Chapter 148: THE INTERROGATION

Bella's POV

The bell over the door had been ringing all evening. Plates clinked, laughter bubbled, and the kitchen sighed steam like a big warm animal. I was wiping a table with my sleeve when I saw her come in.

Victoria walked like she owned the air. Her heels made tiny loud taps on the floor. Her hair was the exact color of old champagne and she smelled like perfume and money. Roberto stood up from the corner table, and his face lit like a lamp.

"Victoria," he said, loud and proud. "What a surprise."

She smiled at him slow, like she had practiced that smile in a mirror a thousand times. "Roberto," she purred. "I wanted to see you. Properly apologize to Alex. But first I had to see you. I missed your cooking."

Roberto beamed. He led her to a table near the window as if he were showing off a new picture. He kissed her hand. My stomach went cold and sharp. Not because of what she said, but because of the way she moved through the room and everyone made a little space for her like she was a passing star.

"Sit, sit," Roberto said. "Bella, come over here. This is Victoria. Victoria, my Isabella."

I came to the table with a tray of empanadas. I kept the tray steady but my hands trembled a tiny bit. Victoria looked at me like she was measuring me under a glass. "You are grown," she said, and it was a compliment and a test all in one.

"Thank you," I said. My voice sounded small to my own ears. I wanted to say something sharp, something honest. I held it like a coin between my teeth and swallowed it down.

Victoria asked about Alex before she asked about anything else. She folded her napkin, very neat. "How is Alexander? I want to apologize to him properly," she said like she was wrapping a present.

Roberto puffed up. "He is well. Busy. He always is. But he is a good friend. He will be delighted you came by."

She let her eyes rest on Roberto the way a cat rests on a warm window ledge. "I hurt him," she said, soft. "I regret things."

I watched Roberto's face melt into the story. He wanted to believe it. He wanted to forgive. He always wanted people to be whole again. I wanted to throw my empanadas and scream that she had done more than hurt. That she had been dangerous.

"You are welcome here," Roberto said. "Always my home."

Victoria reached across the table and touched his hand. The touch was light but the room felt like it had been closed in. "Tell me everything," she said to him with honey and a knife hidden in the words. "Is Alex alright? Is he under stress? Has anyone—"

"Why do you ask?" Roberto asked. His voice sounded small for a man who ran a restaurant.

She tilted her head, that practiced tilt. "I heard about trouble. I read the paper. I worry. Old friends should watch out for one another."

"Trouble?" Roberto echoed.

I said nothing. I wanted to tell them both to stop. To stop dancing around a place where truth and lies looked the same in low light. I wanted to say Alex would come if he could. I wanted to say he had already done too much, that this was not the time for charm.

Victoria smiled at me then. "And you must be Isabella. Alexander spoke of you. He always spoke of Elena fondly."

My mouth filled with an old ache. My fingers left grease on the paper napkin. "Thank you," I managed.

"Tell me," she said to Roberto, leaning in like a secret was going to slip out. "Has he changed? Is he lonely? Does he have friends he trusts?"

Roberto told her about the restaurant, about the garden, about small things. He talked like a man who fed people and thought that feeding fixed everything. Victoria asked another question. A small, soft thing. "Did anything strange happen last week? Anything at all? A man with a camera? People watching? A rumor?"

My heart skipped. Sound left me like a lost coin. I could not tell whether I wanted her to stay and keep talking or leave and take the quiet with her. Roberto shrugged like he didn't understand why the question mattered.

"A man with a camera?" he said. "No. Why would anyone do that?"

Victoria's eyes slid to mine. "Just curious," she said. "I worry. For Alex."

She was fishing. I could see the line in her hands. She cast for facts and waited for someone to bite. Roberto, bless him, wanted to believe her. He wanted to fix a wound that had a name he could say and a face he could recognize.

"She was at the hotel," I blurted before my tongue would hold it back. "Someone took pictures of her and Alex. At the parking lot. Outside the building."

Roberto's face changed. He paled a little. Victoria's hand stilled on the table as if a small bird had landed on it.

"Is that true?" she asked Roberto, very calm. Her voice did not crack. It was a blade wrapped in velvet.

"It is true," Roberto said. "I heard. Police I think. Security."

Victoria made a soft sound that could have been sympathy. She folded her fingers and then, like a trick you learned in a magic show, she slid something small across the table toward Roberto. It was wrapped in a napkin at first. He unfolded it with hands that trembled a little.

"Just a keepsake," she said. "For him. To hold when he misses the old times."

Roberto opened the napkin and I saw the edge of something small and metal. A flash. A tiny rectangle that could fit in a pocket. My breath stopped. I did not know why my heart hammered like it was a drum being hit by someone who was not me.

"Victoria," I said, too loud, and the kitchen went quieter for the second. "What is that?"

She smiled like it was a question that had an answer too delicious to give. "Just something to help remember," she said. "Tell Alex I said hello."

Roberto looked at the small object and then at me. He smiled in a way that made me want to shake him. He folded the napkin over the metal thing and slipped it into his pocket like a secret.

I wanted to reach across the table and grab it from him. My fingers reached and stopped. The world smelled of garlic and oil and something metallic.

"Isabella," Roberto said, voice unsure. "You should go take the order."

I stood because he asked. I walked away because everyone wanted to be polite and pretend nothing had happened. But my eyes were on Roberto's pocket and on the tiny glint that had been hidden like a promise or a trap.

Victoria went back to her story, charming and soft. She asked about Alex again, about whether I was okay, about Roberto's health. She laughed at his jokes and patted his arm. Her nails were red, perfect, and when she left she kissed him on the cheek.

When the door closed a wind slid through me and I realized my hands were wet. I wiped them on my apron and stared at the place where she had been seated. Roberto kept the small napkin in his hand like a rosary.

I had wanted to tell him everything then. To explain that some people did not apologize because they were sorry. They apologized because they wanted something. I wanted to say this while my voice was honest.

Instead I went back to the counter. My hands carried a plate but my head held a bright, small worry. I had seen the glint. I had felt a cold that started in my stomach and spread up like ice. I did not know what it was, only that it would make the next day very loud.

Behind the kitchen door someone shouted an order and a pan sizzled. I took a breath and my phone buzzed. One message. From an unknown number. A photo. I opened it and my world tilted.