Chapter 8
The Hale country house stood thirty miles north.
Warren had not lived there in years.
Preston grew up there.
That was obvious the moment he entered.
His shoulders tightened.
His eyes avoided one corridor.
Giulietta noticed.
“What’s there?”
“Nothing.”
Warren laughed.
Preston looked at him.
“Exactly.”
Giulietta understood.
Some rooms became nothing because memory was easier that way.
The iron room was beneath the old wine cellar.
The black sliver from Lucia’s medal opened it.
Inside were no stacks of documents.
No money.
No weapons.
Objects.
A red scarf.
A broken pearl necklace.
A child’s wooden horse.
A silver flask.
A black leather glove.
Giulietta stared.
“Trophies?”
Warren answered:
“No.”
“Then?”
“Leverage.”
Each object belonged to someone whose family had once owed Warren something.
A reminder.
A proof of access.
A threat without a letter.
Preston walked toward the pearl necklace.
His face changed.
“Mom.”
Warren looked away.
Margaret’s.
Giulietta touched nothing.
At the back stood a small tape machine.
Three tapes.
One labeled LUCIA.
One SAMUEL.
One VITTORIO.
Giulietta’s heart beat harder.
She took Lucia first.
Her mother’s voice.
Older than the Saint Helena recording.
Tired.
“Warren finally agreed to hide this.”
Warren closed his eyes.
Giulietta stared.
“You helped her.”
He said nothing.
The tape continued.
“I do not trust him.”
Warren almost smiled.
“Good.”
Lucia:
“But Warren loves Preston enough to fear Samuel.”
Preston looked at his father.
Warren remained still.
Lucia continued.
“Samuel threatened the boy.”
Warren’s jaw tightened.
There.
A motive beyond greed.
Not innocence.
Complication.
“Warren agreed to help Margaret disappear after he realized Samuel intended to use Preston.”
Preston stared.
“You helped Mom?”
Warren said:
“Once.”
“Why lie?”
“Because she left anyway.”
“That doesn’t answer.”
Warren looked at him.
“Because I hated that fear made me help her.”
Silence.
Giulietta understood the shame.
Men raised to worship control often preferred being called cruel to admitting they were afraid.
Lucia’s recording continued.
“Vittorio knows Samuel is manipulating the war.”
Giulietta felt cold.
“But Vittorio believes he can turn Samuel against whoever stands above him.”
“Who?”
Lucia answered:
“I still don’t know.”
Then:
“Cesare believes Vittorio is becoming Samuel.”
Cesare looked at Giulietta.
She said nothing.
“Cesare wants me to take Giulietta and leave.”
Her uncle closed his eyes.
Giulietta stared.
“You wanted Mom to take me.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t she?”
“I don’t know.”
The tape answered.
“Because I will not teach my daughter that every danger is solved by disappearing.”
Cesare’s face broke slightly.
Lucia continued.
“But if I stay, Giulietta may grow up believing Vittorio’s power is protection.”
Giulietta looked toward the dark wall.
Her mother had feared exactly what she became.
Powerful.
Feared.
Surrounded by armed men.
About to marry into an alliance partly to hunt ghosts.
The tape crackled.
Then Lucia whispered:
“Samuel’s master is coming to the lake house tonight.”
Everyone froze.
“I will finally see him.”
Warren stepped closer.
Lucia continued.
“If I survive, Margaret drives me north.”
“If I don’t…”
A pause.
“…tell Giulietta I chose truth over peace.”
The tape ended.
Giulietta stared.
Samuel’s master had been at the lake house the night of the fire.
The true architect.
She took the tape labeled SAMUEL.
A man’s voice.
“I told you Lucia is becoming dangerous.”
Another man answered.
Older.
Deep.
Giulietta’s blood turned cold.
She knew that voice.
Everyone in the Marconi family did.
Her grandfather.
Alessandro Marconi.
Vittorio and Cesare’s father.
Dead fourteen years.
Giulietta looked at her uncle.
Cesare went white.
“No.”
The recording continued.
Alessandro:
“She is my daughter-in-law.”
Samuel:
“She will destroy Vittorio’s authority.”
Alessandro:
“Then Vittorio should have married a quieter woman.”
Samuel laughed.
Giulietta felt sick.
Her grandfather.
The patriarch whose portrait still hung in the Marconi dining room.
The man who taught Giulietta to play chess.
The man who cried at Lucia’s funeral.
The voice continued.
Alessandro:
“Do not kill her.”
Samuel:
“Then?”
“Frighten her.”
“Separate her from Margaret.”
“Bring her home.”
Samuel:
“And if she refuses?”
A long silence.
Then Alessandro said:
“Make Vittorio choose.”
Giulietta’s hands tightened.
Choose what?
Samuel asked:
“His wife or the family?”
“Yes.”
The tape stopped.
Cesare sat.
“No.”
Giulietta looked at him.
“You didn’t know.”
“No.”
For once, she believed him immediately.
Warren whispered:
“Alessandro.”
Preston looked at his father.
“You knew?”
“Not then.”
“When?”
“Years later.”
“Why hide it?”
Warren laughed bitterly.
“Because by then everyone who could punish Alessandro already kissed his ring.”
Giulietta looked at the tape labeled VITTORIO.
Her father.
May you like
She did not want to play it.
That was why she did.
