Chapter 2 - THE DEBT CARLO LEFT BEHIND
Luca returned the next morning.
Not for pie.
Rose knew because he arrived without the white bakery box and with an eighty-two-year-old woman wearing a red wool coat, pearls, and an expression that suggested the building belonged to her.
Carmela Benedetti looked at Rose for five seconds.
Then said:
“You have Helena’s hips.”
Rose nearly dropped a tray.
“Excuse me?”
Luca closed his eyes.
“Nonna.”
“What? She does.”
Rose looked between them.
“Who is Helena?”
Carmela smiled.
“Your grandmother.”
That erased every joke Rose had prepared.
“My grandmother’s name was Helen.”
“Helena Kowalik before American paperwork flattened everything interesting.”
Carmela sat at a café table without being invited.
“Coffee.”
Rose stared.
Luca sighed.
“She does this.”
“I noticed.”
Rose poured coffee.
Carmela tasted it.
“Too weak.”
“Then suffer.”
Luca actually laughed.
Carmela looked delighted.
“You are definitely Helena’s.”
Then she placed a small brass key on the table.
Rose did not touch it.
“What is that?”
“Something Carlo wanted your father to have.”
“My father died seven years ago.”
“I know.”
The old woman’s expression softened.
“So did Carlo.”
“Last month.”
“Yes.”
Luca stood beside her.
Rose noticed he did not interrupt now.
Carmela continued.
“Forty years ago, Stanley Kowalik saved Carlo’s life.”
“How?”
“Warehouse fire.”
Rose frowned.
Dad had never mentioned it.
“Carlo was trapped. Your father went back inside.”
“That sounds like him.”
“He carried Carlo out and nearly died doing it.”
Carmela slid the key closer.
“Afterward, Carlo promised Stanley ten percent of a distribution company they were building.”
Rose almost laughed.
“My father owned part of a Benedetti company?”
“He was supposed to.”
“Supposed to?”
Carmela’s face hardened.
“Carlo’s brother made certain he never received it.”
Luca looked surprised.
“You never told me that.”
“You never asked the right questions.”
Rose looked at the key.
“What does it open?”
“A safe-deposit box.”
“Containing?”
“Carlo’s original partnership agreement.”
Rose’s pulse changed.
Her bakery was three months behind on the equipment loan.
Tessa’s college scholarship depended on a financial-aid gap Rose had no idea how to fill.
Ten percent of anything Benedetti-related sounded impossible.
Which meant dangerous.
“I don’t want charity.”
Carmela slapped the table.
“Good. Because this is debt.”
Rose finally picked up the key.
Then the bakery door opened.
A blonde woman in a camel coat entered.
Perfect makeup.
Perfect posture.
Her eyes landed on Luca first.
Then Rose.
Something unpleasant flashed across her face.
“Luca.”
His jaw tightened.
“Serena.”
Carmela muttered something in Italian that did not sound charitable.
Serena smiled at Rose.
“So this is the pie girl.”
Rose disliked her immediately.
Then Serena noticed the brass key in Rose’s hand.
May you like
Her smile disappeared.
And Rose understood that Serena knew exactly what the key could unlock.
