Page 43 of Her Dark Salvation

Luca smiled an unaffected smile. It softened his veneer and for a moment gave me a genuine glimpse at the man behind it. A far more charming and sincere man.

“Ciao, zio.”

“Ciao, Luca.”

The elevator doors closed, and I raised my eyebrows at Mr. DeVita.

“That was Luca Moretti, the Chief Operating Officer of DEI’s European branch. His father and I were best friends.” He sounded proud when he announced Luca’s title, but melancholy entered his voice when he mentioned Luca’s father. “He’s in town for our quarterly review, which is next week, by the way, but I’ll brief you on that another time. I’m done for the day.”

He pulled out his keys and walked around my desk to the double doors of his penthouse. “Oh. Email me a summary of what you found out about those permits. We never did get around to that.”

“Please,” I said with emphasis.

He grabbed my eyes, smirked, and closed the penthouse door behind him.

I huffed and turned back to my computer.

Luca’s intense good looks combined with his affected demeanor rubbed me the wrong way. Siobhán had warned me, but meeting DEI’s European COO in the flesh was next level.

Moretti.

It was a common enough Italian surname. Why did it keep nagging at my brain? My model was still compiling, and Mr. DeVita was gone for the day… Time for more internet sleuthing.

Luca Morettireturned almost as few hits asMarco DeVita. A handful of paparazzi shots in Italy with runway-model women hanging off his arm. No surprise there given his good looks and money. But, like Mr. DeVita, I could count on one hand the number of links to any real information.

An article from an Italian magazine featured him in a set of staged photos amid a wall of Italian text. Thank God for my browser’s translation plugin; despite my heritage, I didn’t know more than a handful of Italian words.

The article introduced Luca as the man behind Terme di Roma and Terme di Sicilia, the face of high-end, European resorts from Italian-American entrepreneur Marco DeVita. It lauded the innovative blend of Italian and American cultures, their financial success, and the benefits to the community. I skimmed the rest of the article until I reached a short paragraph at the end.

Luca Davide Moretti is from Boston, Massachusetts. He is the grandson of former Italian citizen, Antonio Moretti, who emigrated to the United States in 1935. Since then, the Moretti family has been involved with the lucrative Valenzano Trading Company and an integral part of the Italian-American community.

A sinking feeling attacked my stomach. I read the paragraph again, and my stomach collapsed into my feet.

Antonio Moretti.TonyMoretti. Notorious member of the Boston Mafia. Capo under Big Frankie Valenzano. Every Italian-American in Massachusetts knew of the two mobsters and their bloody history.

The unease that had taken root after Don Valenzano’s visit and our trip to city hall finally transformed into panic. My mind raced down paths I didn’t want to explore. Mr. DeVita had sworn he wasn’t involved with the Mafia, had explained away his connection to the Valenzanos as an artifact of the small Italian-American community. But he’d conveniently left out the part where his best friend and his European COO were Tony Moretti’s progeny. It was a small world, but it wasn’t that small.

I checked the terminal window. The compilation finished with no errors. Thank God. I needed air.

I collected my things, rode the elevator down to the lobby, and walk-ran out the front door. The winter air hit me in the face, and I welcomed its cleansing slap. I bolted across the street to the Commons and pulled out my cellphone.

“Hey, Anna.” Jeff’s voice sounded distant through the blood thumping in my ears. “What’s up?”

My voice trembled as much as my hand holding the phone to my ear. “What the hell did you get me into?”

ChapterEleven

Anna

Iopened the door to my condo, and Jeff pushed past me, determination etched in the lines of his flushed face. “Stay away from this, Anna. I’m telling you.” He paced my living room with clenched fists.

I closed the door behind me. “First of all, calm down,” I said, more chiding than I’d intended, but I was the one who was supposed to be freaked out. It was his fault I’d even met Marco DeVita. “I’ve never seen you like this before. Okay. Maybe once, the night before your wedding, but seriously, Jeff, you need to slow down and breathe.”

He stopped, took off his glasses, and rubbed his eyes. “Sorry. I’m sorry.” He took a deep breath and exhaled long and slow.

“Second,” I snapped, “you can’t come in here and tell me to stay away from a thing when I don’t even know what the thing is. And the cryptic phone conversation this afternoon didn’t help.”

Walking through the Commons after fleeing the office, I’d asked him straight out if Mr. DeVita was involved in the Mafia. He’d responded with silence. When I’d pushed, he’d said, “We’ll talk about this tonight. I’m coming over. Don’t say anything like that over the phone. Or to Marco.” His voice had been low, words clipped.

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