Dante called three times before noon. His voice carried that tight, rapid quality it always got when he was about to deliver information he knew the Boss wouldn't want to hear. I could almost hear him tapping the face of his watch on the other end of the line.
"Mrs. Valente, is the Boss at the estate? He hasn't come to the club. He's not answering his phone."
Three calls. Three variations of the same question. Each one more carefully worded than the last, because even a low-ranking soldier knew better than to imply that the Boss was unaccounted for.
Putting it all together, there was only one place I could think of. Somewhere with Silvana. Probably in an obstetrician's office, looking at the ultrasound of the child he had chosen to create. Sitting beside the woman he had chosen to give his bloodline to. Holding her hand, maybe. The way he had never held mine.
I was heading somewhere too.
After making an appointment at the private clinic on the east side of the city, I called a cab. Not the Family car. Not Dante. A yellow cab, anonymous and ordinary, because what I was about to do was mine alone, and no one in the Valente household would ever know about it.