him felt guilty.”
Enzo’s expression changed.
“Or wanted the list finished so no beneficiary would start asking questions.”
Both were possible.
Answer one.
Open two.
Elena turned another page.
A child’s drawing slipped out.
Mia gasped.
“I made that!”
Elena recognized it.
Three-year-old Mia had drawn four figures beneath an enormous yellow sun.
Mama.
Daddy.
Mia.
And one tall man in black.
Marco had written names beneath three.
The fourth had no name.
Only the letter D.
Mia crawled closer.
“That’s Daddy’s friend.”
Elena looked at her.
“You remember him?”
“I remember his car.”
Dante stared at the drawing.
“What car?”
“Big black one.”
A dozen men in Marco’s life had driven black cars.
Then Mia added:
“He gave Daddy the red box.”
Victor stood so fast his chair nearly fell.
“What red box?”
Mia shrugged.
“I don’t know.”
“Where?”
“At our old house.”
Elena’s pulse accelerated.
“Mia, was it before Daddy died?”
She nodded.
“I think.”
“Who brought it?”
Mia pointed at the nameless figure.
“Him.”
Elena looked at Dante.
“D.”
Dante’s expression changed.
“There was one other man Marco trusted whose name started with D.”
“Who?”
“Daniel Russo.”
Enzo swore quietly.
Elena stared.
“Russo?”
Dante nodded.
“The enemy family?”
“Yes.”
“Marco trusted one of them?”
“Daniel and Marco went to school together.”
Elena could barely believe another hidden life remained.
“What was in the red box?”
Mia looked annoyed.
“I was three.”
Elena pulled her close.
“You’re right.”
Dante crouched near her.
“Do you remember what Daddy did with it?”
Mia thought.
Then she pointed toward Elena.
“Mommy has it.”
Elena frowned.
“I don’t.”
“Yes.”
Mia touched Elena’s chest.
“Your pretty necklace.”
Elena stopped breathing.
She wore only one necklace.
A thin gold chain Marco gave her on their fifth anniversary.
A small oval locket rested against her skin.
She had never opened it.
Marco told her it had been his mother’s and the hinge was broken.
Dante stared at it.
“Elena.”
Her fingers trembled as she lifted the locket.
The hinge wasn’t broken.
It was sealed.
Victor found a thin blade.
The gold edge clicked.
Inside was no photograph.
Only a tiny rectangle of red velvet.
And pressed into the velvet—
A small brass key.
Dante stared at it.
“I know that key.”
Elena looked at him.
“What does it open?”
“Marco’s private drawer at the old Moretti house.”
Enzo’s face changed.
“That drawer was emptied after his death.”
Dante looked at his uncle.
“By whom?”
Enzo said nothing.
“Who emptied it?”
Finally, Enzo answered.
“Your father.”
Dante stared at him.
“My father had been dead three months when Marco died.”
Enzo slowly closed his eyes.
And Elena realized he had just made a mistake.
Dante’s voice became frighteningly calm.
May you like
“You’ve been lying about when Salvatore died.”
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