Chapter 32: Keep Him

Carla found me in the office at seven in the morning, before the housekeeper had opened the blinds.

She sat in the chair across the desk, with her bag on her knees.

She was wearing the same pale blue dress.

"I've been up all night," she said. "I wanted to say it before I lost my nerve."

"Go on."

"I'm going back to Sullivan County."

I put down my pen.

"To the farm."

"To Cesare."

"He has no ring, no seat and no money. The old man has him cleaning a barn."

"I know." She smiled, and it was small, tired and real.

"I looked at him in the back of that car, with his wrist in a towel.

"He was the most honest I've ever seen him.

"He had nothing, and I had nothing, and neither of us was pretending."

"You're telling me you love him."

"I'm telling you I don't know what I feel. I'd like to find out where nobody is watching."

She looked at her hands.

"I took everything you picked, Gemma, for twenty-five years.

"I'm asking for the one thing you threw away."

I waited.

"Will you let me keep him?"

The question sat between us on the desk.

I thought of the version of me who had died on Atlantic Avenue for that man.

I thought of the photograph in the black mask.

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