She looks down, stabbing carefully through paper-thin slices of beef with her fork. “No.”
“Is it in your room? At the hotel?”
“No. I left it back home.”
Disappointed, I lean back in my chair. This whole trip to Italy has been a bust. Luca was right, we never should have come. We haven’t even been able to see the sights while we’ve been here. All he wanted was to go into the Colosseum, and he won’t get to do it.
Luca clears his throat. “We thought—Finch and Tara and I, we all thought your mother’s rosary might have something to do with this, because of what it says in the letter about keeping God close. Finch and Tara both say your mother kept her rosary with her at all times.”
Róisín finally stops spearing things onto her fork and looks up at Luca. “She did, yes.”
“Have you ever noticed anything strange about the rosary?”
“No.”
“Do you use it yourself?”
She shakes her head. “It’s a little unwieldy. The crucifix is quite heavy. You remember?” She glances at me and I shrug.
“I didn’t take much notice, to be honest.”
She sighs. “Still an iconoclast, even after all the miracles God has granted you.”
I snort at that. “Listen, if you think my life has been miraculous, you must be fucking crazy. Seeing Mom die right in front of me didn’t feel much like a gift from God at the time, let me tell you.”
She cringes, and reaches over to squeeze my hand, a gesture so caring that tears actually sting my eyes. “I didn’t mean that,” she says softly. “Not at all. I’m sorry, Howie, I just meant…”
“Whatdidyou mean?” I ask, trying not to sound as pissed off as I feel.
“I suppose I meant that you’ve survived it all. All the terrible things that have happened to you, and here you are. Pops and Maggie betrayed you, but you found a new family to accept you. And just look at you here, your marriage to Luca—however it might have started, it’s been a blessing for both of you. You love, and are loved. You belong to each other.”
That just about knocks my socks off. Róisín has never said anything about my marriage, and if I’d ever sat down to think about it—which I haven’t—my assumption would have been that she was against it, despite being a bridesmaid. Róisín tends to be pretty hardcore Catholic.
As you’d expect from someone who ran away to a nunnery to forget the world.
“Um, thanks,” I say.
Luca, on the other hand, takes advantage of the emotion of the moment. “So you know, then, that I will do whatever I need to do to protect your brother.”
“Yes. The whole world knows that by now.”
“So when you get back home, will you send me the rosary?”
She looks him over for a long moment and then says, “No.”
“But if you give me the rosary—”
“Youare worried about Howie.Iam worried about the rest of the world, Don Morelli. Whatever secrets my mother took to her grave, they are probably better off there.”
This time, I grab Róisín’s hand. “What did you know about her ties to the IFF?” Róisín is older than both Tara and me, so she might know more about Mom’s past. Mightremembermore.
Slowly, Róisín replies, “I know Mom spent a long time trying to make up for things she regretted doing. And I know our whole family was in bed with the IFF, not just Mom. Back in Ireland, there are strong blood ties between the Donovans and the IFF.”
“That rosary may be the key to cutting those ties for once and for all,” Luca says evenly. “If not for Finch’s sake, surely for Tara you would—”
Róisín stands, slamming her hands down on the table angrily. “I would doanythingfor my family, don’t you understand that? Why do you think I’m here? Ishouldn’tbe. I should be with my sisters in Christ, but instead here I am, having lunch with a crime boss. I’ve tried to make a clean break away fromallof it, but I keep getting dragged back in.”
“You’ll forgive me if it’s not my place,” Luca says, his voice like a whip, “but hiding yourself away in a convent is not making a clean break. It’s a little more like making agetaway. Don’t you think your mother might have had it right? If there are regrets you have, you should make up for them, not pretend they never happened in the first place.”
