No. Don’t think that.Thinking every door has been opened for me gives Alessandro too much power.
I move through the alley, turn left at the baker’s, turn right at the square, and reach the back street where a small motorbike waits exactly where money convinced a boy to leave it.
The boy isn’t there. That’s sensible of him. Children with instincts survive longer.
I ride badly. I’ve driven cars through the Dublin rain and once reversed a van into a fishmonger’s stall during a disagreement involving my cousin and a crate of stolen electronics, but motorbikes are spiteful machines. They require balance and faith. I possess one of those inconsistently, and the other not at all.
Still, I make it out of the village. The gas station sits twelve minutes away by road, longer by the ridiculous route I take to avoid obvious pursuit. By the time I reach it, my hands ache from gripping the bars and my stomach has made several formal complaints.
The station is ugly. That comforts me. Ugly places are honest about their function. Two pumps. A small shop. A cracked sign.A garage bay attached to one side. Cigarettes in the window. Good coffee advertised with undeserved confidence.
A man behind the counter looks up when I enter. Mid-thirties. Thin. Dark hair. Nervous eyes. “Can I help?”
“Yes,” I say in Italian.
His attention sharpens at my accent.
I place a folded note on the counter. “I’m looking for someone who worked here that night.”
He looks at the paper. Then at me. Then at the door.
Fear has a smell.
“I don’t know anything,” he says.
“That was fast,” I remark.
“You should leave.”
“Roberto Greco,” I say.
His face changes. “He’s not here.”
“But he was.”
“No.”
“Careful.”
His jaw tightens. “Who are you?”
I take off one glove. The ring on my right hand is Brennan, not Vitale. My father gave it to me when I turned twenty-one. Gold. Old. Heavy. The crest worn nearly smooth from generations of men touching it before making decisions.
The clerk looks at it. Recognition lands with fear.
Better.
“My father died that night,” I say.
“I don’t want trouble.”
“That’s rarely up to us.”
“I have a family.”
“So did he.” I place cash on the counter. “I need Roberto.”
“He won’t talk.”
