Chapter 10: What Tancredi Kept

Tancredi's POV

She called me at 12:40 in the morning.

"I need somewhere quiet," she said, and hung up.

I was already driving.

I had been sitting in the hospital lot for two hours with the engine off, watching the glass doors.

I told myself I was there because she'd walked into a bad night.

That was true, and it was not why I stayed.

I took her to the room above the warehouse, the one I used when the cage ran late.

It had a bed, a hot plate and a window onto the loading dock.

She stood in the doorway with her arms wrapped around herself and told me what her sister had said.

She told it flat, in order, with her voice not rising once.

I listened to every word.

When she finished I said, "Sit down before you fall down."

She sat on the edge of the bed with her shoes still on.

"I'm not going to sign it," she said.

"I didn't think you would."

"But I can't let them put Corrado in a cell."

"Last week you'd have let them."

"Last week he hadn't taken a bus," she said.

The corner of my mouth went up before I could stop it.

I went to the hot plate and put the kettle on, because it gave my hands something to do.

She lay back across the bed with her boots hanging off the side, and she shut her eyes.

Within a minute she was asleep.

I stood beside the kettle, listening to her breathe.

It was only then that I let myself look at what I had done.

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