Chapter 17: Rule Two

I sat at the kitchen table with the lawyer's words still in my ear and Leandro's blood still under my fingernails.

Then my phone lit up with a text from Mother.

Fiorella has her first scan at eleven. Come as family. Mr. Cattaneo is coming too, so wear something respectable.

I read it twice.

"She wants Adriano's father to see it," I said. "She wants a Cattaneo grandchild on a screen."

Leandro was at the stove with a towel pressed to his ribs, making coffee one-handed.

He said nothing, and the quiet was wrong.

I had spent two years learning the exact shape of his silences, and this one was a different shape.

"What?" I said.

"Nothing yet."

"Leandro."

"She isn't pregnant."

The coffee pot went down on the burner.

I stood up, and the chair scraped.

"How long have you known?"

He turned to face me.

"Nine days."

"Nine days," I said.

"I followed Adriano's car on Thursday. It stopped at a private clinic on Lexington. Fiorella went in alone, and she came out ten minutes later."

"I got a photo through the window. She handed the receptionist a bank envelope, and the receptionist handed her a folder."

"I haven't got proof it's a lie. I've got a camera roll and a guess."

"But you thought it was a lie."

"I was nearly sure."

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