Chapter 11: Compensation

My mother stood in the gatehouse with her hands folded over her purse.

She had come in a gray coat I had never seen. Her hair was pinned badly, and she wore no pearls.

Ruggiero's guards had searched her bag twice. Four of them stood in a ring around her, and she looked at none of them.

She looked at me.

"Nerina," she said.

I stopped ten feet away.

Ruggiero stood at my shoulder. I could feel him there, not touching me.

"You're not allowed in here," I said.

"I know."

"You were told to stay at home."

"I know that too." She swallowed. "I told Ettore I was going to church."

I did not answer.

"I want to see Costanza," my mother said.

"No."

"Nerina, please."

"She's alive because a Falsetti doctor sat up all night with her. You were not there."

My mother's face crumpled.

She did not cry the way Fabrizio had. She cried badly, with no practice.

"I should have been," she said. "I know it."

"You knew about the folder."

"Yes."

"You knew about the waiver, and the clinic. You knew they'd take my heart out on Saturday, on my birthday."

"Yes."

"You told my father to be gentler with me." My voice shook, and I let it. "You said it was compensation."

My mother closed her eyes.

"I said that," she said. "I did."

The guards around her had gone very still.

"I was frightened," she said. "Costanza was going to die."

"So you chose which daughter would."

Nobody moved.

My mother's mouth opened and closed.

"I never thought," she said. "It was Ettore. It was always Ettore. I only..."

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