Chapter 2 - The Woman Who Wasn’t Afraid of Vincent Rossi
I reached Matteo's bedroom in under a minute.
Dominic followed.
Two guards came behind us.
I opened the door too hard.
Clara stood beside the bed.
Matteo flinched.
That stopped me more effectively than any weapon could have.
I released the door handle.
“Matteo.”
His eyes dropped.
Fourteen months.
Fourteen months of silence.
And the first thing I had done after hearing my son's voice was storm into the room like I was interrogating an enemy.
Clara looked at me.
Not afraid.
Disappointed.
That somehow felt worse.
“Everybody out,” I said.
Dominic hesitated.
“Vincent—”
“Out.”
The guards left.
Dominic followed.
Clara remained.
I looked at her.
“You too.”
“No.”
My head turned slowly.
“No?”
“Not yet.”
I stepped closer.
“My son just said he remembers something about the bombing that killed his mother.”
“And he said it during a moment when he finally felt safe enough to speak.”
“My family doesn't need your permission to talk.”
“No. But Matteo needs yours to stop.”
I stared at her.
She lowered her voice.
“If you turn this into an interrogation, he may close up again.”
I wanted to tell her she knew nothing about my son.
But the truth was standing three feet away.
She had gotten more words out of him in four days than I had in months.
So I did something men in my position rarely did.
I listened.
Clara pulled a chair beside Matteo.
“Your dad wants to sit with you.”
Matteo looked at me.
That glance hurt.
There was fear in it.
Not fear of what I would do to him.
Fear of what his memory might do to me.
I sat.
For several seconds no one spoke.
Then I said, “You don't have to tell me anything tonight.”
Matteo's eyebrows lifted.
Clara had been right.
He expected pressure.
I swallowed.
“I just… wanted to hear your voice.”
His eyes filled.
Mine nearly did too.
“Dad.”
One word.
It broke whatever remained of the wall I had built inside myself.
I reached toward him, then stopped before touching his shoulder.
Matteo noticed.
Slowly, he lifted his hand.
I took it.
His fingers were small and cold.
“I miss Mom,” he whispered.
I closed my eyes.
“So do I.”
He began crying.
Not violently.
Silently.
I moved closer and pulled him against me.
He buried his face against my chest.
For the first time since Elena's funeral, I allowed myself to hold my son without thinking about doctors, assassins, security risks, or what vengeance I still owed the world.
I simply held him.
Clara turned away to give us privacy.
Later, after Matteo fell asleep, I found her downstairs.
She was packing her things.
“Where are you going?”
“Home.”
“You leave at seven.”
She checked the clock.
“It is seven.”
“You're coming back tomorrow?”
“If I still have a job.”
“Why wouldn't you?”
She looked at me.
“Because I told your son he hates the way you look at him.”
“That was a dangerous thing to say.”
“It was true.”
“You enjoy being difficult.”
“No. Difficult pays badly.”
Despite myself, I nearly smiled.
Then her expression changed.
“You need to understand something.”
“What?”
“Matteo remembering part of the explosion doesn't mean he remembers everything accurately.”
“I know.”
“Trauma fragments memory.”
“I said I know.”
“Then act like it.”
My jaw tightened.
Clara picked up her coat.
“He is eight years old. He watched his mother die. He woke up unable to move his legs. Whatever he remembers needs to come out slowly.”
“I'm not going to hurt my son.”
“I didn't say you would.”
“You implied it.”
“I think you'll hurt yourself.”
That silenced me.
Clara slipped on her coat.
“You've built sixty acres of security around a child who already survived the worst thing that could happen to him.”
She looked toward the staircase.
“Maybe what he needs now isn't more protection.”
“What does he need?”
“A father who comes upstairs instead of watching him through a screen.”
She left.
I stood in the foyer long after the front door closed.
That night, I did not go underground.
I went to Matteo's room.
He was awake.
“Dad?”
“Yeah.”
“You sleeping here?”
I looked at the ridiculous velvet chair beside his bed.
“If you'll let me.”
He nodded.
I sat.
For an hour, nothing happened.
Then Matteo whispered into the darkness.
“The man had red shoelaces.”
My body went still.
“What?”
“The man by the car.”
I turned toward him.
“Red shoelaces.”
He swallowed.
“And a silver bird on his jacket.”
I wanted to ask a thousand questions.
Instead, I remembered Clara.
“You don't have to say more.”
Matteo stared at the ceiling.
“I saw him before Mom came outside.”
My pulse accelerated.
“He was kneeling near the back tire.”
I kept my voice steady.
“Do you know who he was?”
“No.”
“Had you seen him before?”
A long pause.
“Maybe.”
My chest tightened.
“Where?”
Matteo turned his head toward me.
“At Uncle Dominic's birthday.”
Everything inside me went cold.
Dominic had been my closest friend for twelve years.
He had carried Matteo out of the burning vehicle.
He had stood beside me at Elena's grave.
And now my son was saying the man who planted the bomb may have been at Dominic's birthday party.
I didn't sleep.
At six the next morning, I went underground and began searching archived footage.
Dominic's birthday had been seven months before the bombing.
Forty-three guests.
Family.
Business associates.
Security staff.
Drivers.
Caterers.
By eight, my eyes burned.
At 8:13, I found him.
A man near the service entrance.
Dark jacket.
Silver bird emblem.
The camera resolution was poor.
His shoes were partly hidden.
I zoomed.
Red laces.
My blood went cold.
Then someone walked into frame beside him.
The man's face was clear.
I stared at the monitor.
Because the person speaking privately with the stranger was someone who had been inside my house every week for years.
Someone Elena had trusted.
Someone Matteo loved.
May you like
And when I saw who it was, I realized the bombing had not begun on that road fourteen months ago.
It had begun inside my family.
