Chapter 5 - WREN’S FATHER
The ledger was not about money.
That was the first surprise.
The second was Wren's name.
Odile told them that thirty years earlier, Adriano's father had secretly recorded every politician, judge, businessman and criminal partner who had used Vescari companies to launder money.
Then, late in life, he had tried to dismantle parts of the organization.
Some people had not appreciated that.
The ledger disappeared shortly before his death.
Renato believed Odile knew where it was.
She did not.
But she knew something else.
One of the accountants who had helped create it was named Gabriel Aldana.
Wren's father.
“No.”
The word left Wren before she could stop it.
“My father repaired restaurant equipment.”
“After he left Boston,” Odile said.
“He never lived here.”
“Yes, he did.”
“No.”
Odile studied her.
“You were six when he left.”
Wren's stomach dropped.
She had been six when her mother told her Gabriel's restaurant had failed.
Six when they moved.
Six when her father stopped talking about the past.
Adriano watched her carefully.
“You didn't know?”
“No.”
Anger came faster than grief.
“My father died without telling me any of this.”
Odile's expression softened.
“Perhaps he was trying to protect you.”
“Everybody says that when dead people leave messes.”
Wren walked out.
Adriano found her outside twenty minutes later, sitting on the back steps.
Rain had stopped.
He handed her a coat.
She did not put it on.
“You can leave,” he said.
Wren laughed once.
“That's your comforting speech?”
“I don't know how to comfort people.”
“I noticed.”
“I know how to remove them from danger.”
“I'm not leaving.”
“Renato may know who your father was.”
“Then leaving doesn't remove me from danger.”
Adriano sat beside her.
It looked strange seeing him on a concrete step.
For several minutes neither spoke.
Then Wren said, “My father used to hide recipes.”
“What?”
“When he got sick, his memory went strange. He'd write recipes everywhere. Receipts. Envelopes. Margins of newspapers.”
Adriano turned.
“Do you still have them?”
Wren did.
Three boxes in a storage unit.
They retrieved them that night.
For four hours they searched.
Nothing.
At 1:40 a.m., Adriano picked up an old recipe card.
“Your father cooked?”
“Badly.”
“Then why did he have a recipe for osso buco?”
Wren took it.
Her father hated veal.
The measurements were wrong.
2 cups flour.
17 carrots.
4 onions.
9 cups stock.
11 tomatoes.
Nonsense.
Unless they weren't measurements.
2-17-4-9-11.
Adriano recognized it first.
“Bank deposit box.”
The next morning they opened Box 2174911.
Inside was no ledger.
There was a key.
And a photograph.
The photograph showed Gabriel Aldana standing beside Adriano's father.
Between them was a young Odile.
Written on the back:
IF THEY COME FOR MY DAUGHTER, TELL HER THE TRUTH.
Wren stared at it.
“What truth?”
Odile answered when they returned.
May you like
“Your father saved Adriano's life.”
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