by Wendy Tyson
Jackie touched her neck, looked away. “I’m sure I don’t know.”
“And I’m sure you do.” Allison moved so that she was in front of Jackie, but the cook turned again, avoiding eye contact. “Look, Francesca’s life’s in danger. You don’t want her to end up like Maria.”
Silence.
“Jackie, this key was in a bag that Francesca was bringing to me. She told me she had things to share, secrets about her past and the family. Please, I am truly begging you. If you care for your friend, and I know you were her confidante and possibly her only friend, tell me.”
Jackie turned, looked at Allison, eyes wide and liquid.
“Alex mentioned that you used to cook together, that Francesca learned from you. You told me yourself that she was the only one who took the time to come down here, to chat. And Francesca never left this house. Who else would she have trusted with secrets, things she may have even hid from Paolo?”
Jackie stood, motionless. Finally, with a sad shake of her head, she said, “Francesca wanted to protect Paolo. Once she found out what Dom and Alex were up to, she tried to keep it from her brother. She loved him. But—”
“But what?”
Jackie swallowed.
“But they cornered him,” she said. “Pushed for him to sign papers, first relinquishing control of the company, then going along with their scheme. He refused, they pushed more.” Full blown tears now, streaming like raging creeks down her face. “And he had the stroke.”
Allison lowered her voice. “They were selling parts of Benini Enterprises to the Russian Mob, weren’t they? Until Paolo and Francesca found out.”
It was barely a nod, but Allison caught it. Jackie moaned, a long soft moan that spoke of bottled up secrets and the cancer of hate. “He built this business on honor, despite...well, he did his best. Francesca, too. And they sold his honor. For what?”
“Did they kill him?”
“Dom and Alex?” Jackie looked horror-stricken at the thought. “I hope not.”
Allison pictured Reginald Burr’s name on the hospital registry. It would have been so easy to smother a comatose man, delay the alarms connected to the monitors, slip in and out of his room dressed like a hospital employee. It could have been Burr. It could have been one of the sons. If it happened at all. They may never know for sure.
“Jackie, what does all this have to do with Gina?”
“I don’t know.” Eyes wide, she said, “I really don’t. There were some secrets Francesca wouldn’t share, even with me.”
“Tell me what the key is for.”
Jackie glanced around the kitchen. She seemed to be thinking, weighing. Finally, she pulled off her apron and threw it down on the counter. “I can’t leave. But I’ll write you directions.”
Vaughn and Jamie sat, staring at the computer monitor in Jamie’s room, in stunned silence.
Jamie said: ARE YOU SURE?
Vaughn nodded, sweat soaking his t-shirt, heart thumping at his ribcage. There was no way he could get to Ithaca before Allison had to leave for her flight. But they needed to get this information to her as soon as possible. She needed to know.
THIS ALL MAKES SENSE NOW.
“Yeah, I knew something was up with both of them.”
They were looking at pictures of the Gretchko family.
It had taken Jamie an hour to find a good shot of Andrei Gretchko’s daughter. But there she was, Denise Gretchko Carr. Tammy’s manager. Mob boss’s kid.
It had taken Jamie five hours to find a picture of Andrei Gretchko, and he’d finally had to get Jason’s help. The guy was damn good at avoiding the media.
But he couldn’t avoid his mug shot photo.
Andrei Gretchko. Reginald Burr.
“No wonder we couldn’t find anything on Burr.”
SO THE GRETCHKOS HAVE BEEN BESIDE THE BENINIS THE WHOLE TIME. IN PLAIN SIGHT.
“Denise called me after we started the engagement with Francesca. She knew. And she was using Allison to get to Francesca.” Vaughn’s mind spun with the implications. “The Gretchkos went through either Tony Edwards or Kai. Somehow they knew about Tammy and her burgeoning musical career. They used Tammy to get access to Francesca.”
BUT SOMEONE THWARTED THEM.
“You think Allison’s right? That Dom or Alex has Francesca, not the Gretchkos?”
I DO NOW. THINK ABOUT IT. IF THE GRETCHKOS WANTED BENINI, AND PAOLO BALKED, THEN HAD A STROKE, THEY WOULD NEED FRANCESCA’S COOPERATION. THEY FOUND OUT THROUGH DOM OR ALEX THAT SHE’D BEEN DOWN HERE. THEY NEEDED HER OUT OF THAT HOUSE. AND OUT OF THE WAY.
“So they arrange for a second client, Tammy Edwards. Denise has an excuse to be here, to snoop, to ask questions.” Suddenly nauseous, Vaughn said, “And a way to kill her.” He let that sink in.
RIGHT. ONLY FRANCESCA NEVER MAKES IT DOWN HERE.
“Because someone else placed that tracker on my car. Followed me. Took Francesca.”
BUT DID THEY TAKE HER TO SAFETY...OR DID THEY WANT TO GET TO HER FIRST?
Allison listened to Vaughn’s information with a heavy heart. She’d just left the post office with a manila envelope of materials from Francesca’s post office box, and she was anxious to go through them. But when Vaughn told her about Denise, she had to pull over.
“There’s only one way Denise knew about me, knew to connect me and Tammy.”
Vaughn had the sense to stay quiet.
“Alex,” she continued. “She must have been his manager. He was using me from the start.”
“I’m sorry, Allison. You don’t know that for certain.”
“I’m pretty sure, Vaughn. Think about it. How would the Gretchkos and Beninis have connected in the first place? I suppose the Gretchkos could have approached Benini Enterprises, but why that company? No, I thought from the beginning that this was more personal than that. I think Alex and Denise knew each other. That’s what started the corporate courtship.”
“And he and Denise used Tammy to get to you. To Francesca.”
Allison started to nod before realizing he couldn’t see her. “Poor Tammy. She must have figured it out, been frightened. Did Jamie have any luck pinpointing the location of that picture?”
“He’s working on it now.”
“Let me know what you find.”
“Where are you headed? You should take the package and get to the airport. Come home. We can figure out the rest from here.”
She pulled out the family photo she’d gotten at the library and studied the picture. She thought of Francesca’s determination, Alex’s playboy charm, Dom’s serious demeanor, always looking at the world through his mother’s dark eyes.
And then it hit her. Gina Benini. Trying forever to get pregnant. Then having not one, but two sons. Number two born soon after Francesca arrives.
Francesca, married off to the highest bidder. A family rival. A bad man.
Abused, frightened, she runs back to Daddy. But Daddy has to send her somewhere. A convent. An asylum. America.
Not because she’s mentally ill. Because she’s pregnant.
“Allison? Are you still there?”
“Oh Lord, Vaughn. There it was all along. The key.”
“What are you talking about?”
She turned the key in the ignition, started the Ford. “Alex Benini. Those damn striking blue eyes. He looks nothing like Gina. That always bothered me, that one son looked so much like his mother, the other not at all. It’s because Alex is Francesca’s child.”
“From her marriage?”
“Yes.” Quickly, Allison explained her theory, thinking of Gina’s diary. “It makes sense that Gina rejected Alex. She didn’t want to have to live that lie, resented Francesca and her son for intruding on her life and marriage, the tidy world she’d created for herself. But she was forced to play along, pretend Alex was hers.�
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“But why the façade once Francesca got to the States?”
Carefully, Allison opened the envelope. As she suspected, inside was a binder clip of documents outlining the Gretchko-Benini alliance. Real estate transactions, shipping instructions, bank deposits. Things that, by themselves, meant nothing. Together they could bring down the whole arrangement.
“I have a hunch, Vaughn, that this all ties back to organized crime. From the time of Alex’s conception. Jackie, the cook, mentioned Paolo’s honor, his honest efforts to grow this business. And his sons’ betrayal.”
“You think the boys have Francesca?”
“Yes.”
“But where?”
“I think I know that, too.”
Thirty-Eight
Allison’s first call was to Jason. She left a message at his office, giving him a bare bones account of what was happening and telling him where he could find the incriminating papers, which she’d left in the safe back at the inn. Then she called Razinski. She hoped to hell he was clean, because she had no real choice but to trust him. She didn’t know who else to turn to. He listened quietly, reacting only when she said she had hard evidence. “I’ll see what I can do,” he’d said at that point. She gave him Jason’s number. Then she called 9-1-1 and reported a kidnapping at the Benini estate.
When she arrived back at the Benini home, no cars sat in the circle. Jackie let her in immediately. “Simone and Dom are at the funeral home,” she said. “You probably shouldn’t be here.”
“I need your help.” Allison told Jackie about the police and where she was headed. “If I’m wrong, it’s a false alarm. But I don’t think I am.”
Jackie gave a grunt of assent. “Hurry.” She gave Allison a flashlight from a kitchen drawer. Allison rummaged in her purse until she found the Swiss Army knife. Then she placed the knife in her pants pocket.
“You remember the way?”
“Yes. But my phone won’t work out there.”
“I’ll watch for the police.” Jackie made the Sign of the Cross. “Just be quick.”
It was hard to be quick in the rain. The muddy path slowed Allison’s progress, and made it hard to see clearly. But rain had its advantages, too. It would hide her tracks if anyone came searching. After all, she reminded herself, Dom and Simone were accounted for, but Reginald and Alex were not.
It took her fifteen minutes to find the grotto, another ten to locate the trap door in the ground. She remembered seeing the platform and the metal ring, but when she tried to visualize where it was, its distance to the statues, she couldn’t remember. She tapped along the muddy ground, listening for a hollow sound, but the rain and wind muted whatever echo there was.
Allison dropped to her knees. She searched the area with slick fingers, feeling her way along the dirt and grass, hoping to feel wooden boards, metal, an edge, anything that would indicate the door, for she was certain now that’s what it was. Water streamed down her face, into her eyes. Her shirt clung to her, wet cotton against raw skin. Fingernails caked with mud clawed the earth. Frustrated, she made pass after pass. She started to wonder if she’d imagined the whole scene at the grotto.
Bingo.
Her hands finally brushed something hard underneath a section of mud. Allison followed the edge of the wood, looking for a handle. She found a small ring on one edge, smaller than the original. They’d changed it, she thought, to hide the entrance. With one mud-streaked hand, she pulled. The door wouldn’t budge. She tugged harder.
The door came up slowly on rusty hinges. The sweet smell of rotting vegetables mingled with human excrement hit her, even with the wind and driving rain. Allison tried to listen. She thought she heard noises like a human grunting. Excited, terrified? She turned on the flashlight and aimed it carefully into the hole. She saw a rope ladder extending into the darkness, and began her descent into the depths of the hiding place, flashlight between her teeth.
“Nooks and crannies,” Alex had said when describing the Benini estate. Nooks and crannies, for sure. Allison figured this was an old root cellar, a place to store vegetables over the winter.
Now it was the den of a kidnapper.
She reached the last rung and hopped down, onto a dirt floor. Letting her eyes adjust to the dark, she stood for a second, getting her bearings and listening for sounds that might indicate a trap. When her vision was clearer, she swept the room with the light from the flashlight, searching for Francesca. There she was, tied to an old armchair, gagged.
Allison ran to her, pulling the knife from her pants pocket. Quickly, carefully, she sliced the ropes holding Francesca’s legs together and the ones binding her arms to the chair. Francesca pulled the gag from her mouth, coughed. When she could breathe, she said, “We have to hurry! He went to get food. He’ll be back soon.”
“Who, Francesca?”
But it was too late. Another form started its descent into the blackness. Before Allison saw who it was, she caught the unmistakable silhouette of the gun.
“Really, Allison,” Alex Benini said. “You’re more tenacious than I thought. And it was downright amusing watching you crawl around in the mud.”
Alex walked across the small cavern, gun aimed at her, not Francesca. He was carrying a bag, which he thrust toward Francesca. “Eat.”
Francesca took the bag, dropped it to the ground. “Alex, let her go. She has nothing to do with any of this. I don’t even understand why she’s here.”
“Andrei was having her followed. They can’t figure out who took you, Aunt Francesca. They thought maybe Allison was hiding you.”
Francesca looked at Allison with a mixture of pity and sorrow. “I’m so sorry you’re involved. And that young man, the one who was driving me. I felt so bad when Alex nabbed me. I was afraid he would be blamed.” To Alex, she said, “Let her go.”
“No, Aunt Francesca. I don’t think we can.”
Francesca sat down on the chair, rubbing her leg. Calm. Stoic. Not quite the reaction Allison had anticipated.
“You used me for information,” Allison said. “Played the part of the grieving son, worried nephew. When all along, you were lying.” Allison shook her head. She twisted her hand behind her back, adjusting the knife in the shadows. “It was you who placed the tracker on Vaughn’s car. You didn’t come to Philadelphia to see what Francesca had given me. You wanted to remove any evidence that Vaughn had been followed. But Maria knew. She saw you place the tracker on Vaughn’s car—”
“Allison, Allison, Allison.” He gave her a tired smile. “I was never using you. I enjoyed our conversations, would have enjoyed even more. But for the life of me, I couldn’t figure out what kept you going, despite the danger. I knew Andrei and his people were following you, trying to scare you. And I said as much. I figured,” he shook his head, let the gun fall a hair, “that you were playing some angle yourself.”
“No angle, Alex. Just trying to find your aunt.” She had the knife in the right position now, so she kept talking, back against the wall. “Tammy Edwards was your idea? So Denise is your manager?”
“I wanted her to be. Instead, she’s fucking my brother.”
“Always with the competition between you two,” Francesca said.
Alex turned to his aunt. “And the competition continues.” He looked back at Allison. “I never wanted to hurt my aunt. I was trying to save her.”
Allison glanced at Francesca. The older woman ran a dirty hand down a haggard face. Francesca said wearily, “I haven’t changed my mind.”
“Dom is getting antsy,” Alex replied. He did sound regretful. Whether it was sincere or not, Allison had no idea. “Andrei is pressuring him, he suspects we have you. Dom never wanted to do this in the first place, he wanted to let the Gretchkos work things their way. And I’m afraid I’m losing the battle. If you don’t agree soon, he’ll put you back in the hunting cabin and let Andrei find you
.”
“Then let him! I told you before, I won’t let you two ruin what your father and I worked so hard to build.”
“It’s only money.”
“It’s never only money!” Francesca stood, pointed a finger at Alex. “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“No, I don’t. So why don’t you tell me.”
“Because you’re her son, Alex.”
Francesca and Alex turned to Allison, both horrified. And in that instance, Allison once again saw the resemblance. Not in stature, but the eyes. His were blue, hers brown, but they reflected the same world-weary, lively intelligence. No wonder they were never together in pictures, Allison thought. That should have been a dead giveaway.
“Yes, Francesca, I finally pieced it together. Your marriage, it was arranged by your grandmother. You escaped, but not before you got pregnant with your husband’s child. His family had to be rich, powerful for the marriage to be worth it. A rival family. If I had to guess, I’d say he was Mafioso. You didn’t want to be tied to him, and a child would bind you.”
“More than that,” Francesca said. “He would own that child. Control him. Turn him into a monster like he was.” She shook her head. “That could never be allowed to happen.”
“So you lived a lie. Came here, pretended Alex was Gina’s, stayed in this house, guarding your son and your secret.”
Alex was staring at Francesca with a mixture of hurt and betrayal. “She despised me. All those years, you let me believe I was her son?”
“I despised her for despising you. But she was fragile, jealous. Paolo forced her to go along, but she couldn’t be trusted. There was nothing I could do.” Francesca’s voice was burdened by years of guilt. “When Gina died, I thought it would all die with her, but then your uncles...” She put her hand out, pleading. “I couldn’t tell you.”
Alex lowered the gun. He shook his head, dazed. “You set the fire?”