Round Numbers

Dante Moretti leans in the doorway like he owns it, which, you suppose, in some way he does.

"Hey, Teo," he says. "Hey, cousin-in-law." He grins at you. "That's a thing, right? I'm making it a thing."

Teo doesn't get up. You notice that. Teo, who stood every time Nonna Rosa walked into a room, stays in his groaning chair with his arms folded.

"Mr. Dante," Teo says.

"So formal." Dante strolls in and perches on the corner of your desk, close enough that his knee almost brushes your notepad. He smells like expensive cologne and outside air. "Luca put you to work already? On your honeymoon? That man has no romance in him."

"I asked for a job," you say.

"Of course you did." He tilts his head to read your notes upside down, and you resist the urge to cover the circled number with your hand. His eyebrows go up. "Bellmare. Wow. You found Bellmare on day one."

"You know about it?"

"Sure. It's a wine broker in Jersey. My guy Paulie set them up years ago. They pre-buy cases for us at auction, hold them in a bonded warehouse, ship when we need them." He shrugs. "It's an investment thing. The bottles are sitting in a climate-controlled room somewhere getting more expensive while we talk. The inventory sheet here won't show them because they're not here."

It's a good explanation. It's fluent and easy and makes you feel a little silly for the way your heart was pounding.

It's also exactly the kind of explanation you've heard from every client who was hiding something.

"Then there'll be storage receipts," you say. "Auction records. Lot numbers."

Dante's smile doesn't change at all. "Somewhere, I'm sure. Paulie's a disaster with paper. I'll have him dig them up for you."

"Thanks."

"Anything for family." He reaches out and gives your arm a little squeeze above the elbow, friendly, brotherly. His hand stays a second too long. "You know, you're a lot more fun than the last few people Luca hired to look at these books. They mostly just cried."

"What happened to them?"

"Oh, nothing dramatic." He laughs. "They quit. Everybody quits Luca eventually."

"Not everybody."

The voice comes from the hallway, low and quiet, and every hair on your arms stands up.

Luca is standing behind Dante, in a dark coat beaded with rain, and you have no idea how long he's been there. His eyes are on Dante's hand on your arm. Just that. Nothing else in the room seems to exist for him.

Dante takes his hand back. Slowly, not guiltily. Like a man putting down a glass.

"Cugino," Dante says warmly. "I was welcoming your wife."

"I saw."

"She found Bellmare. Sharp, this one. You should keep her."

"I intend to." Luca steps into the little office, and suddenly there isn't enough air in it. He's not looking at you yet. "Thank you for stopping by, Dante. I'm sure the docks need you."

For a second, something passes between the two cousins that you can't read. Old, heavy, older than you. Then Dante laughs and stands and buttons his jacket.

"The docks always need me." He winks at you on his way past. "Remember what I said at the wedding, Ava."

And he's gone, whistling down the hall through the clatter of the kitchen.

The silence after he leaves is a living thing.

Teo heaves himself out of his chair. "I'll get coffee," he says to no one, and closes the door behind him.

Luca doesn't sit. He picks up your notepad, reads the circled number, and you watch his face do absolutely nothing for a long time.

"Say it," you tell him.

"Say what?"

"Whatever you're thinking. You look like you're about to put a hole in the wall."

"I'm thinking," he says carefully, "that I don't like my cousin touching my wife."

"Your contract wife."

"Clause six," he says. "As far as anyone outside this room knows, there's no such thing."

Heat crawls up your neck. You decide it's anger. "He was being friendly."

"Dante is always friendly." He sets the notepad down very precisely, lined up with the edge of the desk. "What did he say about Bellmare?"

You tell him. The broker in Jersey. Paulie. The bonded warehouse full of bottles getting older and more expensive.

Luca listens without interrupting. When you're done, he asks, "Do you believe him?"

You think about the round numbers. About the way Dante's smile didn't move when you asked for lot numbers.

"I believe wine invoices are never round," you say.

Something changes in his face. Barely. A loosening at the corners of his eyes, as if you've passed a test you didn't know you were taking.

He pulls the other chair around and sits across from you, elbows on his knees, coat still on. Up close he looks tired. There's a faint line between his brows that you suspect never fully goes away.

"For six years," he says quietly, "Elena's has made a little less money than it should. Never enough to panic. Always enough to notice. I've had three people look. One said it was theft in the kitchen. One said it was bad luck with suppliers. One said nothing, quit, and moved to Florida."

"You think someone in your family is stealing."

"I think someone is stealing from my mother's restaurant." The word mother comes out flat and careful, like he's carrying something heavy across a slippery floor. "And I think they're very sure no one will ever check."

"So that's why you gave me this job. Not to keep me busy."

"Both can be true."

"Why me?" You hear the question that's been under every other question since that rainy night. "Why trust me with this? You don't know me."

He looks at you for a long moment. You can't read him at all. Then he says, "You read the contract twice. Most people don't read it once."

It isn't an answer. You both know it isn't.

"From now on," he says, "you report to me. Not Teo. Not my father. Not my cousin, however friendly he is. If anyone asks, you're learning the menu and complaining about the coffee."

"The coffee is terrible."

"Then you won't have to lie." He stands. "Find me the money, Ava. Every dollar. I want to know where it goes."

"And if it goes somewhere you don't like?"

He's at the door. He stops with one hand on the frame, and for a second you think he's not going to answer.

"Then I'll have to decide what kind of man I am," he says. "I'd rather do that with the numbers in front of me."

He opens the door. Teo is right outside with two paper cups, pretending he wasn't listening.

"One more thing," Luca says over his shoulder. "Tomorrow night is the Harbor Gala. Every family in Port Sorrel will be in one ballroom, smiling at each other and counting exits." His gray eyes meet yours. "You're on my arm. Every family in Port Sorrel will be watching."

"Watching what?"

"Whether the Moretti heir married a woman who flinches," he says. "Don't."