“That’s about it, Brooke,” DuPey said. “He said there was word out that the matter was being handled, and no
one was to interfere. But he’s belligerent and not too bright—”
“And greedy,” Brooke said.
DuPey nodded. “As soon as he heard about the money, he was on his way. According to him, he got here, dropped into the Beaver Inn, had a couple of beers, asked some questions, mouthed off, and the next morning headed out to recover the bottle from Mrs. Di Luca.”
Sarah? Criminals were chasing Sarah? Penelope’s head was spinning.
DuPey continued. “But before he got very far, three guys, older men, he said, pulled him over and told him to get the hell out of town. Apparently he doesn’t have a strong protective instinct, because he threatened to bring his cousins in to battle for turf.”
“And?” Noah’s voice was quiet, pitched to reach each person and no farther.
“They got his tire iron out of his trunk and broke all his fingers. Broke”—DuPey’s mouth twisted in disgust—“hell, they pounded them.”
Penelope protectively closed her hands into fists.
“He’ll be lucky to ever use his hands again.” DuPey pulled his hat low on his forehead.
No one else seemed as distressed as Penelope. It was almost as if they’d all seen worse and were inured to the horror.
Murder. Brooke said there was murder. More than one? And violence of a most horrific kind…
“What has this to do with us?” Rafe asked.
DuPey hitched up his belt. “Actually, trouble is… he said the three men were brothers. They looked alike. And the men he described sound like Di Lucas.”
Rafe and Noah looked incredulously at DuPey.
“You really think we’d do that?” Noah asked.
“No…” DuPey sounded doubtful. “Seems excessive. But I do think you’d do anything to keep your grandmother safe, and if this guy said the right stuff—and he’s got quite a mouth on him—I think things might get heated.”
Rafe and Noah exchanged glances.
“When did it happen?” Rafe asked.
“This morning around eight,” DuPey answered.
“I was on a conference call with my people on the East Coast.” Rafe looked and sounded sure of himself. “I’ve got witnesses to that.”
“You employ a computer hacker who could fake the time and your presence,” DuPey retorted.
“Darren is good,” Rafe acknowledged.
DuPey finished, “And your people are loyal enough to lie.”
Rafe didn’t argue. Instead, he inclined his head.
Penelope swallowed. These guys were spooky.
DuPey looked at Noah.
“I was in the shower. Alone. No witnesses.” Noah put his hands on his hips. “And no, I don’t know where Eli was, but I’d guess Chloë does. They’re together… a lot.”
The guys smirked.
Brooke rolled her eyes.
Apparently Eli and Chloë were an item.
“I’ll check with him. Chloë’s no better as an alibi than Rafe’s people, but maybe Eli was working in the vines or in the barrels. All we need is one valid alibi, and all of you are off the hook.” DuPey touched his hat. “Okay, I gotta run.”
Noah grinned. “Doughnuts just come out of the fryer at Binkies?”
“Yeah,” DuPey drawled. “You want to come and get your usual dozen?”
Penelope noted that DuPey and Noah sniped at each other like old friends.… How interesting that she didn’t get the same feeling of camaraderie between Rafe and Noah.
A few more jabs, and Noah escorted DuPey to the back door to make sure it was properly closed.
With a great deal more intensity and less cordiality, Rafe turned once more to Penelope. “
What
are you doing in town?”
“Come on.” Brooke pulled on his arm. “I’ll fill you in while I show you what Penelope and I decided to do upstairs.”
He hesitated, clearly wanting to argue with his wife… and
not
wanting to argue with his wife.
Brooke patted his shoulder and murmured softly, and, with a final hard glance at Penelope, he let Brooke lead him up the stairs—leaving Penelope alone to face Noah.
Chapter 13
F
acing Noah might be no big deal—was no big deal—but until Penelope made a final decision about this job, she had no business sticking around here. She could go back to the motel and… well, read a book or something. She had no responsibilities.…
But leaving felt awkward and childish and as if she were running away, and she couldn’t bear for Noah to think she couldn’t face him. So she stayed, alone in the tall entry, listening to the echo of the footsteps on the floors above and hoping to hell that Joseph Bianchin turned out to be worth all this trouble.
When she heard the back door open and close, an unexpected chill ran up her spine. Noah and Rafe and Brooke kept weapons at the ready. Brooke used words like
trouble
and
murder
. The way they acted made Penelope wonder all of a sudden who had come in.
Then Noah came around the corner and walked toward
her through the afternoon’s downward-slanting light, and a different sort of chill ran up her spine. Because, oh, God, he was handsome.
She assured herself that there wasn’t a woman in the world who could remain unmoved by the sight of him. He had the kind of beauty that came from centuries of wealthy Italian families breeding their sons and daughters for the choicest lands and sums of money. His arms were too long, his hands too big, his shoulders impressively broad, his hips dangerously narrow. But it was the way he stepped that made her gaze cling to him; his strides were long and smooth, centered on his being. He moved like a dark-browed pirate king in command of his ship, his crew, the very elements that raged around him.
“Rafe and Brooke bought this place, and Rafe wanted me to see the house.” He was close.
She was skittish. “I know. Brooke thinks a lot of your opinion. We were discussing whether this is a bearing wall.” Penelope walked into the parlor and rested her hand on the peeling plaster.
“It is,” he said with assurance.
“You didn’t even look or tap or… whatever.”
“In older homes, assume every wall is a bearing wall. When you go in for the permit, it’s easier.” His peculiar green eyes observed his world with good-humored interest—and Bella Terra was his world in every way.
Yet she remembered the way his eyes changed to the angry gray of a stormy sea… or the rich gold of a great passion.
“I’ve learned a fair amount about remodeling. I’m the manager of Bella Terra resort, you know, a job I got by shrewdly being born into the Di Luca family.” He smiled at her, inviting her to smile back.
She did not. Instead she stared like a rodent enthralled by a snake.
He continued. “The resort has grown since it was built in the thirties, and I’ve had to deal with every electrical upgrade and plumbing disaster.”
Charming. My God, he was as charming as ever.
“The resort keeps me busy most of the time, and by most of the time I mean I’m on call twenty-four hours a day. So when I vacation, I leave town, ski, or go to Hawaii for the Iron Man competition or hike.… Last summer I went to Nepal and tackled a couple of pretty impressive peaks. Nonna said that was stupid.” He chuckled. “But it’s one more item off my bucket list.”
“I’ll have to agree with your grandmother.”
“I’ve done it now. I can go to my grave knowing I’ve conquered K2.”
He could have died. Plenty of people had fallen to their deaths on that mountain, their bodies never recovered. And Penelope shouldn’t care, but she did. Too much death…
She folded her hands at her waist and, to hide her expression, looked down at them. “I would say it’s more important to go to your grave later than earlier. But… that’s just me.”
“How’s your mother?” he asked. “Is she visiting Bella Terra with you?” He must have seen something in the way she stood, or heard something in her voice… or maybe he had simply moved on to another topic of conversation.
“No.” Penelope gained control, looked up at him. “I lost her a few months ago.”
She had caught him by surprise. “L-lost? She died? Your mother? But she seemed so vibrant!”
“Yes. Always.” Until the very end.
“What happened?” He added hastily, “If it’s not too painful.”
“I came to Bella Terra the summer after my freshman year in college.”
He nodded. “To serve an internship for the interior designer who was updating the resort.”
“The summer
before
my freshman year, Mama discovered a lump in her breast. But we had a lot to do to get me ready to go to college. Plus she was working for Mrs. Walters.”
“Your mother was her… nurse?”
“Nurse/companion, I guess. We lived with her, you know, and Mama was at her beck and call.” Penelope looked down again, remembering how her shoplifting in L.A. had precipitated the move to Portland, how she had been flung into an all-girls Catholic school with no more chances to screw up… and how she had realized she could never stand to disappoint her mother like that again.
The two of them were on their own.
“Mrs. Walters did a lot for us—I would never have been able to afford Cincinnati if it hadn’t been for her. But she was always demanding. Cincinnati was a long way away, so Mama didn’t say anything about the lump to me or Mrs. Walters. She didn’t do anything about the lump.” Penelope put her back against the wall, slid down, and sat on the floor, arms on her knees, eyes staring straight ahead. “Once she got me settled and returned to Portland, she had it checked out. They removed it. It was malignant. She underwent chemotherapy, and by the time I came home for Christmas, she was… She looked thin, but her hair was growing back in, and when I asked
her, she didn’t tell me she’d had breast cancer. She said she was fine.” If only Penelope had questioned her further. If only she’d been less selfish and more concerned for her mother. If only…
If only.
Noah joined her on the floor, staring straight ahead, not looking at her… but listening. He might be her enemy, but he knew her and he knew her mother, and he remembered.… “It’s not your fault,” he said. “If your mother had told me lies, I would have never questioned her. She was a force of nature.”
“And I was selfish, happy to be home, to see my friends. Mrs. Walters might have told me if I’d asked, but I didn’t. I didn’t think to ask why or how my mother managed to pull enough strings to get me that internship in Bella Terra that summer, or why she was willing to leave Mrs. Walters and come here to live with me.”
“She was afraid she was going to die, and she wanted to give you a good start in life and spend as much time with you as possible.”
Not quite. But close enough.
“That’s right. At the end of the summer, we left here. I finished college. I went to work. I got married. I lost my husband.” She dropped her gaze. She’d said enough. “When Mama came to help me get through it, this time I knew there was something wrong. They’d told her the cancer was gone. Actually, it had metastasized to her lungs. I quit my job. I sold our house. I went to Portland to take care of her.” Penelope recited the story steadily, but an unexpected wave of emotion caught her by the throat.
“How long ago?” Noah asked.
Had Mama died, he meant. “Five months.”
“What about her family in L.A.? Have you seen them?”
“I let them know when she died. Her mother is dead. Her father never forgave her for getting knocked up. Then he never forgave her for moving out of L.A.”
“But you said he washed his hands of you.”
“After I got arrested, he wanted Mama to put me in a correctional facility. Said it would teach me a lesson. She said no and we moved. He blames me. Which is true. So he told me I shouldn’t expect anything from him. As far as he was concerned, I was no grandchild of his.” Not that Penelope expected anything different, but what a bitter conversation that had been!
Now Noah turned to her. “You’re alone in the world.”
“Mrs. Walters is still alive. She is very old, ninety-seven and feeble. When Mama got really sick, Mrs. Walters finally had to concede defeat and go into an assisted-living facility. She hates it, of course, and she’s starting to fail, and she told me… well. She told me stuff. Stuff that might be true, but her mind is wandering.” And for all that Penelope had not loved the old tyrant, she found that to be another almost unbearable loss. “She thinks I’m my mother.”
“Oh, Penelope. You’ve had such a tough time.” Before she realized what Noah intended and could move to take countermeasures, he grasped her hand again, holding it in both of his, warming her cold fingers between his palms.
She cleared her throat. “The last couple of years have been a challenge. But things are on the upswing.” She was so uncomfortable. Uncertain and uncomfortable and… Why was he doing this? Why was he being nice? The last time she’d seen Noah, he certainly hadn’t been
nice
. He had taken her youthful, fragile heart and crushed it with all the focused cruelty of a man who’d had his pleasure and wanted to move on.
She had loved him.
He hadn’t loved her.
She had thought he wanted to marry her.
He had dumped her in the cruelest way possible.
It had taken years for her to recover confidence in her own judgment, years to grow an ego large enough to believe a man could truly love her. It had taken Keith, kind and gentle, before she’d been willing to wade into the marital waters.
So what was Noah up to? Did he think she was just going to forget what a jackass he was?
If she was mature, she would.
She was never going to be that mature.
She pulled her hand away and scrambled to her feet. “No, really. I’m fine. Living the usual boring life.
I
don’t carry a knife. Or a gun. Or any weapon at all. So tell me, Noah—what’s going on here in Bella Terra?”
Chapter 14
N
oah hesitated, apparently wanting to extend the moment of connection between them.
But Penelope pointedly rejected him, rising, turning, and walking away from the shadows of the parlor and into the foyer, where the westering sun splashed light across the walls.
Noah followed. “It’s a long story.” He glanced at the ceiling as if weighing the chances that Rafe and Brooke would return, then gestured Penelope toward the entry and the stairway. “Have a seat. I’ll try to make it brief. Over eighty years ago—”