Chapter 56

Chapter 56
Lina's POV

The second week I arrived before Antonio, sitting in his usual seat.

When he came in and saw me, he paused, then smiled, saying "you stole my spot."

I said then let's sit together, the bar's long enough anyway. So he sat beside me, one position closer than last time.

By the third meeting, he already looked for me when entering, and upon finding me, sat directly beside me. The distance between us seemed to have closed another step.

Once he asked my opinion on jazz. I said the saxophonist always liked closing his eyes playing high notes, as if afraid to see the audience below wasn't even listening.

He laughed a long time at that, saying my description was too cutting, but from then on every time the saxophonist closed his eyes, he'd wink at me conspiratorially.

This secret only the two of us knew, and this was a small trick for building intimate relationships: creating inside jokes belonging only to two people.

It creates an illusion that there's some unique and irreplaceable connection between you.

On the seventh meeting, he took me to a restaurant he'd never taken any female companion to before.

It was a family restaurant in Little Italy. The owner was a seventy-year-old lady who shouted "Little Antonio" in Italian when she saw him.

He leaned close to tell me that after his parents were gone, while Luca was busy handling family matters, he ate all his dinners here.

When he said this, he wasn't smiling—the only time he didn't smile.

That evening we talked a lot.

Antonio said when he was fifteen, he went to the morgue to identify a body for the first time, saw his mother lying on an iron bed, Luca standing in front of him blocking half his view.

He said Luca cried harder than him, but made no sound, shoulders just kept shaking.

He said the thing he feared most in this life wasn't death, but disappointing Luca.

So I asked if he'd ever disappointed Luca.

He thought a long time and said yes, more than once, but Luca never blamed him.

When he said this, he spun his whiskey glass several times, then looked up at me, saying this was the first time he'd told anyone these things.

The next second he asked what my parents did. I stayed vigilant, knowing Antonio was fishing for information.

"They passed away very early, didn't leave much behind." I answered truthfully.

"Oh God... I'm so sorry." A trace of guilt flashed across Antonio's face.

Our relationship warmed slowly over this month-plus—from coincidental encounters to habit, from habit to dependence.

Once he fell asleep on the small sofa in my living room. I casually covered him with a blanket. When he woke and saw the blanket, he froze for a full five seconds, saying it had been a long time since anyone had covered him with a blanket.

In that moment I actually hesitated briefly, because Antonio's gaze and touch were both too sincere.

But in the end I still pressed all that hesitation deep into my heart, telling myself that if I didn't eliminate Antonio, the one eliminated would be me.

So I couldn't soften.

The tenth meeting—Antonio's birthday banquet.

Luca Moretti sat at the head of the long table. The moment Antonio brought me to my seat, I felt his gaze.

That gaze passed through the silver candelabras and crystal glasses on the table, settling fixedly on me, like an X-ray sweeping my entire body.

Thinking back now, Luca must have recognized me even then.

That evening after the banquet ended, I injected Antonio with cyanide in his hotel room.

He was leaning on the sofa at the time, having just finished his favorite red wine, eyes half-closed, corners of his mouth still carrying a trace of lingering smile.

When the needle tip pierced the side of his neck, he trembled slightly, then turned his head to look at me. Those eyes, in gradually dilating pupils, flashed a trace of confusion, then understanding, finally weariness.

With his last strength he squeezed my fingers once, just as lightly as when we'd shaken hands that first meeting at the jazz bar.

"So that time you weren't there to listen to jazz."

That was the last sentence he spoke in his life.

I reached out to close Antonio's eyelids, laid his body on the sofa, covered him with the small blanket, then withdrew through the hotel's back door.

However, I didn't expect to run straight into Luca at the back door.

He stood in the shadows, expression very calm.

I alertly reached behind my back to draw my knife and attack, but he stepped aside, opening a path.

"That time you let her go," Dmitri's voice pulled me back from memory, "it wasn't because you were merciful, Mr. Moretti. It was because you recognized her, correct?"

I turned to look at Luca. Luca leaned against the wall. He still hadn't looked at me.

His gaze rested steadily on Dmitri. He was silent for so long I thought he wouldn't answer.

Then the next second he spoke.

"I let her go that night for three reasons." Luca spoke deliberately. "First, Antonio had been gnawing away at my power from behind, making deals with outsiders. If he didn't die at Lina's hands, sooner or later he'd die at someone else's."

"Second, from her methods of approaching Antonio, I could tell she wasn't an ordinary person. And she helped me eliminate Antonio. Why would I kill her?"

Luca paused. "Third, I did recognize her. The first moment I saw her at the family banquet, I knew who she was."

Dmitri suddenly burst into laughter. "Good, very good! Now it's my turn to tell a story."

He set the teacup on the table. Porcelain met wooden tabletop with a soft crisp sound.

The desk lamp's light cast deep shadows on his face, hiding half his face in darkness.

"1998. Someone hired me to exterminate the Volkov family. The employer was a name you've never heard, doesn't matter now—their family stood on the wrong side in a mafia war, was jointly eliminated by several factions, remnants fled to South America. But when I received this assignment, they were still alive, still able to pay. They wanted me to eliminate the entire Volkov family. Leave no one."

His tone had no inflection, no remorse, no self-justification, just stating facts.

"Your father was the most stubborn man I've ever met. He didn't believe anyone dared move against his family—maybe he'd spent too long in high society, thought everyone followed rules like them. He dismissed all his bodyguards, leaving only himself, your mother, and you. That night he guarded the study door, emptied three magazines alone, held out seven minutes, finally fell where your mother could see him."

"The study's secret passage led to a back alley. That door was iron, locked from inside. Even explosives couldn't blow it open from outside." Dmitri's gaze passed over me, landing on Luca, corners of his mouth lifting in that ambiguous arc again. "So your mother gave you to Luca at that time."

I heard my own voice coming from somewhere far away: "Who?"

"Luca Moretti." Dmitri's gaze returned to my face. "In the end, she entrusted you to him, had him take you away."