“Let me see your hands,” I say, and he presents them to me. No razors or knives, and there is nothing stashed under his pillow. “We’ll discuss this in the morning when you’re feeling better. We’ll make a plan together. Sleep well, sweetheart.”
He’ll feel differently in the morning when this strange mood has passed, I’m sure of it. I lean down to brush my dry lips against his forehead. He looks up at me but says nothing. His sudden despair is as maddening as it is confounding. He’s never acted quite like this before, and even though I know I’ve somehow caused it, I don’t know how to remedy it.
I stay up for hours mulling over our conversation. How could he feel so differently after just a few days? And if those weren’t his true feelings, why would he lie so obviously? I recount our entire conversation in my head, but try as I might, I do not understand.
It isn’t until much later—too late—I realize he was echoing me all along.
17
Iwake up the next morning alone and the bed beside me cold. The clock says I’ve slept in past the hour when Giovanni usually wakes me for breakfast.
“Giovanni,” I call because I’d simply like to lay with him for a bit.
There’s no response to my query so I call again, louder. The apartment isn’t that big. I climb out of bed and grab my robe, expecting to find him in the kitchen or perhaps setting the table on the terrace, but he is not there either. The countertops are bare of any activity as is the dining table. “Giovanni?” I call as an icy dread starts to solidify in my chest.
I search the bedroom, the bedroom closet, the bathroom, the dungeon, my study, and the guest bedroom, but he is nowhere to be found. There is precisely one pair of his shoes missing from the foyer. I go out to the hallway where my security stands alert. “Where’s Giovanni?” I demand.
“Inside?” the man says.
“No, he’s not. Did you see him leave?”
“No, Boss.”
“Were you here all night?”
“Yes, right here, except for the two times I had to take a leak.”
I have a bathroom that opens to the hallway so my men can make use of it without disturbing me. “What times exactly?”
He tells me when he vacated his post, and I tell him to get me the security footage. “Now,” I bark.
I dress quickly and take another inventory of the apartment, more thorough this time, looking for clues as to where he might have gone, any indication as to when he’ll be back. He’s never ventured outside the apartment without me or Rico, not even to the lobby. I ask the concierge to check the pool and the locker rooms as well, but there is no sign of him. Nothing of value in my apartment is missing, not even his jewelry. I survey my wallet to find my money and cards all accounted for. His phone. I search for it everywhere, but can’t find it, and when I call his number, it only rings and rings. It’s as if he vanished.
“Fuck,” I shout to the empty room.
My security informs me that he’s sent me a link to the footage. I review it on my phone, the times he specified. During the first one, Giovanni is there, peering out into the hallway and glancing up at the security camera before ducking back inside. Was he having second thoughts? The next one, around 3:30 a.m., shows him walking out, wearing street clothes and a hooded sweatshirt. He carries nothing with him, though he must have taken his wallet and hopefully his phone.
“Where the fuck would he go?” I take a deep breath and try to refocus my concentration.Think, Valentin, if this was one of your people, how would you locate them?
I call up my tech expert and relay the situation, then give him the number to Giovanni’s phone. I wait while he runs the number. The news is not good. “This is an old phone,” he says. “Not a smart phone, right?”
“That’s right.”
“There’s no geolocating features on old phones, you have to rely on the cell towers which aren’t nearly as precise.”
“Where is he, as close as you can get?” I have enough men to canvass entire neighborhoods if need be.
“I don’t know, Mr. Fortuna, he has to make a call with it in order for me to triangulate his location.”
“Porca puttana!” I shout with the phone to my chest before resuming our conversation. “I’m going to keep trying to call him. I want you running the number every ten minutes and call me as soon as you know something. The very same minute, understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good. Thank you.”
My next call is to my enforcers. I send them Giovanni’s picture via text and tell them to start looking, clearing all other commitments, and beginning with the surrounding neighborhood. He doesn’t have a subway pass or even a debit card—he insisted he couldn’t be trusted, which means he has maybe twenty dollars cash on him, total?
“This is your first and only priority,” I tell Carmine. “He is not to be harmed.”
