Chapter 11 - The Graves That Might Be Empty
Hope could be crueler than grief.
Dominic learned that within hours.
For three years he'd accepted death because there had been no alternative.
Now every photograph became evidence.
Every memory became a question.
Marco reconstructed Isabella's last known movements.
Security footage from the Moretti garage had been deleted.
But an old traffic camera had captured a dark SUV leaving twelve minutes after Isabella's original car.
The driver's face was invisible.
A small passenger appeared in the back seat.
Dominic stared at the image.
"Matteo?"
"Could be."
"Could?"
"Resolution is terrible."
Dominic wanted certainty.
There was none.
Falcone warned stress could interfere with treatment.
Dominic ignored him.
Then Valentina asked the question no adult would.
"If your old family is alive, am I still your family?"
Dominic turned.
She stood beside the hospital bed.
He reached for her.
"Come here."
She climbed beside him.
"Listen to me. Isabella and Matteo are not my old family."
"Oh."
"And you don't replace them."
She looked worried.
"Then what am I?"
Dominic pressed her hand against his chest.
"Another piece."
"Can hearts have pieces?"
"Mine apparently has terrible construction."
She smiled.
Dominic continued.
"If they are alive, loving them doesn't reduce this."
He squeezed her hand.
"There's no limit."
Valentina leaned against him.
"Then I hope they're alive."
The generosity of that sentence humbled him.
Investigators located the retired dentist who had supplied Isabella's dental records.
He admitted the records had been altered.
Victor Sarto had threatened his family.
The remains in the vehicle were never Isabella.
Nor Matteo.
Dominic walked outside the interview room and vomited.
Marco held him upright.
"Three years."
"I know."
"They could have been alive."
"I know."
"Where?"
"We'll find them."
The evidence led to a private medical facility in Pennsylvania.
A patient had been admitted three years earlier under the name Bella Marin.
Female.
Early thirties.
Severe head trauma.
Memory loss.
Transferred six months later.
Dominic could barely speak.
"And the child?"
"No record."
They traced Bella Marin to a rehabilitation residence in Vermont.
Dominic wanted to leave immediately.
Falcone refused.
"You have treatment."
"Cancel it."
"No."
"Rico—"
"You finally decided to live. Don't sabotage it because you discovered something worth living for."
Dominic glared.
Falcone did not care.
So Marco went first.
The call came the following evening.
Dominic answered with trembling hands.
Marco appeared on video.
He was crying.
Dominic had seen Marco wounded without crying.
"Tell me."
Marco turned the camera.
A woman sat beside a window.
Her hair was shorter.
A scar crossed her temple.
She looked thinner.
Older.
But Dominic knew her.
Isabella.
His wife.
Alive.
Dominic stopped breathing.
She looked at the screen.
"Who is that?"
His heart shattered.
Marco whispered, "She doesn't remember."
Dominic couldn't speak.
Isabella studied his face.
Then something shifted.
She touched the screen.
"Dominic?"
He covered his mouth.
"Yes."
Her eyes filled.
"I know that name."
Dominic cried openly.
"Isabella."
But one question remained.
"Matteo."
Isabella's expression changed.
"I have dreams."
"What dreams?"
"A little boy."
Dominic's voice broke.
"Where is he?"
"I don't know."
She began crying.
"I don't know."
Records showed Isabella had been found unconscious beside a rural road after escaping captivity.
No child was with her.
Someone had kept her hidden for six months before the escape.
Victor's organization.
The purpose was simple.
They believed Isabella possessed copies of financial evidence.
She had hidden them before the crash.
When she refused to reveal the location, they kept her alive.
Matteo had been separated from her.
Dominic returned to Aleandro.
"Where is my son?"
Aleandro stared in disbelief when told Isabella was alive.
"I swear I don't know."
"You knew she survived."
"For weeks."
Dominic's face darkened.
"Then?"
"Victor told me she died."
"You believed him?"
"I wanted to."
Dominic stepped back.
Aleandro began crying.
"I'm sorry."
Dominic looked at him.
"For three years I wanted to kill the person responsible."
Aleandro lowered his head.
Dominic continued.
"Now I don't."
Aleandro looked up.
"Why?"
"Because I need my time for people who matter."
That hurt Aleandro more than hatred.
The search for Matteo intensified.
An old payment record led to a couple in Ohio.
They had received cash from Victor's organization three years earlier.
When agents arrived, the couple admitted they'd been given a frightened six-year-old boy under a false name.
They claimed they were told his parents were dead.
"But he's not here?" Dominic asked.
The agent hesitated.
"No."
Dominic's stomach dropped.
"Where is he?"
The woman had entered foster care two years earlier after her husband died.
Matteo, living as Michael Grant, had been transferred into the system.
A child matching his description had moved through three homes.
The last record placed him in Chicago.
Dominic stared at the address.
Valentina grabbed her jacket.
"Where are you going?" he asked.
"With you."
"This is Chicago."
"I know."
"You have school."
"You found your son."
Dominic almost laughed.
"We don't know that."
Valentina looked at him.
"You told me hope is allowed."
He had never actually said that.
But perhaps she'd heard what he was learning.
Dominic's doctors cleared him for forty-eight hours of travel.
He, Valentina, Rosa and Marco flew to Chicago.
They reached a modest foster home after sunset.
A social worker entered first.
Dominic waited outside.
His knees shook worse than during any violent confrontation in his life.
The door opened.
A boy stepped onto the porch.
Nine years old.
Dark hair.
Thin face.
Dominic saw Isabella in his eyes.
The boy stared at him.
Dominic couldn't move.
"Matteo?"
The boy's face tightened.
Nobody had called him that in three years.
Then he whispered one word.
"Dad?"
Dominic fell to his knees.
May you like
And for the second time in a month, a child's answer changed everything.
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