Chapter 37
N
oah looked around the kitchen. Every eye was focused on him: Nonna and the aunts were anxious, Brooke and Chloë inquisitive, Gavino puzzled, but his brothers… they were accusatory.
So Noah told the truth. Not all of the truth, but the truth. “The intruder—he accosted me as I walked down the driveway. He’s one of the gang that smashed that one guy’s hands.” He looked directly at Rafe. “He’s one of the gang who broke into your home. He’s fast, he’s trained, he’s dangerous”—and now Noah decided to see what he could find out from his father—“and he’s after something we hold that he cannot have.”
“I’d say that was obvious!” Rafe snapped.
Noah sliced his gaze toward their father, then back to Rafe.
Rafe looked startled, as if the idea that their father might be involved had never occurred to him.
But Noah could easily make a case to his brothers that Gavino’s arrival at this particular time signaled a reason to be suspicious.
The moment dangled like a shiny bauble, enticing Rafe to grab at it.
But before he could, June said in a soothing tone, “My polenta casserole is ready to come out of the oven.”
“I brought a fresh strawberry pie.” Chloë walked to the refrigerator, opened it, and removed the decadent red dessert.
“I can’t wait!” Annie said brightly. “Let’s all sit down to eat. We can talk then.”
Ah, yes. The women thought to ease the tension with food.
Well, why not? It always worked.
“Wash up, dears,” Nonna said to Rafe and Bao.
They nodded and went to the kitchen sink.
Nonna shooed the company toward the dining room.
Noah waited until Penelope walked past, then joined her, his hand resting lightly on the small of her back. It was an instinct, a claiming, and one he noted his brothers also utilized with their wives. Not that Penelope was his wife, but… if life was fair, she would be.
His chair was on the back side of the table against the cabinets. He led her there, then held out the chair next to his.
She looked at him, and the memory of his forceful claiming was in her resentful eyes.
“Please.” He indicated the seat, and tried to look trustworthy and not at all insane.
He didn’t have his father’s acting skills, but he must have pulled it off, because she seated herself next to him, although she turned her face away from him.
June brought the yellow ceramic casserole dish and with a flourish placed it on the table. Steam rose in the air, and the fragrance of tomatoes, mushrooms, Italian sausage, and Parmesan rose like the memory of good times past.
Everyone relaxed, and sighed, and exclaimed; then June served spoonfuls of heaven and Nonna passed the salads.
For a few minutes, all was quiet as Annie said a brief grace thanking God that the whole family could be together again; then the silence was broken by the clatter of forks and the muffled exclamations of pleasure.
Noah waited until the first pangs of hunger had been eased before he said, “Dad, we’ve had some problems since you last checked in.”
“Which is why you should leave,” Eli said. “You don’t want to be involved in any problems.”
Shut up.
But Noah didn’t say a word.
“I know someone attacked Mama. How much worse could the problems get?” Gavino leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers, a move he’d learned while playing a judge in one of his most popular movies, a remake of an old Tracy/Hepburn romance.
“It’s all about Nonno’s bottle of wine,” Noah said.
Gavino stopped faking concern and got real. His hands dropped to the arms of his chair. He gripped them tightly and leaned forward. “Papa’s wine? Someone’s looking for Papa’s wine?”
“That’s right. Several someones,” Noah said.
“Joseph Bianchin, for one,” Rafe said.
Noah wanted to tell Eli and Rafe to let him handle this. But they had as much right to disdain their father as he did. In addition, Noah was their baby brother, and
they didn’t trust him to handle anything. And, of course… they had no idea who his mother was.
If they knew that, they’d have more respect.
But his father knew who his mother was, so Noah said, “It seems the bottle of wine probably contains a fortune in lost pink diamonds.”
“Son of a bitch,” Gavino whispered. “Is that what it was all about?”
Noah thought that was probably the first unrehearsed line his father had given since the day he turned three. In an innocent tone, he asked, “What was
what
all about, Dad?”
Noah saw him snap back into actor mode. “The attack on your grandmother, of course.”
Liar
.
“How did you find out about the diamonds?” Gavino asked.
“The Internet,” Chloë said.
“How did
she
…?” Gavino whispered.
“She looked it up on the Internet,” Eli repeated. “You know, the Internet? Where your fan club is based?”
Only Noah understood what his father meant. He wasn’t questioning Chloë’s abilities to do the research. He was wondering how, twenty-nine years ago, Liesbeth figured out where the diamonds had disappeared. “The information was always available, Dad,” Noah said. “It might not have been easy, but as long as you were willing to do research in newspaper archives and old travel records, it was possible to connect the famous winemaker Massimo Bruno to the thief who was always hanging around when the jewels vanished.”
Penelope faced Noah now. “Eighty years is a long time to remember lost diamonds exist, much less search for them.”
“Throughout history, stolen treasure has captivated the imagination. People become obsessed. They search for ships’ treasures and buried treasure and lost gold mines.” Chloë spoke with the assurance of a writer who studied the human psyche and used it in her novels.
“In this case, where the diamonds that vanished are from one extremely valuable necklace owned by dispossessed Russian nobles who fled the 1917 revolution… the diamonds are inherently romantic. And when they’re big…” Brooke tempted them with the concept.
“Big diamonds definitely command attention,” Chloë said, “and the diamonds in the Propov necklace ranged in size from one-half carat to a six-point-eight-carat pink diamond, the Beating Heart, which has an inclusion that when viewed through a jeweler’s loupe looks like a red heart that appears to pulse.”
Noah pressed his fingers to the artery that pulsed in his throat.
How appropriate that the Beating Heart should be the death of him.
Turning, he caught Penelope’s gaze on him, on the way he took his own pulse, and once again he thought she saw him all too clearly, for he appeared to puzzle her.…
He smiled and used his hand to pick up his knife and smear a roasted garlic clove on a piece of Parmesan-pepper bread. He offered it to her. “In this family, if you don’t eat enough garlic, the rumor goes around that you’re a vampire.”
“We can’t have that. Thank you.” She took it, but she didn’t smile back, leaving him to wonder whether she was still angry or if his absentminded gesture had given her food for thought when he preferred to keep her firmly in the dark… with everyone else.
Eli lifted Chloë’s left hand.
Chloë wiggled her fingers. An impressive pink diamond flashed in its platinum setting.
Penelope did a double take. “Wow,” she said in an awestruck voice.
“This is not quite a two-carat diamond,” Eli said.
Now Gavino said, “Wow…” He nodded slowly. “So this Beating Heart diamond is more than three times that size?”
“Even without the history attached to it, with its clarity and size, it’s worth probably”—as he thought, Eli screwed up his forehead—“probably five million. In an auction with rabid buyers interested in such a unique stone, and with the other stones associated with it sold at the same time, I bet the price could go as high as fifteen or twenty million.”
“Dollars?” Rafe asked.
“No, clamshells. Of course, dollars!” Eli said.
“I can’t even imagine such a stone—or such an amount of money.” Penelope shook her head. “It’s haunting to think that that bottle of wine containing those stones could be somewhere in this house.”
“I wish the location of Anthony’s bottle would haunt me,” Nonna said. “Then this whole terrible situation would be finished.”
“If you find the bottle, what will you do with it?” Penelope asked.
A silence fell over the table.
Then the argument broke out.
Everyone wanted to open the bottle and see if the diamonds were inside.
Nonna thought they should give the diamonds to a museum.
Rafe and Brooke agreed.
Chloë wanted to examine the big diamond through a jeweler’s loupe and see whether the heart really did beat.
Eli wanted to taste the wine.
Throughout the quarrel, Noah smiled benignly, and covertly observed his father.
Gavino’s actor’s face was a showcase for false emotion, but now, while he thought no one was watching… he showed the real thing. In his expression, Noah saw the memory of Liesbeth’s seduction and the lies she had told, all with the intention of getting pregnant and placing her spy into Anthony Di Luca’s home. Gavino could not countenance what had happened in his past, yet there was no other explanation: He had been set up, enticed, his sperm taken and used for procreation. He had been a fool of incredible proportions.
More important for Noah—Gavino believed Noah knew nothing about Liesbeth.
Now was the time to enlighten him. With a smile, Noah leaned across the table toward his father and said, “Seems as if there should have been an easier way, doesn’t it, Dad?”
For the space of five heartbeats, Gavino didn’t comprehend.
Then he turned to Noah so quickly his neck popped. He saw the knowledge in Noah’s eyes, and the accusation. And Gavino did what he always did when facing a personal crisis.
He ran.
Pulling his phone out of his pocket, he glanced at it, then pushed back his chair. “Excuse me. This is a very important phone call, and I’ve got to take it.” He moved quickly toward the hall, turning back only to say with a smile, “Mama, I think maybe I have nailed one of those roles!”
Chapter 38
N
oah watched his father walk away from him the way he’d always walked away from him and, in a single violent gesture, threw his napkin on the table. “Excuse me for a minute.” He shoved his chair back and headed after him. As Gavino swung open the front screen door, Noah grabbed his shoulder. “Oh, no, Dad. Not this time. You know stuff I need to hear.”
Gavino twisted out of Noah’s grasp. “She’s in town, isn’t she?” His brown eyes were narrowed, intent… scared.
“My mother?”
“Liesbeth.”
“Oh, yeah.”
“Then I’m getting the hell out.” Gavino shoved his way out the door and onto the porch.
Night had fallen. The porch lamp was on. The windows cast squares of light into the shadows, but ultimately… the shadows won.
It seemed to Noah they always did.
Grasping Gavino by the shirtfront, he shoved him against the wall. “Tell me all about your affair, Dad. I need to know the truth—or at least your version of the truth.”
Gavino glared into Noah’s eyes, but he didn’t struggle. “I don’t know anything.”
Noah tightened his grip. “Look at me. I’m your son. And I’m her son. She’s in Bella Terra for me.” Taking his hands off his father, he unbuttoned his collar and bared his throat. “And I’ve got a bomb waiting to blow off my head.”
Gavino’s outraged gaze dropped to the dog collar, then lifted to Noah’s face, and his horror seemed genuine.
In this case, it probably was.
“When does it explode?” Gavino asked.
“Not yet,” Noah assured him. “If I don’t find that damned bottle, I’ll be dead in eleven days, at exactly three thirty-seven p.m. So tell me what you know.”
Gavino sucked in a long breath; then, like a tortured prisoner, he gave up the information. “She planned everything. Our meeting. The story she fed me, of how she was an international spy. My seduction. She played me, and then… she talked about Dad’s bottle of wine. I couldn’t figure out how she knew, or why she cared. Why would a spy give a damn about my father’s bottle of wine? The glamour was wearing off, nothing was adding up, and I got the hell out right before I was supposed to help her pull off a job.”
“You… left her hanging?” Gavino’s foolishness made Noah breathless.
“Yes.” Gavino looked both frightened and defiant.
“Why?”
“Come on, son. I’m famous.” Gavino tapped his nose. “I’ve got a good instinct for when someone wants to use me.”
“You’re not as stupid as you would like us to believe.” It was a revelation to Noah.
Gavino puffed his chest. “No one stays on top in Hollywood by being stupid.” Then his pride collapsed. “I guess I am, though, because nine months later, there she was, her and an infant—you—and two of her goons in the middle of the night, standing in my trailer on a movie set on studio grounds.” Gavino thrust his face back at Noah. “Do you know what movie studio security is like? We were filming the last scene of the Wilder series. It was a closed set. We couldn’t leave. No one got on without a pass. And there she was, handing you over to me.” Gavino shoved back at Noah.
Noah let him go.
“I took you. Of course I did. I didn’t know if you were mine, but I wasn’t about to argue, not with those two black-haired boys of hers grinning at me.” Anger and humiliation fought for supremacy on Gavino’s face. “But they weren’t done. She pulled out a metal rod and plugged it in. She got the end of it red-hot—and while those two bastards held me down and smothered my screams, she branded me.”
“She
branded
you?” Noah could hardly believe it.
“With the Poopon coat of arms.”
“Propov,” Noah corrected.
“Whatever. She branded me on the front of my hip, right on the bone.” Gavino touched the spot as if it still hurt. “Ever since, I haven’t been able to do a nude scene without body makeup.”
Noah bit down on a reluctant grin. Trust his father to find the real tragedy of the matter.
Gavino had given up his information. Now it was his turn to ask questions. “How did
you
find out about her?”