Chapter 21: Play

The speaker was small, and it filled the room.

A door, a rustle of cloth, and the clink of a coffee cup.

Then Rocco's voice, easy and warm.

"Don't cry, Fiorella. It spoils your face."

At the foot of the table, the live Rocco smiled.

"Obviously edited," he told the board. "Anyone can build a voice these days."

Nobody answered him.

The recording went on.

I did not need to listen to it again.

I watched the faces instead.

The director in the red tie sat with his pen halfway to his mouth, and it did not come down.

The woman on the left had her hand pressed flat to her collar.

A man in the middle put his head in both hands at the words "Zurich," and did not lift it.

The older department manager at the far end of the table was crying openly.

He did not wipe it.

Behind me, in the front chair against the wall, Fiorella sat without moving.

I could hear her breathing, short and even, counting.

"Five," said the voice from the table, small and broken.

"Good girl," said Rocco's voice.

The live Rocco stopped smiling.

"Turn it off," he said.

"I'll laugh," the recording said, pleasantly. "It'll look like family. Everyone will see she had it coming."

"Turn that off."

He was on his feet.

His chair went over behind him.

He came down the length of the table with his hand out for the phone, quick and graceful, and I did not move.

I did not have to.

The flat-nosed man caught his right arm above the elbow.

A second man caught his left.

The third stepped in behind them and held his collar.

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