Bound by Honor novel · Chapter 8 of 24

Chapter 8: The Tow Yard Sheet

Dario had stolen more than the tow yard sheet.

From the lining of his coat he drew a stack of ledger pages.

He laid them in a row under the kitchen lamp.

"Eleven pages," he said. "I didn't dare take the whole book."

"That was smart."

"That was terror. I could feel my pulse in my teeth."

I pulled a stool to the long table and sat down.

Nonna's kitchen was dark except for our lamp, and the old stove ticked as it cooled.

"Pen," I said.

He gave me one.

I began to read.

The pages were Silvio's black-book hand again, slanted and neat, covering two years of the Red Hook docks.

I ran my finger down the columns.

Containers in.

Containers out.

Fees collected.

Fees paid.

At the third page, I stopped.

"Here."

"What?"

"Every quarter, a line called 'adjustments.' See? Eight hundred containers in the spring, eight hundred in the fall."

"That's sixteen hundred."

"Per year. And each time, the cash for them goes somewhere that isn't the family account."

I ran my pen down to the right-hand column.

Beside each cash payment was a payee, and the payees repeated.

There were three names on the list, paid month by month.

The first was a port inspector.

The second was a police sergeant in Queens.

The third was a county medical examiner.

"Silvio paid the medical examiner," I said slowly, "four weeks before your fiancee's crash, and then again the week after."

Dario had gone white.

"Say that again."

"I'm saying he was already paying that man. Before."

"It wasn't a favor for her car."

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