Chapter 2 - THE KNIFE CARRIED MY FAMILY’S CREST
The doctor arrived twenty-three minutes after Isabella kissed her husband for the first time.
Dr. Samuel Greco was sixty-three, permanently exhausted, and apparently immune to the atmosphere surrounding Matteo Rienzi.
He entered the music room carrying a medical bag, took one look at Matteo’s half-open shirt, and said:
“You’re an idiot.”
Isabella smiled.
Matteo stared at both of them.
“Has everyone in this house formed a committee?”
“Yes,” Dr. Greco replied. “Rosa chairs it.”
From the hallway came Rosa’s voice.
“I heard that.”
Matteo closed his eyes.
Isabella nearly laughed again.
Then Dr. Greco removed the temporary bandage she had placed along Matteo’s ribs.
The humor disappeared.
The wound was longer than Isabella had first realized.
Not deep enough to threaten an organ.
Deep enough to require stitches.
“How?”
Greco asked.
“Knife.”
“That part I gathered.”
Matteo said nothing.
The doctor looked toward Isabella.
She lifted both hands.
“He won’t tell me.”
“Smart woman.”
Matteo opened his eyes.
“I’m sitting right here.”
Greco began cleaning the wound.
Matteo did not react.
Not even when the antiseptic should have burned.
Isabella watched his face.
He noticed.
“What?”
“You don’t flinch.”
“I’ve had worse.”
That answer bothered her.
Not because she doubted it.
Because she believed it completely.
Twenty minutes later, Dr. Greco finished.
“No running tomorrow.”
Matteo looked offended.
“No lifting.”
Worse.
“And if this opens again, I will personally tell your mother you ignored me.”
That got him.
“You wouldn’t.”
“I delivered you.”
Greco snapped his bag shut.
“I’ve been threatening you longer than most of your men have been alive.”
Then he turned to Isabella.
“Make him eat.”
Matteo sighed.
“Why does everyone assign her responsibility for me?”
Isabella crossed her arms.
“I refuse.”
Greco smiled.
“Excellent.”
He left.
Rosa followed him out after placing soup and bread on the table.
The door closed.
Quiet returned.
Isabella stood near the piano.
Matteo remained on the sofa.
For the first time since the kiss, neither of them seemed to know what to say.
That almost amused her.
The feared Matteo Rienzi could negotiate with men who carried guns under their jackets.
Apparently one kiss had destroyed his vocabulary.
Then Isabella noticed something near the leg of the piano.
Metal.
Dark.
She frowned.
“Matteo.”
He looked.
“What?”
She walked closer.
A knife lay partly beneath the piano bench.
Narrow blade.
Black handle.
Blood along one edge.
His blood.
She stopped.
“You brought it home?”
Matteo’s expression changed.
“I forgot it was there.”
“You were stabbed and kept the knife?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“To find out who owned it.”
Of course.
She crouched.
Matteo’s voice sharpened immediately.
“Don’t touch it.”
Isabella stopped.
Not because he ordered.
Because his tone carried genuine concern.
She leaned closer without touching.
The handle was carved.
A small silver emblem.
A lion beneath a crown.
Her breath caught.
Conti.
Her family crest.
Matteo watched recognition cross her face.
“That came from my family.”
“Yes.”
The warmth from the kiss vanished.
“You knew.”
“Yes.”
“How long?”
“Since I took it from the man holding it.”
“And you didn’t tell me?”
“It happened tonight.”
“Before you came home?”
“Yes.”
“At my wedding?”
“After.”
Her stomach tightened.
“Who?”
Matteo stood slowly.
She noticed he kept one hand away from his wound now.
“Three men intercepted my car near Yonkers.”
“Conti?”
“They wanted me to think so.”
“How do you know they weren’t?”
“One called me by a name your father’s men don’t use.”
“What name?”
“Prince.”
Isabella blinked.
“That proves nothing.”
“It proves they learned about me from Rienzi circles.”
“How?”
“Your men call me bastard, murderer, animal, occasionally son of a—”
“Matteo.”
He almost smiled.
“Never prince.”
Despite herself, she understood.
“Why would someone use a Conti knife?”
“To restart the war.”
Her stomach dropped.
The marriage had happened twelve hours earlier.
Someone had already tried to turn peace into blood.
“What did you do to them?”
Matteo became quiet.
“Two ran.”
“And the third?”
“Alive.”
That was not the answer she expected.
“Where?”
“Being treated.”
“By who?”
“My people.”
“You kidnapped him.”
“I prevented him from bleeding out.”
“While preventing him from leaving.”
“Yes.”
“That is usually called kidnapping.”
“In my profession definitions are flexible.”
She stared.
Then:
“Did you hurt him?”
“No.”
“After he stabbed you?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because somebody wanted me angry.”
The answer stopped her.
Matteo walked toward a cabinet and poured water.
“If I had killed him, his body would have appeared somewhere your father could find it.”
“With that knife.”
“Yes.”
“Then my father would retaliate.”
“Probably.”
“And the marriage collapses.”
“That is the intention.”
Isabella looked toward the bloodied blade.
Fear returned.
Not fear of Matteo.
Something worse.
Fear of the world around them.
“Does my father know?”
“No.”
“You have to tell him.”
“Eventually.”
“Eventually?”
Matteo looked at her.
“If Salvatore Conti hears tonight that three men carrying his family crest attacked his new son-in-law, what happens?”
“He investigates.”
Matteo raised one eyebrow.
She sighed.
“Fine.”
“He becomes furious.”
“Yes.”
“He assumes your family arranged something first.”
“Yes.”
“And everyone starts carrying bigger guns to breakfast.”
“Exactly.”
She hated that he was right.
“So what are you doing?”
“Finding the men.”
“You said two escaped.”
“I know.”
“How?”
“Cameras.”
“Phones.”
“Cars.”
“People talk.”
Isabella felt her skin tighten.
That world again.
Networks beneath ordinary life.
She thought of the wedding guests.
Judges.
Politicians.
Men without names.
Peace was apparently a thin tablecloth spread over weapons.
“What do you want me to do?”
Matteo looked surprised.
“Nothing.”
She immediately became angry.
“No.”
“Isabella.”
“No.”
“You don’t get to marry me to stop a war involving my family and then tell me to go upstairs while someone uses my name to stab you.”
His face changed.
She stepped closer.
“If someone is trying to frame the Contis, that concerns me.”
“Yes.”
“If someone intends to destroy this marriage, that concerns me.”
Matteo became very still.
“This marriage?”
She realized how it sounded.
Her face warmed.
“The agreement.”
“Of course.”
His mouth moved slightly.
She ignored it.
“And if my father has a traitor, I want to know.”
Matteo studied her for several seconds.
Then nodded.
“All right.”
It was so simple she almost missed its importance.
He had changed his answer because she objected.
No intimidation.
No:
I know better.
Just:
All right.
“What can I know?”
she asked.
Matteo picked up his phone.
“Everything I know.”
He called someone named Nico.
Within fifteen minutes, Nico Ferraro entered.
Thirty-seven.
Dark suit.
Dark eyes.
The kind of man who looked as though smiling required paperwork.
He stopped when he saw Isabella.
“Boss.”
Matteo glanced at him.
“My wife stays.”
Nico hesitated.
One second.
Then nodded.
“Understood.”
He placed photographs on the table.
Traffic cameras.
Three men near a black SUV.
One wore a baseball cap.
Another had a neck tattoo.
The third was blurry.
Isabella leaned closer.
“That one.”
She pointed.
“The tattoo.”
Nico looked at her.
“You recognize it?”
“Not him.”
“The symbol.”
A circle crossed by three waves.
She had seen it on crates.
Years earlier.
“My uncle Paolo.”
Matteo’s expression hardened.
“Explain.”
“Paolo Conti uses a private warehouse company.”
“Vela North Logistics.”
“That mark is on their maintenance crews.”
Nico typed something into his phone.
Matteo watched Isabella.
“Your father’s brother.”
“Yes.”
“You trust him?”
She hesitated.
That was answer enough.
Paolo Conti was charming.
Loud.
Always affectionate.
He called Isabella principessa even after she turned twenty.
He also loved money more than most priests loved God.
Her father had argued with him constantly over shipping margins.
Still.
An uncle was not a murderer because he owned a logo.
“Could be stolen equipment.”
Isabella said.
Matteo nodded.
“Could.”
Again, no rush.
Nico received a message.
His face changed.
“What?”
Matteo asked.
“The man we have.”
“He woke up.”
“Name?”
“He says Daniel Reeve.”
“American?”
“Yes.”
“Former private military.”
“Who hired him?”
Nico looked toward Isabella.
Then back.
“He won’t say.”
Matteo’s voice became quieter.
“Yet?”
Isabella stared at him.
He noticed.
Then corrected:
“He has been offered a lawyer.”
Nico blinked.
Isabella nearly smiled.
Progress in real time.
“Anything else?”
Matteo asked.
Nico placed a small plastic evidence sleeve on the table.
Inside was a folded paper recovered from Reeve’s jacket.
Typed.
No letterhead.
Nico opened it.
TARGET: MATTEO RIENZI.
VISIBLE SIGNATURE: CONTI.
NO FATALITY REQUIRED.
Isabella stopped breathing.
No fatality.
The stabbing was theater.
Blood.
Crest.
Anger.
War.
Someone had wanted Matteo injured enough to react, but alive enough to retaliate.
Matteo read the paper twice.
Then looked at Isabella.
“This wasn’t your father.”
“How can you know?”
“Salvatore would never write ‘visible signature.’”
Despite herself, she laughed once.
Then stopped.
“Who benefits?”
Matteo looked toward the dark windows.
“Anyone who was making money from eighteen months of war.”
That list was probably long.
Then Nico’s phone buzzed again.
He read.
His expression changed more dramatically this time.
“What now?”
Matteo asked.
Nico turned the screen.
A photograph had been sent anonymously to both Rienzi and Conti senior lieutenants.
Matteo.
Sitting in the music room.
Shirt open.
Isabella kneeling between his knees.
Her hand pressed against his side.
The angle made the blood visible.
Made intimacy visible too.
The message beneath:
THE CONTI BRIDE HAS DRAWN FIRST BLOOD.
Isabella stared.
The photograph had been taken through the music-room window.
Minutes earlier.
Inside Matteo’s estate.
Someone was watching the house.
Matteo stood.
His entire expression changed.
The warmth disappeared.
The teasing husband vanished.
In his place was the man everyone feared.
“Lock the grounds.”
Nico nodded.
“No one leaves.”
Isabella’s chest tightened.
Matteo looked at her.
He saw it.
Stopped.
Then corrected himself.
“Not you.”
She stared.
“You’re not my prisoner.”
He turned back to Nico.
“Staff can leave after identities are verified.”
“Check exterior cameras.”
“Quietly.”
“No calls to Conti.”
“Not yet.”
Nico left.
Matteo picked up the knife.
Carefully.
Then looked at the photograph again.
“They saw you.”
Isabella understood.
Not just him.
Her.
The attack had been about their families.
The photograph made their relationship part of the weapon.
“Matteo.”
“Yes?”
“Whoever is doing this knows the layout of your house.”
“Yes.”
“Your security.”
“Yes.”
“And enough about my family to use Paolo’s company symbol.”
“Yes.”
She swallowed.
“This isn’t someone outside.”
Matteo looked at her.
“No.”
His voice became almost gentle.
“It isn’t.”
May you like
And eight days after Isabella married a man she had been taught to fear, she realized the most dangerous person in the Rienzi estate might not be her husband.
It might be someone standing close enough to photograph them through the window.
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