Chapter 24

CHAPTER 24

L auren's heart was as full as her belly by the time the delicious German Christmas feast was over. Afterward, she and Joe had cleaned the kitchen together while his parents and Doreen rested upstairs. It was there, while he washed dishes and she dried them, that they decided that Joe would take Doreen to see her nephew, and Lauren would play tour guide for Joe's parents at the Met.

"I'll miss being with you, but this is the right thing to do," he'd said, up to his elbows in dishwater. "I hope you aren't disappointed."

If this was a taste of how things would be with him, she savored its bittersweetness. Of course she would have enjoyed his company this afternoon, but doing the right thing was who he was, and she loved that about him. She wouldn't ask him to be less, even when that took him away from her.

Lauren stood on her tiptoes and kissed his cheek. "I'm happy to show your parents the Met."

And she was. Showing Sal and Greta Caravello around made everything seem fresh and new to her, even the objects she'd known for years.

As Lauren walked with them, matching her pace to accommodate theirs, memories called out to her. "This is where Joe found me that first time we met," she could have told them when they came to the sarcophagus in the corridor outside the Egyptian rooms.

From there, Lauren led Sal and Greta to the Tomb of Perneb, and then to her favorite exhibits in some of the other rooms. "Here is a display of jewelry worn by a pharaoh's queen," she said.

And here was the spot where Lauren had first told Joe she was going to Egypt someday. "Just wait and see," she'd added, though he'd not challenged her. "My father is coming to get me, and he's going to take me with him. He said so."

In the Great Hall full of statuary, Lauren found the sculpture that had made Joe blush.

In the Arms and Armor collection, she showed them the knight that had been Joe's favorite. This was where he had told her all that she'd missed since the previous Christmas while she was home in Chicago. He'd told her about the Black Hand Society, the way they were terrorizing families in Little Italy and beyond, and that Joe Petrosino was a real-life knight in shining armor, the only one willing to fight them.

And right there, in the shadows beneath the grand stairway that led to the second floor, was where Joe later told her everything had changed. He had stopped talking about Joe Petrosino. He had stopped talking about almost anything at all, except the art they looked at together. Not until the following Christmas break did he admit that his family had lost their restaurant.

In the gallery of old masters paintings, Lauren had told him that her mother died, that her father was still gone, and that she wasn't ever going home. Not ever. That this would be her home now. This was where Joe had first held her hand.

In taking his parents through the galleries, she was touring her past with their son. Years of recollections were housed in this enormous museum, and she knew exactly where to find them. Yet, like all great works of art, they still managed to take her by surprise.

As Joe's parents wandered through the period rooms of the American wing, Lauren realized she was making a new memory here even now. This was where she realized she loved him.

She lowered herself onto a bench between Federal period rooms, and Greta sat beside her while Sal continued to explore.

"This has been wonderful, dear." She sighed. "I don't think I can absorb a single thing more."

Lauren laughed. "The Met has that effect on people."

"Speaking of the Met, I can't believe you got us tickets to the opera and that you remembered Joe's near-obsession with Petrosino."

"We were talking about him last night, actually. Joe told me about the long wait for his wife."

"Ah yes," Greta murmured. "Poor Adelina. After they married at last, her husband told her to keep the shades drawn in their apartment so as not to provide a silhouette for an assassin to use as a target."

With a jolt, Lauren's image of their happily ever after began to tear at the edges. "Was that necessary?"

"He thought so, and I'm sure it didn't take long for her to agree with him. She was the one who brought in the mail each day. So she saw his death threats before he did. Petrosino told her he'd been getting those for years, though, and nothing had happened to him. Yet."

Lauren flinched at the three-letter word. She knew the detective had died by now, but didn't know the details. What had Joe left out of the love story he shared last night?

"I don't know if I want to know," she murmured. "But tell me anyway."

Greta took Lauren's hand. "Joseph Petrosino was assassinated by Mafia he'd had deported to Sicily. He had a newborn daughter. He and Adelina had been married for one year."

Lauren went cold with shock and sorrow for Adelina. "No," she whispered. "Not after ten years of waiting. Not after she'd already been widowed before."

Joe's side of the conversation from last night took on a new shape as she viewed it through this lens. He had to have been thinking about this unhappy ending. "Joe didn't tell me that," Lauren said.

"Petrosino's assassination shook him more deeply than he'd want to admit." She sighed. "When he talks of Petrosino now, especially when he talks to you, he's thinking about the widowed bride he left behind to raise their baby alone. And when he's thinking of Adelina, my dear, he's thinking of you. He doesn't want her fate for you."

Tears stung her eyelids. She'd been blind not to see the full extent of what he'd meant when he'd told her he couldn't be there for her whenever she'd want him to be. All Lauren saw was a man who cared for her, might even love her, and simply had her best interests at heart. She didn't want to consider that her best interests, according to Joe, might not include him.

"Here." Greta fished a scallop-edged handkerchief from her purse and pressed it into Lauren's palm. "I didn't mean to make you cry on Christmas, dear. These are risks we don't like to think about, let alone speak of."

"I needed to hear it, though." Lauren dabbed the soft linen beneath her eyes.

Families in holiday finery shuffled past. Men in suits, women in dresses, boys in suspenders and bow ties, and girls with ribbons streaming from their hair like Clara from The Nutcracker ballet. When Lauren spotted Sal ambling back their way, she stood. There is the Haverhill Room , she thought, and there the Baltimore. And there is the bench where I learned Joe feared that I might one day become his widow.

Joe focused on the road as he drove Doreen to the jail to visit Connor. With the snow turning to freezing rain, he drove slower than usual over the slippery streets.

His mind, however, raced. "I never noticed those bottles you used as vases before last night," he said. "They're all the same brand, aren't they? They looked familiar, but I didn't see a label."

"Oh, I soak the labels off before using them. I know some folks like to leave them on as part of the decoration, but I find them distracting. The focal point should be the flowers or foliage, not the vessel that holds them."

He squinted through the windshield. "Do you remember what the label said?"

"It was something French. The writing was so scrolly I could barely read it, to tell you the truth. But I do remember a picture of a chateau above the name."

So far, she was describing the same wine Ray Moretti favored. Moretti and most likely countless others.

"Why do you ask?" she inquired.

"I think I've seen that bottle before," he admitted, "and if I could identify it, it may be a clue in a case." How that clue would help him, he had no idea yet.

"Oh! Well, why didn't you say so? If it's the label you want, I have more. Those bottles are better than the average bud vase because the broader base is sturdier. I have crates and crates of them."

Joe hazarded a glance at her, schooling his face to conceal his shock. The cost of one of those bottles—at least, when it was full of the wine—was easily a month's wages. That was before Prohibition. Now it was four times that cost. A single crate holding a dozen of those bottles would be worth four years of his salary.

"That's a lot of bottles," he said. "How did you come by them?"

A sigh lifted and released Doreen's shoulders. "Connor. He was so sweet to think of me. He knew I was always looking for special vases like that, and it certainly cuts down on my overhead expenses if I can get them at a discount. Or in this case, for free."

Joe gripped the steering wheel tighter. "Did he say where he got them?"

"Sure, I asked him the same thing, I did. He told me the bottles had all been confiscated due to the Eighteenth Amendment. Something about the Folstead Act, I think he said."

"Volstead," he corrected her.

Bottles like these would have been confiscated, all right. But Joe wouldn't have been at all surprised if they'd been emptied into some thirsty gullets instead of into the gutter. At least they weren't taking up storage space at a cost to the city. Last Joe had checked, more than $7 million worth of confiscated liquor was being stored at a cost of $20,000 per month.

Connor had never mentioned finding a cache of this wine. "Did Connor give you all the bottles at once? Or was it spread out over several weeks or months?"

"Oh, it wasn't all at once. I would say a crate or two a month."

Joe slowed the car to make a turn, then fractionally increased the speed again. "For how many months? Do you remember when it started and ended?"

"Let's see." She looked out the window again, talking quietly to herself as she sorted it out. "Started over two years ago, but at that time, it was only a few bottles a month, not a case. Then he found more, until it was two cases' worth, consistently, right up until a month or two before he was arrested."

That was hundreds of bottles. "This is really helpful," he told her. "Were the bottles always empty when he gave them to you?"

She didn't respond right away. "Now that you mention it, there was one time when I'd come to visit him in his apartment, and I saw a bottle on his table. There was no cork in it, so I assumed it was empty like all the rest, and he had set it out to give it to me. So I picked it up, but it was still halfway full."

"Was there a glass nearby?"

She shook her head. "No, he wasn't drinking it. He said he was in the process of dumping it down the sink when I knocked on the door, interrupting him."

That was one possibility.

The other was that Connor had been drinking straight from the bottle. He was no teetotaler.

"So did he finish dumping it down the sink then?" he asked her.

"I did it for him," she said. "I was the one holding it at that point, after all."

Oh, what Joe wouldn't give to have seen the look on Connor's face at that moment. "Did he seem upset that evening?"

"Something was bothering him, sure and certain, but isn't that always the case with you boys? Can't talk about work, even when it's written across your face."

Joe forced a smile. "Did you notice anything else unusual about the visit?"

"No. He was out of sorts, but I'd seen him like that before. He asked me to let him know next time I planned to visit so he could tidy up the place. But I never cared about that anyway, and I told him so."

"I bet he insisted."

Doreen chuckled. "He did at that. You know him well."

Not nearly as well as he'd thought.

"He'll be pleased to have some company tonight," she said. "I'm sure he'll want to see you, too."

"Actually, I'm just your chauffeur tonight, Doreen. I'd like to visit, but I've been instructed not to. The investigation is ongoing, and since it's not my case, I'm not to have contact with him."

"But you visited with him on Thanksgiving. ... Oh. Did you get into trouble for that?"

"Slap on the wrist," he told her. "Nothing to worry about."

"Oh dear," she murmured. "We don't want that, now, do we? I'll pass along your greetings to him, shall I?"

By the time the visit was over and they were on their way home again, it was clear Doreen had passed along more than that. Her cheeks were flushed, and her hands shook as she clutched her purse.

"I don't understand it." Her voice warbled. "I upset him, Joe. If you'd only seen his face right before he stormed out."

Joe checked his mirrors, then glanced at the woman before slowly pulling back onto the main road. "He cut the visit short?"

"By half, I'd say!" she cried. "Every minute with him is precious, and he gave up half our time together. I'm sorry, Joe, but he's upset with you, too. More so than with me, or so he says. It was the bottles that set him off. I never would have guessed. All I said was that I'd been using those bottles he'd given me to decorate your family's home for Christmas, and how lovely they looked."

"That made him angry?"

"It made him on edge. What made it worse was when I told him you and I talked about those bottles for a good bit of the drive out here. Believe you me, I had no idea if it was to be a secret. Empty bottles used as vases! What could be more mundane than that?"

The hair rose on the back of Joe's neck. "Do you remember what he said exactly?"

"I'd be surprised if I ever forgot it. He slammed his palm on the counter and yelled, ‘It's none of his business. If he knows what's good for him and you both, and for everyone he loves, he will leave it the fudge alone.' Only he didn't say ‘fudge.' Swore like the drunk his father was, when he knows I don't abide that filthy talk. I do wonder now if he was trying to drive me away, knowing that I'd not stay and hear more. But he took that choice away from me when he stalked off."

Joe saw it in his mind as she described it. The flaring temper, the outburst, the red-faced cursing. Thing was, Connor only swore when he was scared. It was bravado, a last-ditch attempt to persuade when he didn't trust his reasoning to carry the argument.

"Did you know the subject would upset him so?" Doreen asked.

Shaking his head, he kept his hands steady on the wheel. "I never heard about those bottles until tonight."