Chapter 16: The Second Book

The text came from Domenico's own phone at ten past six, while the captains were still standing around the long table.

Pier Four, the warehouse. Nine tonight. Bring the second book and come alone, Cari.

I held the screen out to the gray-haired captain, and I watched his face change.

"That's a trap," he said.

"Yes."

"You can't go."

"He wants me alone because he wants a room with no witnesses," I said. "I'm going to give him the wrong room."

An envelope had reached Agnese's hand at seven, driven out from Newark by a man who would not give his name.

I read the deed twice, and then I read the single line on the Santangelo letterhead once.

Agnese watched me read it, and she said nothing.

"Rule one," I said to nobody. "I can leave whenever I like."

At nine I walked into the Pier Four warehouse alone.

The second ledger was under my arm, and the iron ring was on my hand.

The gray-haired captain's cars sat dark on the road a half mile back, with their lights off and their phones open.

The warehouse smelled of tar and cold water.

A single bank of lamps lit the center of the floor.

Paolo had set a long table under it.

At the table sat the men of the three allied families, the same ones who had watched me at the portrait.

They had been told this was the signing of the Greco port.

Domenico sat on a steel chair behind Paolo with his wrists bound and a split lip.

His green eyes found mine across the floor and held, and nothing else about him moved.

"Cari," Paolo said, and stood with his arms open. "There she is. Gentlemen, my sister."

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