Chapter 10 - Anton’s Aunt Had Chosen Me for a Reason
I met Lucia Marquetti on a Sunday.
She was seventy-nine, wore red lipstick before breakfast, and opened her front door by saying, “You are thinner than your photograph.”
I looked at Anton.
He looked at the ceiling.
“Aunt Lucia.”
“What? She is beautiful. Thin is not an insult.”
“Hello,” I said.
Lucia pulled me into a hug.
Anton sighed.
“You’ve known her eleven seconds.”
“Long enough.”
Lucia lived in a townhouse filled with family photographs, religious candles, antique furniture, and enough food to feed a small military unit.
She served pasta at noon.
Anton’s daughter, Elena, joined us.
Elena was twenty-six, a pediatric nurse, and inherited her father’s eyes without his intimidating silence.
“So,” she said, sitting beside me, “you’re the library woman.”
Anton frowned.
“I have a name.”
“No one was speaking about you.”
Lucia smiled.
“I told him to meet you.”
I looked at her.
“I’ve wanted to ask about that.”
Anton groaned.
Lucia waved him away.
“He needed somebody normal.”
“Aunt.”
“What? His last date owned a crystal company and asked whether his aura was financially blocked.”
Elena burst out laughing.
I tried not to.
Failed.
Anton looked betrayed.
“Please continue discussing my humiliation.”
Lucia pointed her fork at him.
“You see? He jokes now.”
Then she turned to me.
“I knew your work.”
I stopped.
“How?”
Lucia’s expression softened.
“My friend Teresa.”
The name was familiar.
“Teresa Marano?”
“Yes.”
I knew her.
Teresa had died the previous winter.
She had been one of our homebound readers.
Every two weeks I delivered romance novels to her apartment.
She always complained the heroes were too young.
“She talked about you,” Lucia said.
My throat tightened.
“She was wonderful.”
“She said you brought books when snow came.”
“That was my job.”
“No.”
Lucia shook her head.
“Your job was to leave them downstairs with the doorman. You came upstairs. You made tea.”
I remembered Teresa’s tiny kitchen.
Her terrible instant coffee.
“She was lonely.”
“Yes.”
Lucia reached across the table.
“When Teresa became sick, you found the audio books because she could not hold paper anymore.”
I looked down.
Anton was watching me.
Lucia continued.
“When my nephew complained that I tried to arrange dates, I remembered you.”
“You matched us because I delivered books?”
“I matched you because you stayed.”
The room became quiet.
“People always come when somebody is important,” Lucia said. “Character is who comes when nobody important is watching.”
Anton lowered his eyes.
I felt suddenly emotional.
After lunch, Elena showed me childhood photographs of Anton.
He threatened disinheritance.
She reminded him she had her own salary.
For two hours, we were almost normal.
Then Lucia asked me to help carry dishes into the kitchen.
The moment we were alone, her expression changed.
“You are in trouble.”
It was not a question.
“I’m dealing with something.”
“With the man who hurt you?”
I looked toward the dining room.
“Anton told you?”
“My nephew tells me nothing. I discover everything.”
Of course.
“He cares about you,” she said.
“I care about him.”
“That frightens him.”
“Why?”
Lucia rinsed a plate.
“Because Anton believes everyone near him eventually pays for being near him.”
I thought about his wife.
His reputation.
His daughter.
“He told me about Maria.”
Lucia stopped.
“He did?”
“Yes.”
“That is rare.”
“What happened?”
She considered.
Then shook her head.
“His story to tell.”
Fair.
“But I will tell you this.”
She lowered her voice.
“Anton has spent many years believing fear and respect are the same protection.”
I listened.
“They are not.”
“What protects him?”
Lucia smiled sadly.
“Very little.”
Later, Anton drove me home.
Halfway there I said, “Your aunt knew Teresa.”
“Yes.”
“You knew that before our date?”
“Not until Lucia told me afterward.”
“So the match really was random.”
“Nothing Lucia does is random.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Yes.”
He glanced toward me.
“She chose you because Teresa loved you.”
I looked out at the city.
“That somehow feels more intimidating than an algorithm.”
“It should.”
We stopped at a red light.
“Anton.”
“Yes?”
“Why did your marriage end?”
His hands tightened slightly on the steering wheel.
“You already know.”
“I know about the affair.”
“That was the end.”
“What was the beginning?”
The light turned green.
He drove another block.
Then pulled over.
He turned off the engine.
“My wife was afraid of me.”
I stared.
“Did you hurt her?”
“No.”
The answer was immediate.
“But she was afraid of the world around me.”
“What world?”
Anton leaned back.
“My father built businesses through methods I would not defend today.”
There it was.
The closest he had ever come to confirming the stories.
“When I was young, I believed loyalty excused many things.”
“What things?”
“Pressure. Threats. Favors that were not really favors.”
He looked at his hands.
“I changed the companies after my father died. Not all at once. Not cleanly enough.”
“Maria wanted out?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you leave?”
“Pride.”
His voice became quiet.
“I thought if I became legitimate enough, respectable enough, powerful enough, she would stop being afraid.”
“But?”
“Power was the thing she feared.”
I understood.
“And now Derek’s fraud touches your companies.”
“Yes.”
“Does that scare you?”
“More than you know.”
“Why?”
“Because I spent fifteen years telling myself I had removed men who behaved like my father.”
He looked at me.
“Then Victor Salvi hid a criminal network inside a company with my name on the door.”
The shame in his voice mirrored mine.
They used me.
They used him.
Different lives.
Same wound.
I reached over and took his hand.
“You didn’t know.”
He laughed once.
“That phrase again.”
“I hate it less now.”
He looked at our hands.
“So do I.”
Then his phone rang.
Julia.
Anton answered.
His expression hardened.
“What happened?”
He listened.
Then looked at me.
“Derek filed a statement.”
My stomach tightened.
“About what?”
Anton ended the call.
“He says the outreach database was given to him voluntarily.”
“By who?”
His eyes stayed on mine.
May you like
“You.”
---
