Footsteps(118)

“You understand that Trey isn’t safe if she’s still out there.” Darby closed her notepad and leaned forward. Sabina noticed that she’d said ‘if’ and not ‘while’; she wondered if that was a telling choice. “She could do it again at any time. This case is not closed just because you have your son back. A crime was committed. A federal crime. We need information to solve it.”





“I understand. But you are not talking to my son. Ever.”





“You seem calm for a man whose son was abducted at gunpoint. I’d think you’d want justice and security for your kid.” Kohl was regarding him through eyes narrow with suspicion.





“I’m not calm. And I do want justice and security. I’m helping every way I can. My first priority is to my son, though, and this ordeal is over for him.”





Darby stood, and Kohl followed. “All right, then. You have our card. Get in touch if there’s anything else you want to tell us.”





Carlo showed them out and then came back to sit on the sofa with Sabina. She put her hand on his knee. “Is that it, then?”





“I doubt it. I’m sure they don’t believe us, and I expect they have pretty accurate suspicions about what really happened. The Uncles are well known to the Feds. But there’s a reason neither of them has ever even been arrested, in maybe fifty years of this work. They’re good. They have a firm grasp on the line between what’s known and what can be proved. We haven’t heard the last of the agents, but eventually they’ll put their resources elsewhere.”





They sat quietly, for a while, and then Sabina said a thing that had been gnawing at the edges of her mind since she and Carlo had talked earlier. “We both have spouses your Uncle Ben has saved us from, in some way. There is blood on our hands. And we owe your uncles a great deal.”





“No, Bina. It’s important that you think about this the right way, because ‘owing,’ with the Uncles, means something specific. They deserve our gratitude and respect, and they have it. That’s all. I was willing to owe, but we don’t. Uncle Ben did what he did for you, and for me, out of love and honor. Because we’re family. There’s no debt.” He turned and took her hands. “Do you regret it? Is that why you said we have blood on our hands?”





“No. Truly, I don’t. But it’s quite a thing, I think, to be responsible, even…sideways? Is that right?...for someone’s life ending. It’s not a thing I thought I’d know. Do you regret?”





Carlo was quiet. “I don’t. When I saw Trey’s bruises, I could have killed her with my hands, and I would have, except my hands were full of Trey. There were a few times while she had him when I felt out of control and would happily have bashed her head in. But…I did love her, once. I think I had blinders on, and made excuses or didn’t even notice some of the ways she was…just wrong. Carmen says I have a hero complex and I didn’t see Jenny for who she was because she needed me so much. Carm was worried that I would love you because I had saved you.” He squeezed her hands. “That’s not true. You know that’s not true, right?”





Sabina lifted one of his hands and kissed it. “It’s a little true. You do want to save and protect. You are a hero, I think. A little. And I think I would be dead now, if you hadn’t been so persistent in helping me. Chasing me down the beach even to help me. But I know you love me for more than that. And I know I love you for more than that, too.”





Carlo leaned in and kissed her. Just as the kiss was becoming something more, the staircase creaked. They pulled apart. The creak was too heavy to have been Trey, and there was no sound of Elsa coming along, so they knew they’d see Carlo Sr.





And they did. Standing in the entry to the living room in a pair of white boxers and a white V-neck t-shirt, his short hair wild from sleep, Carlo St. came into the living room.





“John called. Joe’s awake. He’s awake. I gotta get back there.”





~ 25 ~





Carlo tied Trey’s little Converse sneaker and gave his foot a pat. “Okay, pal. Let’s go down for breakfast. Big day today.”





Trey hopped off the bed and grabbed his new little shark backpack. Today was his first day of preschool. He was getting a late start; it was the middle of September and almost three weeks since the beginning of the school year, but it had taken him most of that time to come back out of his post-traumatic shell. Those weeks, when his beautiful, boisterous boy had been withdrawn and indolent, had scared Carlo badly. Jenny had managed to do a lot of damage in less than a single day.