Chapter 4 - THE GRANDFATHER AT THE FUNERAL
Anthony Bellini was not a senator anymore.
He had served twelve years, retired with approval ratings high enough to earn a university fellowship, a foundation and a memoir about public service.
Television called him statesman.
I called him Tony.
Celeste called him Dad.
Matteo called him Grandpa.
He had held my son's hand at the funeral.
I remembered him whispering:
“Your mother loved you more than anything.”
Now a mechanic in Arizona claimed Bellini had paid to sabotage her brakes.
Evidence first.
I repeated it until it almost worked.
Voice identification is imperfect.
Memory is imperfect.
Luis was scared.
Fourteen months had passed.
We needed records.
The audit found one.
$20,000 deposited into Luis’s sister's account the morning after the brake sabotage.
Sender:
North Atlantic Civic Consulting.
Shell company.
Beneficial ownership buried.
Three layers later:
A political consulting firm that had worked on Bellini's final Senate campaign.
Not proof Bellini ordered anything.
Enough for questions.
I did not call him.
My attorney did.
He accepted a meeting surprisingly quickly.
That worried me more.
He came to the estate alone.
Seventy.
Silver hair.
Navy coat.
The same measured smile that calmed voters and infuriated enemies.
He looked toward the missing bedroom camera mount as we passed.
“You’re renovating?”
“No.”
He studied me.
“Something happened.”
“Yes.”
We sat in my father's library.
No hidden cameras.
Visible recorder on the table.
“My counsel advised recording.”
Bellini looked at it.
“You've always had theatrical instincts.”
“Did you pay Luis Ortega twenty thousand dollars?”
No warm-up.
His expression changed slightly.
“Who?”
I watched.
Politicians are professional reactors.
His face told me nothing.
“Mechanic.”
Nothing.
“Worked here fifteen months ago.”
Then recognition.
Small.
“Ah.”
I leaned forward.
“He says a man with your voice paid him to sabotage Celeste's brakes.”
Bellini stared.
Then laughed.
Not dismissively.
Sadly.
“Vincent.”
“Answer.”
“No.”
“Did anyone working for you?”
“I don't know.”
That was too careful.
“North Atlantic Civic Consulting.”
His eyes hardened.
There.
“You know it.”
“Yes.”
“What did they do for you?”
“Opposition research.”
“On who?”
“Many people.”
“Me?”
Silence.
My pulse rose.
“Tony.”
“Yes.”
He had investigated me.
His daughter's husband.
“How long?”
“Before the wedding.”
“After?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“You were Vincent Rossi.”
“I still am.”
“My daughter loved a man whose name appeared beside killings, labor investigations and businesses nobody could fully map.”
“And you let her marry me.”
“She would have married you if I chained her to the Capitol.”
Despite everything, that sounded like Celeste.
“Did you monitor her?”
He looked away.
That was worse.
“Did you?”
“I monitored risks.”
“My wife was not a risk asset.”
“No.”
His voice cracked.
“She was my daughter.”
Something in the room changed.
Bellini had always been controlled.
Now grief appeared.
Real.
“What happened with the brakes?”
He stared at the recorder.
Then said:
“I wanted her scared.”
I went still.
Not denied.
Not enough.
“Explain.”
“I believed she was considering leaving you.”
My stomach tightened.
“How?”
“She called me.”
“When?”
“Four months before the bombing.”
“What did she say?”
“That she was tired of living under guard.”
That she wanted Matteo in a normal school.
That she thought my enemies were becoming his childhood.
I knew none of this.
Bellini continued.
“I told her to come home.”
“She refused.”
“She said leaving suddenly would provoke you.”
My jaw tightened.
“Would it?”
I hated the question.
Would I have hurt her?
No.
Would I have sent men to find my wife and child?
Yes.
Immediately.
For safety.
At least that is what I would have called it.
Bellini watched me understand.
“I wanted to create an incident small enough to prove she wasn't safe with you.”
My blood went cold.
“The brakes.”
“I ordered Luis to introduce a leak that would be discovered before failure.”
“You ordered sabotage.”
“Yes.”
“You almost killed her.”
“No.”
His voice rose for the first time.
“The car was scheduled for inspection that afternoon.”
“But she drove early.”
Silence.
Of course.
Real life ruins controlled plans.
“She hit a wall.”
“I know.”
“Matteo could have been inside.”
“He wasn't.”
“You didn't know that!”
Bellini closed his eyes.
“No.”
I wanted to kill him.
Simple.
Clear.
Then I remembered Matteo.
I kept my hands flat on the table.
Bellini noticed.
Maybe he understood how much effort that took.
“Celeste discovered it was you?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“Eventually.”
“What did she do?”
“She confronted me.”
“She told you she would expose it?”
“No.”
“She told me I would never see Matteo again.”
That hurt him more than prison apparently would.
“She meant it,” he whispered.
“So you killed her?”
His head snapped up.
“No.”
“Then who planted the bomb?”
“I don't know.”
“Why should I believe you?”
“Because the bomb killed the only person I was trying to get back.”
Selfish.
Possibly true.
He reached into his briefcase.
My guards stiffened outside.
Bellini placed an envelope on the table.
“Celeste gave me this one week before the explosion.”
My wife’s handwriting.
DAD
I opened it.
You don't get to call what you did protection. You scared me because you wanted me to make the choice you preferred. Vincent does that too, only with guards instead of campaign consultants. I am tired of powerful men deciding fear is useful when they believe they are right.
I stopped.
The words cut both of us equally.
Bellini continued.
“She told me she was investigating someone.”
“Who?”
“She wouldn't say.”
“Why give you the letter?”
“Because she wanted me to know she understood.”
“Understood what?”
“That the brake incident wasn't Vincent.”
I stared.
“She initially thought I ordered it.”
“Yes.”
My wife believed for a time that I might sabotage her car to keep her close.
I could barely breathe.
Bellini said:
“She realized you hadn't.”
“How?”
“I don't know.”
Then the final line of the letter:
There is someone else using both our families against each other. I think they want Vincent to blame you when something bigger happens.
Something bigger.
The bomb.
Bellini whispered:
“I have lived fourteen months knowing she warned me and I still failed her.”
I looked at him.
For once, we were not mafia boss and senator.
Just two men Celeste had loved and distrusted in different ways.
Then my phone rang.
Owen.
“Boss.”
“What?”
“The audit found who accessed Senator Bellini’s consulting files.”
“When?”
“Two weeks before the bombing.”
“Who?”
A name I knew.
Everyone knew.
Dominic Russo.
I looked at Bellini.
He saw my face.
“What?”
I hung up.
“Dominic knew about the brake sabotage.”
Bellini went pale.
“What?”
“He accessed your records.”
“Why?”
“I don't know.”
Then another thought.
If Dominic knew Bellini caused the first incident, he had the perfect person to blame for a second.
May you like
The man I trusted most had not been cleared.
Not even close.
