A car was directly up ahead of us, two on each side of us, and one behind us. Each car followed close as Matteo whipped up the hills in a sporty Jeep Wrangler that I really liked. I really fell in love with it when he pulled to the side and took the top down. It reminded me of our last days in Sicily: the weather hot, the wind warm, and the smell of salt, sand, and sun on our skin and clothes. I closed my eyes and lifted my hands, letting the feel of freedom rush through me.
It was dark when we got back to the house, and after Matteo opened the door for me, I held out my arms for him. He grinned, picking me up and carrying me inside the house. Armando had gone in ahead of us a few minutes before, and after we walked in, he offered Matteo a phone.
“Italia,” Armando mouthed.
Matteo took it. He nodded once or twice at whatever Whoever was saying, and when he hung up, he turned the television on. I crept behind him with my stuffed shark and watched as the news played across the screen. Two anchors were discussing a missing person who had been found.
“It has been confirmed, Damon Carter, the famous movie producer, has been found.”
The second anchor chimed in. “What looked like human remains washed ashore a week ago, and we’re now getting confirmation that the remains are that of Damon Carter.” He shook his head.
The woman anchor said, “Two fishermen found what appeared to be human remains and called local law enforcement to report it.”
Two young men appeared on the screen. A microphone was stuck in their faces.
“Yeah,” one of the young guys said, taking his baseball cap off, running a hand through his sandy blond hair, making it stick up. “We didn’t know what it was at first.”
The screen cut back to the anchors.
“This is a loss Hollywood will feel for a long time. Carter was part of the Carter dynasty, his family being a Hollywood fixture since the golden age,” the female reporter said. “This isn’t the first time the Carter family has been in the news lately. The family has filed for bankruptcy.”
“No foul play is suspected,” the male anchor said. “Police suspect Carter fell off a small yacht he’d rented and into theocean. Massive tissue loss and hemorrhaging have been cited as causes of death.”
“A shark attack,” the woman said, her features set into a mask of horror.
The male anchor organized some papers, then tapped them against the desk. “Carter was alone at the time of his disappearance. The yacht has been found.”
Matteo turned off the television, sucking us into complete darkness.
I cleared my throat. “He’s dead.”
It was so lame, but it was all I could think of to say. My thoughts were elsewhere. Matteo had told me he was just walking him to the door, tosee him off.The meaning of that cut through my thoughts and seemed to cut off my air supply for a second.
Words.
Their meaning.
How they were spoken.
All those things meant a great deal to Matteo and his family.
It was an art form to them.
Seeing him offprobably had a much different meaning than what I assumed in that moment. I thought maybe he would have threatened him. Told him to stay the fuck away from me.
I should have known.
Threats weren’t Matteo’s style. He had probablyseen Carter offthe fucking pier that night, or a day or two later. Or from a…yacht.
After we’d gotten home from the day meeting with Carter, I didn’t feel like going anywhere, and after dinner, Matteo said he had some business to take care of. I assumed he was in the office of the humongous house, but maybe…he’d left for a while?
When I turned my eyes up, he was facing me.
“Great Whites,” Matteo said, shaking his head. “You have to take great care when you get in the water with them. If you don’t respect their ocean, they’ll rip you apart—limb from fucking limb. All’s fair when it comes to their territory.” He came to stand next to me, in his causal clothes, but it was like he was wearing his suit again. He leaned down and whispered in my ear, while I closed my eyes, “Mine,Mrs.Fausti.”
When I opened my eyes, my husband was gone, but the plush shark he’d won for me was still clutched in my arms, and the darkness had turned deep and cold, like the water of the Pacific.
Chapter 40
