Sergio was in a murderously bad mood after his best man Natale had botched the job yesterday. There hadn’t been an opening to get to Kostidis for weeks. He’d been constantly surrounded by a line of bodyguards. It was Natale’s idea to kill him at the cemetery because he found out that Kostidis didn’t let his security follow him to his family’s grave. It seemed like an easy enough operation. He could generally rely one hundred percent on Natale, but this time he’d not only missed his mark but had also been seen. Sergio could have dealt with that, but Natale also claimed that he saw Alex together with Kostidis at the cemetery.
Sergio had unsuccessfully tried to call her at home and on her cell phone, so finally he sent his people over to her apartment. They confirmed that she wasn’t there. She only appeared again at six that evening. Someone with a blue Honda had dropped her off at home, and Sergio was close to going on a rampage when he heard about that.
Then he found a letter addressed to him on his desk in his Mount Kisco house. He tore it open impatiently and read the few lines Constanzia had written in her sweeping handwriting:
Sergio,
I’m leaving you today. I thought long and hard about this decision, but after Cesare’s death I no longer see any possibility of continuing my life as it has been up to now. My sons don’t need me anymore. And you don’t need me either, if you ever have. I can’t stand the house and the loneliness anymore.
He stared at the letter in his hands silently. Fury consumed him. How dare Constanzia? She had packed her bags and disappeared like a thief in the night without even uttering a word. He crumpled the paper angrily and threw it away. Silvio and his sons stood in front of the desk with embarrassed faces while Sergio paced up and down the large room furiously.
“How could she do this?” he roared. “How dare she? Didn’t I give her everything that a woman dreams of? Didn’t I buy her everything she wanted? She has countless servants. Three cars!”
“Mama was very unhappy,” Domenico said carefully. “And after Cesare’s death—”
“Unhappy, ha!” Sergio cut him off. “She made him into what he was! A good-for-nothing, spoiled, and ungrateful brat! He was cowardly and dumb to boot!”
He felt like killing someone with his bare hands, which is why these three men who knew him well prudently remained silent.
“Domenico,” Sergio ordered, “bring all of the domestic workers here, right now. I want to know where she went. The last thing I can afford right now is the headline that my wife…”
He fell silent. He couldn’t bring himself to say his wife had left him out loud. How could Constanzia humiliate him like this? If he’d wanted to get divorced, then it was up to him to do so, but the fact that she’d run away was more than his vanity could take.
“I told you to get them!” he yelled at his younger son. “Pronto!”
Domenico shot him an upset look and disappeared.
“How could she do this to me?” Sergio continued his restless pacing like a predator in a cage. “How could she expose me like this?”
“But, Papa,” Massimo tried to argue, “she didn’t expose you at all. No one but us knows about this.”
“Soon everyone will know!” Sergio yelled. “Everyone will make fun of me!”
“Ahh, I don’t believe that.”
“Shut up!” Sergio snarled at his son. His face was pale with anger. “She makes me look like an idiot in front of my people. I’ll never forgive her for that! Sergio Vitali left by his wife! That’s unheard of!”
Sergio’s anger wasn’t really about his wife. What really made him furious was the fact that Alex had lied to him. She had told him that she was with the Downeys on Long Island. But instead, she’d snuck behind his back to see Kostidis!
“Silvio,” Sergio said after a while, calming down, “make sure that Constanzia comes back here. I don’t care how you do it. But if I read a single line about it in the newspaper, you’re fired! Capito?”
Silvio nodded calmly. He had gotten used to his boss’s temper tantrums years ago.
“Hold on!” There was a cruel smile on Sergio’s face.
“Call Luca. I have a special job for him.”
Silvio nodded and left the room.
“What’s your plan, Papa?” Massimo asked, concerned. “What will you do with Mama?”
“Nothing.” Sergio waved his hand dismissively and walked to the bar to pour himself a whiskey. “I just want her to return to this house.”
“What about this special job?”
“It has nothing to do with your mother.” He downed the whiskey in one gulp. That damn bitch Alex was about to really get to know him! First she’d pretended that she couldn’t wait to get married and live with him, and then she met secretly with his archenemy!
Alex looked around her now-empty apartment as she waited for the movers to arrive. Maybe it was naive of her to think that she could escape from Sergio, but at least she no longer owed him anything. Alex checked her watch and lit a cigarette. Her thoughts drifted back to last Sunday. She was deeply touched that Nick put her safety ahead of her information against Sergio. She had assumed that he’d do anything to avenge the murder of his wife and his son, but the bombing and the shooting at the cemetery had changed his mind. When he called her late Monday afternoon, they talked for nearly fifteen minutes. But he didn’t utter a single word about what Alex had told him on Sunday.
The doorbell rang right at that moment. Alex walked across her apartment, opened the door, and froze. Constanzia Vitali was standing in front of her.
“Excuse me for showing up unannounced,” Sergio’s wife said. “May I come in?”
“Umm…of course.” Alex was astonished and embarrassed at the same time. Had Sergio actually filed for divorce? Did his wife come here to make a scene? Constanzia Vitali stepped into the foyer.
Alex had only seen Sergio’s wife once before, and that was a year and a half ago. The woman had visibly aged since then. Deep wrinkles had settled into her face, and she had bags under her brown eyes. She couldn’t hide her unhappiness. She had lost her son, and Alex suspected Sergio did little to comfort his wife during this difficult time.
“You won’t be surprised to hear that I don’t want to see your husband anymore,” Alex said.
“You’re leaving him?” Constanzia raised her eyebrows in surprise.
“That’s my intention,” Alex replied.
“Well,” Constanzia said, smiling with wicked amusement, “then Sergio has been left by his wife and his lover on the same day. That’ll be a big blow for his ego and his pride.”
“You…left him?” Alex asked in disbelief.
“Yes.” Constanzia nodded and gave her a probing look.
Constanzia sat down in one of the rattan chairs and observed Alex, who was her absolute opposite in terms of appearance. She was silent for a while as she considered how to phrase her question.
“I have known Sergio since we were small children,” she began. “We grew up in Little Italy. Everyone knew everyone there. Ignazio Vitali sent Sergio to a boarding school when he was six years old, shortly after his brother Aldo was killed by a rival gang.”
Alex was astonished because Sergio told her that his brother died of an illness, but she wasn’t surprised to learn he had kept the truth from her.
“Sergio only returned to the city after his father’s death,” Constanzia continued. “Ignazio, who was the padrino of the Genovese family, was essentially executed because he was in the way. My father was his successor. I didn’t understand the intricacies of the power structure among the city’s families back then. I fell head over heels in love with Sergio when I saw him at a girlfriend’s wedding, and I could hardly believe it when we got married just a short time later. I was deaf and blind with love and didn’t listen to my father’s warnings. However, I realized very quickly that Sergio didn’t love me.”