Chapter 11 - THE WOMAN WHO CAME BACK
Rosa played the message twice.
Alessandro reached for his phone.
She caught his hand.
“Call Brooks. Don’t go running into this.”
He looked at her.
Then he called.
Isabella was found at a hotel outside White Plains.
She refused to speak to local officers until Maya arrived.
Maya called Rosa from the hallway.
“She has a bruised face and a flash drive.”
“Does she need a hospital?”
“She’s been checked. She’s asking for you.”
Rosa stared through the nursery window.
Lily was asleep beneath a blanket covered in stars.
“No,” she said first.
Then she remembered the photograph of Elena.
The split lip.
The silence afterward.
“I’ll come. With you.”
Isabella sat on the edge of the hotel bed wearing yesterday’s blouse.
Without the perfect hair and the jewelry, she looked younger.
She stood when Rosa entered.
Rosa remained near the door.
“Talk.”
“My father wants me out of the country.”
“Then go.”
“He isn’t sending me somewhere safe.”
Isabella’s mouth trembled.
“I heard him talking to Vittorio. They said I’d become unreliable.”
Rosa folded her arms.
“Were you involved in taking my daughter?”
“I told the guard the order was approved.”
“Did you know where they were taking her?”
“No.”
“Did you ask?”
Isabella looked down.
“No.”
That answer settled between them.
Ugly.
Useful.
“I thought they would scare you into leaving.”
“You called her filthy.”
Isabella began to cry.
Rosa’s voice stayed level.
“She offered you a button.”
“I know.”
“She thought you were someone safe.”
“I know.”
“No. You don’t get to rush through this because now you’re scared too.”
Isabella wiped her face.
Then she held out the flash drive.
“Copies of my father’s schedules. Payments. Messages between him and Vittorio. I saved them because I wanted insurance.”
Maya took it.
Isabella looked at Rosa.
“Will you tell Alessandro I helped?”
“I’ll tell the truth.”
“Will he forgive me?”
“That isn’t what this is for.”
Outside, Agent Brooks took custody of the drive.
Before Rosa left, Isabella spoke again.
“There’s someone inside the estate. My father calls him Sunday.”
Rosa stopped.
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
But Rosa did know one thing.
May you like
Every Sunday, the same man took Lily’s drawings down from the kitchen wall and replaced them with new ones.
A man everyone trusted.
