Chapter 4 - THE CHILD IN SALVATORE'S PHOTOGRAPH
I laughed because the alternative was screaming.
“You think your father is my father?”
“No.”
Gabriel answered too quickly.
“Then why is he standing beside my mother when I'm a newborn?”
“We don't know that it's him.”
“You recognized the ring.”
“So did half of New York twenty years ago.”
Not comforting.
We took the photograph to Salvatore.
The moment he saw it, he dismissed everyone from his study.
Even Gabriel's guards.
Then he sat behind his desk and looked suddenly very old.
“Elena brought you to me once.”
I stopped breathing.
“When?”
“You were six weeks old.”
“Why?”
“She needed protection.”
“From Vittorio?”
“Yes.”
Gabriel folded his arms.
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“You never asked whether I knew Tessa as an infant.”
“That is not a normal question.”
Fair.
Salvatore looked at me.
“Your mother worked briefly for Rossi Imports.”
“Accounting?”
“Translation.”
Elena spoke English, Italian, Sicilian, and French.
She overheard things men assumed women didn't understand.
Just like me.
That realization felt strange.
“Vittorio was moving money through the docks. Worse than money.”
“What?”
Salvatore hesitated.
“People.”
Gabriel's face hardened.
“Trafficking?”
Salvatore nodded.
He had discovered his own brother was using Rossi shipping routes to move vulnerable immigrants and forged labor contracts.
Antonio helped collect evidence.
Elena translated records.
Vittorio discovered it.
Then Elena became pregnant.
“Who was my father?”
Salvatore's gaze moved toward the torn photograph.
“Not me.”
“Then who?”
Before he could answer, the study door opened.
A man I had never seen stepped inside.
Late sixties.
Silver hair.
Beautiful suit.
Salvatore rose so fast his cane fell.
Gabriel moved in front of me.
The stranger smiled.
“Still dramatic, brother?”
My stomach turned.
“Vittorio?”
Salvatore's face became stone.
“You're dead.”
Vittorio smiled wider.
“Apparently not.”
He looked directly at me.
Twenty-nine years of absence sat inside that stare.
Then he said:
“Elena's daughter.”
Gabriel blocked his view.
Vittorio laughed.
“You really haven't told her?”
Salvatore reached for the desk.
“Get out.”
“No.”
Vittorio looked at me again.
“I came because Tessa deserves to know why Elena ran.”
I forced myself to ask.
“Who was my father?”
May you like
Vittorio's answer came softly.
“Antonio Cosenza.”
