Carter Reed novel · Chapter 22 of 24
Chapter 22: Giorgio Falls
St. Lucy's held ninety people on the Sunday before Thanksgiving.
Every one of them sat as far from the front as the pews would let them.
Giorgio knelt in the first row, alone, in a black overcoat.
The casket was long gone.
Nico's photograph still stood on its easel beside the altar, the same smiling boy in a rowing sweater.
The soldiers who used to line the steps had stayed home.
I sat in the fourth pew from the back with Carter on my left and Tori on my right.
Her sling was off, and she kept rolling the shoulder when she thought nobody could see.
Behind us the ten women filled two benches.
They had come in plain coats, and none of them looked at the front.
By the side door a man in a grey raincoat held a phone against his chest.
He was a reporter, and I had written to him on the same night I wrote to the others.
The priest began the old words.
Giorgio's lips moved with them, soft and steady, a man at the end of a long road finding his stride.
Then the side door at the back opened, and a woman came in.
She was small and old, in a black wool coat with a fur collar.
She walked with two canes.
A man in a plain dark suit held her elbow.
A second man in a plain dark suit followed, with a badge clipped at his belt.
The rest of this chapter is part of the paid portion of the series. Chapters 1–12 of Carter Reed are free to read — start from the beginning, then unlock the rest with coins in the app.
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