Chapter 10: Her Own Words

I held the rest back in Winnie's kitchen.

I smiled, I drank my tea, and I said I had to go and open the window.

Bianca said she'd walk down with me.

She looped her arm through mine on the way, bright and chatty, and I let her.

It was half past nine, and the line at the window was already ten deep.

I stepped behind the counter and put on my apron.

Bianca stood in front of it with her hands folded and the sunlight in her curls, smiling at everyone in line.

"Two coffees, please," she told the nearest fisherman, who had not asked. "I'll pay for the whole line. Rocco insisted."

"No, you won't," I said.

She laughed.

"Orla, don't be proud."

"Who did you send the photograph to?"

The laugh stopped.

"What?"

"Eli's photograph. You took three of him at the gate, and you sent them somewhere. I saw the name."

"I sent them to my mother."

"Your mother is not Carmine Sarno."

A fisherman near the front put down his paper cup.

The line behind him went quiet in a ripple, from the front to the back.

"You're upset," Bianca said, and lowered her voice. "Let's not do this in front of everyone."

"You came here to apologize in front of everyone."

"I came to help you."

"You came to find out who I'm sleeping with and tell Rocco's father."

Several heads turned toward her.

She put a hand to her chest.

"I think you've had a very hard week."

I took out my phone.

I had the screen recording ready, thirty seconds long, the group chat scrolling slowly from the top.

I held it up so the whole line could see it, and I read it out.

"At 4:12, Bianca wrote: She'll wait. She always does."

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