Chapter 6 - THE LEDGER BENEATH THE FLOOR
Elena Romano was seventy-two years old and five feet three inches tall.
She terrified every man in the room.
“Adrian Joseph Romano.”
Adrian closed his eyes.
Apparently the middle name meant trouble.
“You brought armed men into my driveway at nine in the morning and frightened my gardener.”
“Ma.”
“And you haven’t visited in six weeks.”
“I called.”
“A telephone is not a son.”
Sophia whispered to me, “She’s mad.”
“Yes.”
“I like her.”
Of course she did.
Elena’s attention shifted to us.
She had Adrian’s dark eyes, although hers were warmer.
“This is Maria?”
I blinked.
“You know me?”
“My son called me at six this morning and spent fifteen minutes pretending he was not worried about you.”
Adrian looked at the ceiling.
“Ma.”
“What? You did.”
I stared at him.
He suddenly found the antique clock fascinating.
Elena crouched in front of Sophia.
“And you must be the little girl who interrogates criminals.”
Sophia frowned.
“What’s interrogates?”
“Asks questions until grown men regret their choices.”
Sophia smiled.
“Yes.”
Elena kissed her forehead.
Then her expression became serious.
Adrian showed her the photograph of Anthony.
Her face drained.
“My nephew.”
“He’s alive,” Adrian said.
“For now.”
“Do you know anything about a ledger?”
Elena’s eyes snapped toward him.
That was answer enough.
Adrian stepped closer.
“You do.”
She walked into the sitting room.
“Close the door.”
No one spoke until it clicked shut.
“Your father kept records,” Elena said.
“Of course he did.”
“No. Not business records.”
“What kind?”
“Insurance.”
Adrian’s face hardened.
“Against whom?”
“Everyone.”
She looked at Sophia, then at me.
“He never trusted allies completely. Politicians. Union men. Judges. Police officers. Other families. He kept copies of payments, favors, threats, names.”
Matteo swore softly.
Adrian stared at his mother.
“You knew about this?”
“I knew enough.”
“Where is it?”
“I don’t know.”
He laughed without humor.
“Colton is threatening to kill Anthony over a ledger nobody can find.”
“Your father hid it after Isabella died.”
“Why?”
“Because he realized Colton had access to some of the same people listed inside.”
Adrian’s jaw tightened.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because you were trying to become something better than him.”
Her voice cracked.
“I did not want his ghosts deciding your life.”
Adrian looked away.
Elena touched his arm.
“After Isabella died, your father became obsessed. He believed Colton had help from inside.”
“He did.”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
“I never knew.”
Matteo asked, “Did Salvatore ever mention where the ledger was?”
Elena was silent.
Then her eyes moved toward Adrian.
“What?”
he asked.
“Your sister did.”
Adrian stopped breathing.
“Isabella?”
“She came to me two days before she died. Your father had given her something for safekeeping because he trusted her more than anyone.”
“What?”
“A key.”
My skin prickled.
“To where?”
“She said, ‘If anything happens, tell Adrian the house remembers where children hide from thunder.’”
Adrian stared at her.
“What does that mean?”
Elena’s face changed.
Then Adrian’s did too.
He knew.
“The nursery,” he whispered.
Elena nodded.
“Romano House.”
We returned to Manhattan under heavier security.
The nursery had not been used regularly in years.
It was now a guest room for nieces and nephews.
Adrian stood in the center, turning slowly.
“Children hide from thunder.”
Sophia walked around us.
“Under beds.”
We all looked.
Nothing.
“Closets,” I said.
Nothing.
Sophia crawled behind an old rocking chair.
“There’s a house.”
“What?”
She pointed at the wall.
A small carved wooden panel had been painted over years earlier.
A house.
Barely visible.
Adrian knelt.
He pressed it.
Nothing happened.
Sophia pressed the chimney.
Click.
A section of baseboard opened.
Matteo stared.
“You have got to be kidding me.”
Inside was a narrow cavity.
One brass key.
And a folded note.
Adrian opened it.
His hands began to shake.
I had never seen that before.
He read aloud.
Adrian,
If you are reading this, Dad was right to be afraid.
Colton knows about the ledger.
But he isn’t the only one.
Someone in our family helped him.
I don’t know who yet.
I moved the ledger somewhere they will never search because men like Dad only look where men keep secrets.
Remember where I kept mine.
I love you.
Bella.
Adrian closed his eyes.
“What secrets?” Matteo asked.
He did not answer.
I looked around.
Isabella had been twenty-two.
What secrets did a young woman keep?
Letters?
Diaries?
Photos?
I looked at the key.
Tiny.
Not a safe key.
Not a door key.
“A locker,” I said.
Adrian opened his eyes.
“What?”
“Or a jewelry box.”
Elena shook her head.
“She hated jewelry.”
“School locker?” Matteo asked.
Adrian froze.
“No.”
“What?”
“She volunteered at the clinic.”
“So?”
“She kept a locker there.”
The clinic still existed.
Different name.
Same building.
We reached it before sunset.
The administrator found old renovation records.
The original employee lockers had been removed nine years earlier and placed in basement storage because nobody had bothered paying to dispose of them.
Locker 117.
The brass key opened it.
Inside was a faded backpack.
Adrian lifted it out.
Beneath an old nursing textbook sat a black leather ledger.
Nobody spoke.
Twelve years of blood and secrets reduced to something that looked like an accountant’s notebook.
Matteo opened it carefully.
Pages of names.
Dates.
Payments.
Initials.
Then he stopped.
“Adrian.”
“What?”
He pointed.
R.C. — COLTON.
V.C. — VINCENT CASTELLANO.
A.R.
Anthony Romano.
My stomach dropped.
Adrian stared at his cousin’s initials.
Next to them were several payments from twelve years earlier.
Then a notation written in Salvatore’s handwriting.
A.R. PROVIDED VEHICLE SCHEDULE — I.R. ATTACK.
I.R.
Isabella Romano.
Adrian went white.
“No.”
Matteo said nothing.
“He was nineteen,” Adrian whispered.
“He was a kid.”
“A nineteen-year-old who gave Colton Isabella’s route.”
We heard footsteps behind us.
Security moved immediately.
A nurse came through the basement door.
“Mr. Romano?”
“Yes?”
“There’s a call upstairs for you.”
“Who?”
She looked confused.
“He said his name is Richard Colton.”
Every guard reached for a weapon.
Adrian’s face became stone.
He walked to the nearest desk phone.
Pressed speaker.
“Colton.”
A man laughed.
Older.
Calm.
“Hello, Adrian.”
Adrian’s fist tightened.
“You have Anthony.”
“For the moment.”
“You want the ledger.”
“I want what belongs to me.”
“It belongs to the dead.”
“Everything belongs to the living eventually.”
Adrian’s voice dropped.
“If you touch him—”
“Still protecting family?”
Colton chuckled.
“Even after reading what your precious cousin did to Bella?”
Adrian’s eyes closed.
Colton knew we had found it.
He had been watching.
Then another voice came through the speaker.
Anthony.
Weak.
“Adrian…”
Adrian leaned forward.
“Anthony.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Where are you?”
“I—”
A blow.
Anthony cried out.
Sophia gasped behind me.
I covered her ears.
Colton returned.
“Midnight. Pier 46.”
“No.”
“Then he dies.”
Adrian looked at the ledger.
“We make the exchange.”
Matteo stepped forward.
“Adrian—”
“We make it.”
Colton laughed.
“Come alone.”
The line disconnected.
Sophia pulled my hands away from her ears.
“Mr. Adrian?”
He looked at her.
She walked toward him.
“Is your cousin bad?”
The question broke something in his face.
“I don’t know.”
Sophia thought carefully.
“Sometimes I do bad things.”
Mrs. Greco whispered, “Sophia.”
“I colored the wall.”
Adrian stared at her.
She continued.
“Mommy got mad. But I’m not a bad Sophia.”
Adrian looked down at the ledger.
At the proof his cousin may have helped kill his sister.
Then he whispered, “No.”
Sophia touched his hand.
“Maybe he’s not a bad Anthony.”
For the first time since finding the ledger, Adrian looked uncertain.
May you like
And that uncertainty may have saved his cousin’s life.
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