The Don Chose His Mistress, So I Chose His Enemy novel · Chapter 14 of 24

Chapter 14: The Kitchen Table

The safe house in Gary was a two-story frame house with a beagle asleep on the porch.

Fourteen people from three families sat in the kitchen eating soup, and every one of them stopped talking when I came in.

Paola waited in the back bedroom on top of the bedspread, still in her cream cardigan.

Maeve shut the door and stood against it with her arms folded.

"I'll be here," she said. "Say what you came to say."

I took the chair by the window.

"Start with the kitchen," I said.

Paola nodded fast, relieved to be asked.

"My mother's kidneys failed three years ago in March. The clinic wanted money before the first treatment."

"I know that. Papa's driver took her."

"Your father came to our kitchen himself, the week before." Her voice was small and steady. "He sat at my mother's table and ate her bread and asked what she needed."

"And you said."

"I said we had nothing."

"And the next morning the bills were gone." She pressed her palms into the bedspread. "Then he said there was something I could do for you."

"For me."

"He said Renato was drifting. That there were women in clubs who talked, and a man like that needed someone gentle who would tell your father where he went."

"Tell him."

"Only where he went and who he saw. I did it for a year before anything else happened. Giulia, I swear I never touched him."

"And the Christmas party?"

"He told me to stay late and be kind." She was crying again, silently. "I was supposed to be kind and nothing more."

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