Chapter 11: Four Men

Luciano's phone started ringing before the anchor finished the sentence.

He looked at the screen and didn't answer.

It rang again.

Rosalba's phone rang.

Then the house phone on the wall, the old yellow one with the curly cord that nobody ever used.

Nonna picked it up, listened, spoke a word in Italian, and hung it up again.

"What did she say?" I whispered.

"She said we're eating," Rosalba said.

By nine there were three cars outside the gate.

By ten the young capo was standing in the kitchen with his gold chain swinging, shouting.

"Three days! Her book puts our judge in a chapter, and three days later he's in cuffs!"

"Two days," I said.

"Shut up!"

Luciano didn't move from the head of the table.

He didn't raise his voice either.

"Say that to my wife again," he said. "In my house."

The young capo went red to his shaved scalp.

He didn't say it again.

The baker stood in the doorway, turning his hat in his floury hands.

"Lu. They're saying she's a plant. The feds put a girl on an app to get close to you."

"Who's saying?"

The baker's eyes slid away.

"People."

"My uncle."

"People, Lu."

The old man with the cane came in last, slowly, and sat down at the table without being asked.

Nonna put a cup of espresso in front of him.

He drank it.

"The judge had a wife and four kids," he said. "He was ours for nineteen years. Somebody gave him up."

He looked at me.

"Twenty-eight days left, signora. The table is counting."

When they'd all gone, I wiped Nonna's grocery list off the whiteboard by the pantry.

"I liked that list," Rosalba said.

"I'll rewrite it. Pen."

She gave me a red marker.

I wrote CHAPTER FIFTEEN at the top and underlined it twice.

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