Chapter 17 - No More Deals, No More Pretending
Aunt May was safe.
Avery learned that eleven minutes after the call.
Those eleven minutes felt longer than the previous week.
May had stepped next door for coffee when someone entered the storage building behind the laundromat.
Security cameras captured Riccardo Duca and another man removing two boxes.
Federal agents intercepted them three blocks away.
No gunfight.
No cinematic chase.
Just traffic.
Riccardo's vehicle became trapped behind a delivery truck.
Avery laughed until she cried when Agent Shaw told her.
"Twenty-three years of conspiracy," she said, "ended by somebody double-parking."
Shaw almost smiled.
"Crime is less glamorous than television."
Inside the boxes were the final records.
Original surveys.
Property documents.
Letters between Elena Vitali, David Boon, Patrick Nolan, and Mary.
Enough evidence to dismantle the remaining network.
Riccardo was arrested.
Odette was not charged with the financial conspiracy.
Her role in leaking the humiliating photograph was ugly, but not criminal.
Camila publicly separated herself from her mother and became interim head of Duca Maritime during restructuring.
Marco remained with Vitali Holdings.
Kessler entered a cooperation agreement with federal prosecutors.
Eric did too.
Rosa retired.
At least she claimed she did.
Avery suspected Rosa would continue knowing everything for the rest of her life.
The crisis ended gradually.
No dramatic switch.
Headlines slowed.
Cameras disappeared.
Avery's courier company offered her job back.
She declined.
That surprised everyone except Aunt May.
"What now?" Dana asked.
They sat in the laundromat one evening after closing.
Avery looked around.
Washers humming.
Old tile.
Familiar detergent smell.
Home.
"I don't know."
"Bookstore?"
Avery looked at her sister.
"You remember?"
Dana smiled.
"You talked about it for ten years."
"Dreams get expensive."
"The trust?"
"Not personal money."
"I know."
Dana hesitated.
"I'm trying."
Avery nodded.
"I know."
Their relationship wasn't magically healed.
Better.
More honest.
Dana had taken a second job to pay back some money she'd borrowed over the years.
Avery hadn't asked.
That mattered.
Lorenzo appeared at the laundromat at 8:20.
No security visible.
Probably nearby.
He carried two coffees.
Avery accepted hers.
Dana immediately left.
Coward.
Lorenzo sat on top of a folding table.
"You haven't returned my calls."
"I returned two."
"Out of seven."
"That's almost thirty percent."
"Terrible metric."
"Depends on the industry."
He smiled.
Their forty-five-day agreement had fourteen days remaining.
Neither had mentioned it.
Until now.
Lorenzo placed a folded document beside her.
Avery frowned.
"What is it?"
"Termination agreement."
She stared.
"For us?"
"For the publicity arrangement."
Her heart dropped in a way she resented.
"Oh."
He watched her.
"The investigation is public. The merger is dead. There's no strategic reason for you to remain associated with me."
Strategic reason.
Avery hated those words.
She picked up the document.
"You're releasing me early."
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Because I don't want our next decision contaminated by the first one."
She looked up.
"What next decision?"
"Whatever happens between us."
Her pulse jumped.
Lorenzo continued.
"I don't know what this becomes."
"Comforting."
"I know what I want."
"Do you?"
"Yes."
Avery waited.
He didn't say it.
Typical.
"Then say it."
Lorenzo looked almost nervous.
She had never seen that.
"I want to date you."
Avery laughed.
His brow furrowed.
"Why is that funny?"
"Because we've been on television together, uncovered a twenty-three-year conspiracy, kissed in your garden, slept under the same roof—separate rooms," she added quickly, though nobody else was present, "and now you're asking to date."
"Properly."
"What does Lorenzo Vitali dating properly look like?"
"I don't know."
"Excellent start."
"Dinner."
"We've had dinner."
"Without photographers."
"We've done that."
"I'll improve."
Avery looked at the termination document.
Something inside her softened.
This was the choice he had promised.
No contract.
No corporate benefit.
No crisis.
Just him.
She signed.
Lorenzo watched.
"That ends it."
"Yes."
Avery handed him the pen.
He signed too.
For several seconds, they stared at the document.
Then Avery asked, "Now what?"
Lorenzo folded it.
"Would you have dinner with me Friday?"
"Are you asking?"
"Yes."
"Then yes."
His shoulders relaxed.
Avery noticed.
"You thought I'd say no."
"I considered it."
"Good."
"Why good?"
"Humility builds character."
Lorenzo laughed.
Their first real date happened Friday.
No mansion.
No Michelin restaurant.
Avery chose a seafood place on Tybee Island with paper napkins and picnic tables.
Lorenzo arrived in a jacket worth more than the restaurant's freezer.
Avery stared.
"You're overdressed."
"I was told casual."
"By whom?"
"Gabriel."
"Gabriel thinks a polo shirt is emotional vulnerability."
Lorenzo removed the jacket.
Better.
They ate shrimp.
Walked beside the water.
Talked about things unrelated to fraud.
Favorite music.
Worst childhood hairstyles.
Movies.
Books.
Lorenzo admitted he had read architecture magazines every month for thirty years.
Avery told him that was deeply nerdy.
He looked pleased.
At sunset they sat on a bench.
No cameras.
No relatives.
No agreements.
Avery leaned against him.
His arm settled around her.
"This feels strange," he said.
"What?"
"Normal."
"Don't worry. You'll recover."
He kissed her hair.
Avery looked toward the ocean.
"Lorenzo."
"Yes."
"What happens if your world becomes complicated again?"
"It will."
"And?"
"I ask."
She looked up.
"Ask what?"
"What you want."
Avery's throat tightened.
He had learned.
So had she.
"What happens if I don't want what you want?"
"I survive disappointment."
"Revolutionary."
"I've made progress."
Avery smiled.
Then her expression became serious.
"I don't want to live at your estate."
"Fine."
He answered too quickly.
"You thought about this."
"Extensively."
"I don't want drivers everywhere."
"Negotiable."
"I don't want your money deciding my life."
"Understood."
"I may open the bookstore."
"I'll shop there."
"No investing."
"I heard you."
"And Aunt May will probably insult you indefinitely."
"I've accepted this."
Avery laughed.
Lorenzo looked at her.
"What do you want from me?"
She thought.
"Consistency."
He nodded.
"Truth."
"Yes."
"Choice."
"Always."
"And maybe that black coffee you keep pretending tastes good."
"Now you're unreasonable."
She kissed him.
Weeks passed.
Federal charges expanded.
The land trust announced plans for wetlands restoration, affordable commercial leases, and flood-protection improvements.
Avery accepted her trusteeship.
Not because she wanted responsibility.
Because for the first time she chose which responsibility deserved her.
She began planning the bookstore.
A small one.
Maybe coffee.
Maybe community events.
Lorenzo never offered money again.
That mattered more than flowers.
Three months after the rain-soaked delivery, Avery entered the Vitali estate for dinner.
The same mahogany doors.
The same chandeliers.
Different feeling.
Camila was there.
Marco.
Gabriel.
Aunt May.
Dana.
Even Rosa, "retired," somehow running the kitchen.
Avery paused at the doorway.
Lorenzo approached.
"Problem?"
She smiled.
"Just remembering."
"The first night."
"Everybody laughed."
His expression darkened.
Avery touched his arm.
"It's okay."
"No."
"No?"
"You say that when something is actually okay."
She laughed.
They entered together.
This time Avery didn't carry a parcel.
This time a chair waited for her.
Her chair.
After dinner, Lorenzo asked her to walk with him.
They stopped in the marble hallway.
The place where he'd first apologized.
He looked unusually serious.
Avery immediately became suspicious.
"What?"
"Nothing."
"You're terrible at nothing."
He reached inside his jacket.
Avery's heart stopped.
"Lorenzo."
He removed—
A key.
Avery blinked.
"That's not a ring."
"No."
"Good."
His expression turned amused.
"It's a key to the storefront on Whitaker."
Avery's mouth fell open.
The bookstore location she'd toured.
"I told you not to buy it."
"I didn't."
"Then—"
"The owner agreed to a six-month lease option."
Avery stared.
"I asked Gabriel to negotiate normal market terms."
"You're helping."
"I am presenting information."
She narrowed her eyes.
"No money?"
"No money."
"No ownership?"
"None."
"No secret shell company?"
"I'm offended."
"Answer."
"No."
Avery took the key.
Her eyes filled.
"Thank you."
"You're welcome."
Then Lorenzo did something far more dangerous than giving her a key.
He said, "I love you."
Avery stopped breathing.
No audience.
No joke.
No door.
No condition.
Just words.
She looked at him for a long moment.
Then smiled.
"I love you too."
Lorenzo kissed her.
And for several perfect seconds, the entire complicated world stayed outside the hallway.
Then Aunt May shouted from the dining room:
"If you're proposing, make sure she's finished dessert first!"
Avery laughed against Lorenzo's mouth.
He sighed.
"I was not proposing."
"Good."
He looked at her.
"That enthusiastic response is encouraging."
Avery grinned.
"Ask properly someday."
"I intend to."
She squeezed the bookstore key.
"Then someday, I might answer."
Lorenzo smiled.
May you like
And this time, neither of them needed a contract to know the future was coming.
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