Finding Angelo (The Wine Lover's Daughter, Book 2) (16 page)

They drove slowly down the rugged road, trying to avoid the
potholes. The jeep, however, was made for streets such as these and lumbered
over the uneven spots without any problems.

Angelo was quiet, deep in thought.
Images of the past night tumbled through his mind. They had barely survived a
vicious attack. If he hadn’t been for Miriam and Sofia, he might be dead. Of
course, the women had brought the criminals to his door. Rather than being
angry or regretting it, he felt a sense of relief. He knew now what he had to
do. He was afraid of the consequences. Anton was still around. He was still a
threat. And there was the murder of Fred. Angelo suspected that Anton was
behind that as well. Who else could it be? But if the police in California
suspected Angelo of killing Fred, he would probably be arrested and would spend
time in jail. What if he couldn’t prove his innocence? He just had to trust. He
couldn’t go on hiding any longer. But first he had to find a place to stay
until he was ready to leave. Should he accept Sofia’s invitation to go to
Tuscany?

“Where are you going to go?” Sofia
asked, as if she had picked up on his thoughts.

“I don’t know.” Angelo said.

“You can stay at my apartment,”
Miriam suggested.

Angelo shook his head. “Thanks,
but I’m afraid they’d find me there. They must have followed you, which means
they know where you live. In fact, you shouldn’t go back home right away. I
don’t want anything to happen to you.”

“I have a better idea,” Sofia
said. “As I told you, I have a place in Tuscany. Why don’t you both come with
me? There’s enough room. Miriam you can stay as long as you want, until this thing
is cleared up. And Angelo needs to return to California anyway. We can leave
together from there.”

Miriam shook her head. “I have to
go to work tomorrow. I teach kindergarten.”

“Couldn’t someone fill in for
you?” Angelo asked. He wanted Miriam to be with him. He felt bad for having
abandoned her and wanted to have some time to try to make things right, to
reconnect.

“No, not at such short notice. But
I’ll stay with my mother for a few days. She lives nearby, and I should be safe
there.” Miriam put her hand on Angelo’s shoulder. “I promise I’ll be careful.
You need to go back and take care of things.”

Sofia turned around. “We’ll have
to keep in touch.”

“Yes,” Miriam said. “Either here,
or I’ll visit you in California. I haven’t been back to the States for a long
time.”

Angelo glanced at Miriam in the rearview
mirror. “I’ll be in touch, too. I promise.” He hesitated. “That is if you want
me to.”

“Yes.” Miriam squeezed his
shoulder. “Not that you deserve it,” she grumbled under her breath.

“Yes, I know.” Angelo cleared his
throat. “Okay, this is what we’ll do. I’ll drop the jeep off at the parking
lot. They’ll find it eventually. Then we’ll take you guys’ car and drive to
Miriam’s place to pick up Sofia’s car. I also need to stop by the monastery and
let Abbot Francesco know what happened and that I need to leave. Agreed?”

“Yes,” Sofia said. “What about the
guys in your house? One of them is hurt. Doesn’t he need a doctor?”

“The bullet didn’t penetrate. It’s
a superficial wound. Fortunately, I have a friend who may be able to help me
out with that. I’ll call him from the parking lot.” He glanced at Sofia with a humorous
glint in his eyes. “I think you shook a little too much when you pulled the
trigger.”

“Thank God,” Sofia said. “I
couldn’t live with myself if I’d actually killed the man. Not even a criminal
like him.”

They arrived at the end of the
bumpy mountain path and drove on the paved road into Rivalta to the parking
lot. Angelo parked the car next to Miriam’s.

Miriam checked the windshield.
“We’re lucky. No ticket.”

“This is a public lot, so it’s
okay to leave it overnight,” Angelo said. “And it’s one of the few ones where
you don’t have to pay.”

They grabbed their bags and
backpacks and piled into Miriam’s car. Angelo pulled out his cell phone. “Just
a moment.” He pressed a button.

“Pronto,” said a groggy voice.

“Larry? It’s … Danilo,” Angelo
said. He had almost used his real name, having gotten used to it again around
Miriam and Sofia. “Did I wake you?”

“It’s okay. I have to get up
anyway. We had a little … well get-together with a few guys last night.” The
voice sounded clearer now.

“Drinking party, huh?” Angelo
said.

“One of the perks of
unemployment,” Larry said, then gave a snort. “What can I do for you?”

“Remember Fabio?”

Silence. Then: “Are you trying to
ruin my day?”

“No, not at all. I just found an
opportunity for you to get back at him. This time for sure.”

Another moment of silence. “This
better be good.”

Angelo briefly related the events
of the past night. “Fabio was asked to eliminate me. Fortunately, I have two
brave friends with me.” He glanced at Miriam and Sofia. “We managed to tie them
up and leave them in my house. Fabio is a little hurt, nothing serious.”

“Who wants to eliminate you?”
Larry asked.

“It’s a long story and has to do
with things that happened back in California. I’ll tell you another time. Right
now, I need for someone to pick the two guys up at my cabin. Key is under the
flower pot next to the door. Fabio may need a doctor. Can you arrange this?”

“May I kill him instead?” Larry
asked.

“It’s up to you, but I have a
better idea. I have real evidence that Fabio is involved in illegal dealings,
exporting stolen art works from Italy to the United States. He delivers them to
a man who is involved with the mob and has killed someone, actually I think two
people, probably more. He ordered Fabio to kill me, because I know too much
about him. I know it sounds crazy, but you have to trust me for the moment. I’m
on my way to write this all down and I will testify if I need to. This could be
the greatest story of your life. You will be back in demand again.”

He heard a sigh at the other end.
“Danilo, this is about the most outrageous and craziest story I’ve heard in a
long time. And I’m supposed to believe it?”

“Larry, it’s true. I’ll tell you
everything later.”

Another sigh. “All right. I’ll see
what I can do. But you better give me all the details.”

“Thanks, Larry, you won’t regret
it.” Angelo pressed the disconnect button and nodded at Miriam. “Ready to go.”

“What was that all about?” Sofia
asked.

“Larry is an investigative journalist, originally from
England,” Angelo explained as they were driving toward Moretta.

“We met years ago in Bardonico
when he did a news report on the corruption and illegal activities of
government officials. When Fabio threatened me and I left Bardonico, I
contacted Larry. I suggested he look into the police department in Bardonico,
that I had been approached by someone with an offer that sounded suspicious to
me. I gave him as much information as I could without directly exposing Fabio.
I still felt a certain loyalty to him, since we’d been friends. Also I didn’t
know if he actually went through with the deal of smuggling art works or if he
took my advice.

“Anyway, Larry looked into the
matter and accused him and the department in an article in the paper of
corruption and illegal smuggling. The problem was he didn’t have enough proof
and the source he got some of the information from wasn’t reliable. He got into
a lot of trouble and was fired from his job.”

“Were you the unreliable source?”
Miriam asked.

“No, I wasn’t. Well, indirectly I
guess I was when I encouraged him to look into the department. In the meantime,
I lost touch with Larry. I heard about the whole thing after the fact by
accident. I felt I was in part responsible for Larry’s downfall. I either
should have given him the whole story and named Fabio, or I shouldn’t have said
anything at all. I tried to contact him. It took me a while, but I finally got
a hold of him.

“We met and we talked. He didn’t
blame me. He understood that I didn’t want to name a former friend. He said
he’d done shoddy work in his eagerness to crack down on police corruption.
Still I felt bad, that in a way I’d betrayed him. Had I known that Fabio would
even consider killing me, I wouldn’t have hesitated to expose him.

“In hindsight, I suspect that
Fabio believed I had ratted on him and that this was the reason for the
investigation of his department. That’s why he tried to track me down and found
out I was in Moretta.”

“Oh, my God.” Miriam exhaled
deeply. “What an ordeal. I just wish you had confided in me.”

Angelo lifted his hands with palms
turned up. “Yes, I know, I should have … but, once again, I panicked.”

“Perhaps now, after all this
happened, your friend will be exonerated,” Sofia turned around to face Angelo,
who sat in the back seat.

“I hope so,” he said. “I hope this
whole thing comes out in the open and the people responsible will get
punished.”

Angelo looked pensive and the
lines in his face seemed to have deepened over the past few hours. Sofia knew
he was worried. He’d been hiding for twenty years. Coming out of hiding and
facing his family and possible murder charges must be terrifying.

“If for some reason we should be
questioned about the incident up in my house,” he continued, “I think we should
say that I shot Fabio.”

“Why?” Sofia asked.

“I have a permit for the weapon. I
speak the language, and I wouldn’t want you to get into trouble.”

“But it was self-defense,” Miriam
said. She started the car and drove it out of the parking lot and onto the
street toward Moretta.

“Yes, but the jerks may deny it.
There might be an investigation. Sofia could be arrested, questioned. She’d
need a lawyer, and it could be very unpleasant, to say the least. I don’t want
you to be involved any more than you already are.”

Sofia’s heartbeat increased. She
hadn’t even thought about the possible consequences. “But you’d be in trouble,
too,” she said.

Angelo gave a quick laugh. “I’m
already in trouble up to my ears, Sofia. One problem more or less won’t make
any difference.”

“But what if he says I shot him.
He saw me, didn’t he?” Sofia said.

“I don’t think he was aware of it.
It happened too fast. Besides, he’d be all too happy to put the blame on me.
He’s too macho to admit that a woman got the better of him. So, let’s agree, I
shot him, okay?”

 Sofia felt his sharp eyes
watching her. She turned around. “Okay.”

They lapsed into silence. Sofia,
her thoughts racing, tried to calm down and enjoy the sun-dappled hills and the
vineyards outside. It didn’t work. For the first time since she began her
search for the mysterious and missing great-uncle, she felt she was way over
her head in this adventure. Investigation, possible jail, what would her
family, Nicholas, say? She’d found Angelo but perhaps lost her freedom in the
process.

“Do you really think I could get
arrested?” Her voice trembled.

She felt a strong hand on her
shoulder. “No. I don’t think so. I just want to cover all the bases.” Angelo’s
voice sounded reassuring again.

In the meantime, they had arrived
at Miriam’s house in Moretta. They went inside and Angelo walked through all
the rooms, then came back into the living room.

“Just wanted to make sure
everything is okay,” he said, meeting Miriam’s puzzled look.

“Why would they bother with me?”
Miriam asked.

Angelo shrugged. “As long as we
don’t know who’s behind Fabio, we better be very careful. There are people out
there for whom human life means nothing. Believe me. So I really want you to
pack some things and spend a few nights at your mother’s. We can drive you
there.”

“I can drive there myself. It’s
actually within walking distance. I need to take care of some stuff first,
water the plants and the yard. They wouldn’t be coming for me today. They’re
probably still tied up in your house.” Miriam opened the refrigerator. “Would
you like some lunch or coffee or something.”

Angelo glanced at his watch. “We
better get going. I still need to drive by the monastery to talk to Abbot
Francesco. I hope you don’t mind?” He turned to Sofia.

“No problem,” she said.

“Well, then, but please Miriam go
to your mother today, okay? And call me when you get there. Do you have my cell
phone number?” Angelo’s dark eyes darted around the room as if he wanted to
make sure nobody was hiding in a corner somewhere.

Sofia, wanting to give them some
privacy, picked up her bag. “I’ll get my car out of the garage.”

“Okay,” Miriam said. “The door is
unlocked.”

Sofia and Miriam hugged. “Please
stay in touch,” Miriam said. “Let me know how everything turns out.”

Sofia nodded. “Yes, of course.
I’ll see you again, either here or in California. Thank you very much for your
help. I dragged you into a dangerous situation. I’m sorry.”

“It was exciting. Getting to know
you and finding this faithless friend here again was worth it.” Miriam gave
Angelo a pointed look.

Sofia opened the front door and glanced left and right
before she stepped outside. No blue Honda. She shook her head, realizing that
whoever drove that car must have been one of the guys now sitting tied up in
Angelo’s house. Waiting for Angelo after backing her car out of the garage, she
wondered if she would ever forget those dangerous moments in Angelo’s house.
Her heart still constricted at the thought of having shot someone. She could’ve
killed the man. She couldn’t even remember if she had aimed at a particular
part of his body. The moment before she pulled the trigger was a blur. The only
thing stuck in her mind was the pressure of her finger pulling the trigger, the
crack of the gunshot, and the smell of something burning.

A light tap at the passenger
window brought her back to reality. Sofia unlocked the door. Locking it while
she was waiting must be another unconscious reaction to the turbulence of the
past days.

Angelo put his bag on the backseat
and got in. “You’re sure you don’t mind driving by the monastery?”

“No,” Sofia said. “I think the
abbot will be relieved when he sees you. I hope we didn’t tell him anything you
didn’t want him to know. At least he didn’t act surprised, and he said you should
go back and take care of things.”

“Yes, he knows me quite well,”
Angelo said softly.

They were quiet on the short
stretch toward the abbey. At one point, a blue Honda drove from a side street
into main road and Sofia flinched.

“What’s the matter?” Angelo asked.

Sofia shook her head. “Nothing. I
just get scared every time I see a blue car.

At the monastery, they got out and
walked into the courtyard. Angelo pointed at the stone bench along the wall of
the chapel. “Wait here, I’ll go find Abbot Francesco.”

Sofia sat down and waited. The sun
was gaining strength, and it promised to be a warm day. Next to the chapel was
a blooming tree with purple blossoms. She closed her eyes and tried to relax,
inhaling the sweet-pungent scent of some kind of herb. Hearing footsteps, she
opened her eyes again. A few monks in black walked by, glanced at her, and
nodded, giving her a silent greeting. Shortly thereafter, Angelo came back out
followed by the abbot, who greeted her with a smile. “You found each other.
Wonderful.”

Sofia got up and shook hands with
him. “Yes, thank God.”

“Thank God, indeed,” he replied.
He turned to Angelo. “I’ll explain your absence to the youngsters. They will
understand and Agosto will be a good substitute.” Angelo and the abbot hugged.
“Go with God,” Abbot Francesco said. “I’ll see you when you get back. All will
be well.”