“So you never got a name?” Burning with rage, Frankie felt her vocal cords go tight. This had been her one chance to find out who was behind the kidnapping, and her men had screwed up. She slammed down the phone.
It was ten past noon in Chicago, twelve hours since Luisa had been snatched, twelve to go until the deadline. She propped her elbows on her desk and covered her forehead with her hand. Her head felt like it was caught in a steel vise.
She forced herself to take stock. They wouldn’t kill Luisa before they got the map—that was a no-brainer. And Frankie might have to surrender it to them. But they had to realize she would make a copy before she handed it over. So what was the point? Unless she was wrong. Maybe it was a rival Family flexing their muscles. Or another organization racing to mine the land. Whatever the case, if she was forced to surrender the map, this wouldn’t be the last battle. A lot could happen after Luisa was safe.
Still, this was her granddaughter. And now it was personal. What’s more, if they’d been searching for the map for decades, as she now suspected, they had to be behind the murders of Luis and Michael. Which made it more personal. Who were they? Did they know who she was? She tried to imagine what her father would have done. He would have gone full bore attack, assuming his enemies were Mob. But what if they weren’t? Would he be that aggressive? Would he save Luisa at any cost?
Frankie wondered if her enemy thought that because she was a woman, she would capitulate. If they did, they’d made a serious mistake. Frankie had watched her father before her. Male or female, as the head of a powerful Mob family, she knew the consequences of war, and she was on intimate terms with death. She would go after them with everything she had. If they thought she would break, they had the wrong woman.
But first she had to find out who they were. The most frightening part of any battle was the unknown. Once you knew your enemy, could put a name or a face to them, you could formulate a strategy. Implement a plan.
Clearly, something or someone had tipped them off to the re-emergence of the map—probably the moron in Toronto. But he was dead, which meant they would have to show themselves. And when they did, she would regain the upper hand. She would regroup, bide her time, retaliate. They would get what was coming to them.
Buoyed by her thoughts, she pulled herself together and emerged from her office. Carla was curled up on the leather couch, this side of catatonic. Frankie’s soldati, unsure where to go or what to do, milled around. Gino, her sotto capo, was on his cell. She sat down on the other end of the sofa. In a quiet voice, she said, “We’re going to have to get the map. The original. Not a copy. It’s at the bank.”
Carla roused herself, and for the first time since the kidnapping, looked alert. She nodded.
“Well then,” Frankie said. “Let’s go.”
Frankie and Carla returned to the Barrington estate with the map around three. The kidnappers were due to call at six. En route Frankie asked Carla about Luis and Michael’s death: exactly what happened and how they were murdered in Cuba. After hearing the story, Frankie was more convinced that the people who kidnapped Luisa were the same people. She was about to tell her crew, so she could prime them for tonight, when one of the guards called from the front gate.
Gino picked up the phone, then called across the room. “Mrs. DeLuca, there’s a man at the gate who says he needs to see you.”
Frankie arched her eyebrows. She wasn’t expecting contact from the other side for two more hours. She crossed the room and took the phone. “Who is it?”
The guard said, “He says his name is Ramon Suarez.”
Frankie scowled. “I don’t know anyone by that name.”
She heard a murmured conversation in the background.
“He says you knew him in Havana.”
Frankie thought. Then she sucked in air. Ramon. The waiter who informed on her. Who tore her away from Luis. She felt her eyes narrow. “What does he want?”
“He says he has important information.”
She snorted. “What information could he have?”
Another murmured conversation. Then, “He says he knows about the map. And who is looking for it.”
She thought about it. After a pause, she said, “You searched him?”
“Yes, ma’am. He’s clean.”
The man who entered the house had skin as brown and withered as a dead leaf, Carla thought. He was using crutches, and his right thigh was heavily bandaged. He’d had an accident, and it was still causing him pain; she saw it in his eyes. Francesca, on the other hand, appraised him coolly.
“Hallo, Miss Pacelli.” He spoke English with a thick accent. It was an accent Carla recognized. He was Cuban.
“What are you doing here?” Francesca said.
“I come to warn you.”
“About what?”
He inclined his head. “The map.”
“What do you know about it?”
He looked around as if he was afraid to go on with so many people—and guns—in the room.
But Francesca had no patience. “I didn’t think so.” She spun around. “Gino, I need—”
“Wait!” Carla threw her hand up in the air. “Don’t.” She started to talk rapidly in Spanish. His face lit when he realized she was talking a language he understood. “What happened to you? Why are you here?”
He answered in equally rapid Spanish.
Carla nodded and asked more questions. He answered, but in the middle of one of his responses, Francesca cut in. “My Spanish is rusty. What is he saying?”
Carla turned to her. “He says he knows you hate him. That you blame him for everything.”
More words poured out from him, as if they’d been bottled up for years. Maybe they had, Carla thought. “He says he could not stand up to the torture your father inflicted. That he was—he is—not a strong man.”
Francesca stared at Ramon as if he was a creature who’d crawled out of the sewer.
“He says the same man who killed Luis came after him in Florida a few days ago. They shot him in the leg when he tried to escape.”
“What man? Why were they after you?” Francesca said in English.
Ramon switched back to English. “Because I was the one who tell Luis to draw map.”
Francesca’s mouth dropped open. “You were with Luis? In Angola?”
“He forgive me when he hear what your father do during the revolution,” he said. “But there was—another problem.”
Francesca threw up her hands. “I’m in the middle of a crisis. I have no time for this.” She started to turn away. Gino and another soldati closed in.
But Ramon stood his ground. He clearly wanted to tell the story. “In Angola, I believe Luis—how you say—leave me to die in the jungle. The rebels get me, and…” His voice trailed off.
Carla broke in. “They tortured you… again?”
Ramon nodded. “But CIA rescue me. Bring me to U.S., give me money. In return I give information. I tell my contact about the map. He leave agency.” He hesitated. “Then I feel bad about what I do. It—how do you say?”
“It haunted you? You felt guilty?” Carla asked.
“Sì. Yes. When I hear you come to Miami, and that Michael is dead,” he tapped an index finger against his temple, “I know who kill him and why. I find out where you work and go there. To warn you.”
Carla reeled back. “You were the one who came to the pharmacy?”
He nodded again.
Blood rushed to her head. Carla felt light-headed. Ramon’s visit was what prompted her escape from Miami. She’d thought he was the enemy. But if they had met, and she had listened to his story, perhaps she would never have left. Would never have come to Chicago. Or met Francesca. And Luisa would never have been kidnapped. Carla felt like screaming and crying at the same time.
Francesca stepped forward. “You are wasting my time, Suarez. You have exactly ten seconds to tell me who wants the map.”
“You do not know?”
Francesca threw a glance towards Gino and the other soldati. They started to approach.
Ramon raised his hand. “Ees okay. His name is David Schaffer. He make electronica.”
“A businessman kidnapped my daughter? A goddammed businessman?” Carla sputtered.
Francesca’s cheeks flamed red, and she fisted her hands. Clearly she hadn’t wanted Carla to reveal the kidnapping.
Ramon looked shocked. “The little girl?” He gestured to Carla. “Your daughter? They take her?”
Carla nodded, but Francesca answered, apparently deciding to admit the truth. “They shot her boyfriend and kidnapped her. They will kill her unless we give them the map.”
“I will help,” Ramon said.
Francesca went rigid. “I will never let you get close to my family. Not after the way you made me suffer.”
“We have all suffered.”
“You turned on us.” Francesca drew herself up. “You were a traitor.”
But Ramon didn’t move. “If I not ‘turn’ as you say, you would not be same person you are now.”
Francesca was speechless, the cords in her neck stretched tight. No one talked to her that way, Carla thought.
“You would still be in Cuba,” Ramon went on. “La esposa of honored revolutionary. You would have big family. Lots of children y grandchildren. Love and happy.”
Francesca went still. So did the people around her. The air, too. It seemed to Carla as if time had stopped. And in that instant, Carla realized exactly who Francesca DeLuca was: a pathetic old woman who’d been forbidden to love, and then lost her son, the only tangible product of that forbidden love.
Suddenly Carla pitied her mother-in-law. At least she had had Michael, albeit briefly. And Luisa was still alive. For now. She stole a glance at Francesca. Her mother-in-law’s face had gone haggard. As if she finally understood how far she had strayed from her youthful plans. For the first time she looked her age.
Ramon broke the silence. “I want to make right, Miss Pacelli. I want to give them map. Get girl back.”
Carla interrupted. “No. They tried to kill you in Florida. They will finish the job here.”
Ramon spread his hands. “I do not want the map. Or what comes with it. This is my way to—clean the past.”
Francesca didn’t reply.
But Carla did. She desperately wanted Luisa back, but there had to be limits. She couldn’t send anyone to a certain death. “What if they don’t release Luisa? After you give them the map?”
“I have lived my life.” Ramon gave her a weak smile, one that reflected an awareness, even a slight embarrassment, at the smallness of his life and how little it mattered. “And if that happens, Miss Pacelli come after them.” He turned to Francesca. “Sì?”
Francesca stood there.
Carla was uncertain. Her longing to have Luisa back warred with her conviction that Ramon would die. She looked at her mother-in-law.
“Look.” Ramon faced Francesca. “They probably already think we partners. They know you have map. Let me do this.” He paused. “This is my way to pay back.”