My brother had stirred up all these fears and feelings of suspicion within me, and now I’d done something almost unforgivable. I hated that I’d ever agreed to it, hated that David’s insistence on my involvement in his ludicrous witch hunt could’ve destroyed what I had with Marco.
“It’s okay,” I told him, silently correcting my words to “It’s going to be okay.” And it would be because I would fix this before it flew out of control.
“You sure?”
I crawled up into his lap, one thumb finding the cleft in his chin. “I’m sure.”
At this, all the tenseness vanished from Marco’s form. He reclined backwards, his lips finding mine as he rolled me beneath him. Evidently, he wasn’t that tired after all.
Due to our late night, we both overslept and Marco had to speed so we could make it to the bistro in time to prep for opening. Even still, he stole kisses every change he got, grinning and kissing our joined hands. It was so nice to be so in sync with him again.
When ten o’clock rolled a
round, I was in the midst of putting together the deposits from the previous day. Carlos had arrived to prepare the bread for our sandwiches; the delectable aroma coming from the ovens made my mouth water. We hadn’t had the chance to eat breakfast before departing, so once the food was ready, I’d grab a bite.
We had another hour before we opened to the public, so when someone knocked on my door, I assumed it must be Carlos. Marco had a key to this door and every other.
“What do you need, Carlos?” I called out, hoping it was just a question I could answer.
“Miss, this is Lieutenant Kate Stroud with the Philadelphia Police Department. I’m going to have to ask you to come out of that office.”
I froze, every part of my body turning to a block of ice. Lieutenant Stroud was David’s boss. Why was she here?
“J-just a minute…” Frenziedly, I started putting the cash away.
When I pulled open the door, I found the entire hallway full of officers from the PPD. My brother emerged from the management office with Marco in a set of handcuffs, sending me further into shock. I only vaguely registered David’s reading of Marco’s Miranda Rights.
“Marco Varasso, you’re under arrest in connection with the disappearance of Dante Bianchi, and the destruction of his property. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be held against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney and to communicate with said attorney by telephone. Do you understand these rights as I have given them to you?”
Marco had a grim set to his mouth, but the rest of his features had become an inscrutable mask, blank and stony. When he offered a quick nod, my brother raised his voice. “Speak, wise guy. We need verbal confirmation.”
“I understand,” Marco bit out, his voice displaying the ire that his face didn’t. And I couldn’t take it anymore.
“Marco?” I reached for him. Our eyes met but he said nothing, so I directed my attention to my brother. “What in the world is going on, David?” I demanded, but he ignored me as he escorted the man I loved out of the bistro and into the squad car waiting outside.
Red and blue lights flashing, they vanished down the road.
Three hours later I sat in a conference room at the police station with my head in my hands.
I’d spent the first hour at the bistro. The police had shut the restaurant down declaring that it must be secured as a crime scene. They’d told me to unlock all office drawers and to put in the combination to the safe. They’d taken numerous pictures of both the manager’s office and the cash office and had then shuffled through the files and paperwork, collecting most of it to take with them to the police station, including the accounting books I’d recorded all my work in.
After that, I’d been taken to my brother’s precinct. I was so upset and confused that by the time I got there, I wanted to slap David right across the face. Everyone kept ordering me around but wouldn’t tell me anything. An officer I’d only seen one time in passing had questioned me about my job with Organic Eats, about what I’d seen and done. About what I’d seen Marco do.
I’d been scared enough to answer all their questions, but I still knew next to nothing about why Marco had been arrested. Yes, I’d heard what my brother had accused him of, but I didn’t know who Dante Bianchi was or what his disappearance could possibly have to do with Marco.
None of this made sense.
Two hours from the time the lieutenant had knocked on my door, my brother finally came into the conference room. Two other officers had been with him, one had been watching the door and the other had been standing at his side. “Bleecker, give me the room, will you?” David said, and for the first time since we’d been in the kitchen at my parent’s apartment together, we were alone.
“You’re going to listen to this,” he told me, in the bossiest cop tone I’d heard from him yet. “It proves what I’ve been saying all along.”
And I lost it.
Everything I’d been seeing and feeling came to a head for me. Marco’s arrest. Being questioned about what I did at my job without receiving any answers to the queries I made myself. My brother blatantly ignoring me when I deserved an explanation. When I needed an explanation. I looked straight into his face and literally saw everything in my vision turn red.
“You know what, David? Fuck you!” I screamed at the top of my lungs. Though I had no memory of doing so, I’d gotten to my feet. My knuckles hurt, and when I looked down I saw why. I was clenching them so tightly that if they’d been made of glass, they would’ve shattered.
I never shouted. I never cursed. I almost never got angry. But I was angry now. In fact, I’d worked myself right past the emotion of anger and into full-on rage.