Straight into a war zone.
109
Niccolo
The Mansion
As I paced back and forth in the parlor, Sofia sat at the chessboard. She was playing both white and black simultaneously.
“Stop it,” she said emotionlessly as she stared at the pieces. “You’re making me nervous.”
“Youshouldbe nervous!” I exclaimed. “Cesare Caproni is insane – and insane people are completely unpredictable! We have no idea what he’s going to do next!”
“What about Lucrezia? I thought she was the brains of the operation.”
I snorted. “Clearly, Cesare’s the one driving the bus right now.”
“So let’s figure out what he’s thinking,” she said as she made another move.
“I don’t think there’s any logic to it, unless he wants to draw us into a street fight.”
“Well, it worked, right?” she asked as she moved a white knight and took a black pawn. “Adriano and Massimo are on their way now.”
I stopped pacing and stood still for a moment.
If I wanted to know what they were going to do next –
Then the best place to start was what they’d already done.
“Why did he order the dress shop firebombed?” I said aloud.
“I think you mean, ‘Why didsheorder the dress shop firebombed.’”
I looked at her. “You’re right. Why didLucreziaorder the dress shop firebombed?”
“To kill Bianca and Lucia.”
“I think that was incidental.”
“Then what was the reason?”
I stared off into the distance. “We hadno ideathey were coming until they firebombed the shop. Lucrezia sacrificed the element of surprise – butwhy?”
Sofia’s face lit up –
And she touched one finger to a rook on the board. “…so we’d all go scurrying back to the castle.”
“Yes –yes!”I agreed. It made perfect sense. “We all went back to the fortress, which meant we were concentrated in one place. But that would suggest an attack on the castle, and that hasn’t happened.”
“Yet.”
“Yet,” I admitted. “But then half of usleftthe castle. Do theyknowthat? Are they watching us evennow?”
“Possibly… but why not attack as Dario and Alessandra were leaving the property?”
“Maybe they were caught unawares,” I said. “Maybe they didn’t anticipate it. I mean,wedidn’t know it was going to happen.”
“Then maybe the attack in Florence is about scaring everyone who left the castle… into goingbackto the castle.”
