Chapter 6 - WHY ALFONSO CHOSE HER
The first snow came early that year.
By morning, the lawns around the Marquetti estate were white and the trees looked stripped down to bone. Alfonso asked for the curtains opened despite complaining about light for weeks.
Adeline raised them halfway.
“More,” he said.
“You complained yesterday.”
“I reserve the right to contradict myself while dying.”
“That is not a medical privilege.”
“It should be.”
She opened them fully.
Alfonso stared outside for a long time.
His breathing had worsened. The swelling in his legs returned more quickly after medication. Small things exhausted him now. Speaking too long left him pale.
Adeline hated what that meant.
She had worked around death long enough to recognize its manners.
It did not always announce itself dramatically. Sometimes it simply reduced a person’s world by inches.
“Sit,” Alfonso said.
“I’m charting.”
“Chart sitting down.”
She pulled the chair closer.
He looked toward the door.
“Close it.”
Adeline did.
When she returned, Alfonso reached beneath his pillow and produced a small envelope sealed with dark wax.
“You are becoming very theatrical.”
“I was theatrical before you were born.”
He placed the envelope in her hand.
“What is this?”
“Insurance.”
“For what?”
“My family.”
Adeline immediately tried to return it.
“No.”
“Do not open it unless Enzo asks you to leave this house because he believes Bruno over you.”
“That is extremely specific.”
“Old men get specific when time becomes expensive.”
She stared at the envelope.
“What is inside?”
“A copy of a ledger and a letter.”
“What ledger?”
“The one Bruno thinks I burned.”
Adeline’s expression changed.
Alfonso continued.
“For twenty years, Bruno has been useful. For the last five, he has been greedy. Greed alone is not rare in our world. But he has begun moving money through shell companies, buying loyalty, arranging debts that make men dependent on him rather than Enzo.”
“Why haven’t you told Enzo?”
“I have told him enough to make him watch. Not enough to make him act without proof.”
“And you’re giving proof to me?”
“I’m giving a copy to someone Bruno does not think matters.”
Adeline leaned back.
“That is either brilliant or offensive.”
“Both can be true.”
She looked at the envelope again.
“Why choose me?”
The question had been living under every conversation since the salon.
Alfonso sighed.
“Because my grandson has spent his life becoming difficult to reach.”
“That sounds like his problem.”
“It is. And now, unfortunately, yours if you marry him.”
Adeline frowned.
Alfonso continued.
“When Enzo was eleven, his mother died. After that, he decided needing people was dangerous. He became excellent at responsibility and terrible at receiving care. Men obey him. Women admire him. Enemies fear him. Very few people tell him when he is being a fool.”
“You think I qualify?”
“You started on the first night.”
She smiled faintly.
“Still not a reason to arrange a marriage.”
“No. The real reason is simpler.”
Alfonso looked toward the door.
“You did not change when you learned who we were.”
Adeline’s smile vanished.
“You did not become impressed. You did not become frightened enough to flatter us. You became more careful, yes. But you still told me my lungs sounded worse. You still told Enzo his men were making a child in pediatrics nervous. You still corrected Marisol when she nearly gave me the wrong pill because she had been awake all night.”
“That is my job.”
“Exactly.”
He reached for her hand.
His fingers were cold.
“I chose a woman whose work requires her to value life before status. My family has spent generations doing the opposite.”
Adeline swallowed.
“That is too much to put on one person.”
“I know.”
“Then don’t.”
“I’m not asking you to save them.”
“What are you asking?”
“To make sure Enzo remembers he can choose what kind of man he becomes after I’m gone.”
Silence settled between them.
Adeline looked down at their hands.
“I don’t know if I love him.”
Alfonso laughed weakly.
“Good. Love declared too early is usually marketing.”
She squeezed his fingers.
“You really are impossible.”
“So they tell me.”
That afternoon, Enzo found Adeline in the winter garden.
She was sitting beside a dead rose bush, coat wrapped tightly around her, the sealed envelope hidden in her bag.
“How is he?”
“Worse.”
Enzo’s face did not move.
That was how grief appeared on him.
Adeline had learned.
“He knows,” she said.
“I know he knows.”
“No. I mean he knows how close it is.”
Enzo stared through the glass.
“I have a cardiologist coming tonight.”
“That will not stop this.”
His eyes hardened.
“I am aware.”
“You don’t have to sound angry at me.”
“I’m not.”
“You sound angry at the weather.”
“I am angry at several things.”
“Death being one of them?”
He looked at her.
No one spoke to him like this.
Adeline stood.
“You can hate it,” she said. “You just can’t control it.”
“That sentence is becoming popular around you.”
“Maybe your family needs it printed on stationery.”
His mouth twitched.
Then his expression softened.
“What did he tell you?”
Adeline thought about the envelope.
“Mostly that you’re emotionally constipated.”
Enzo stared.
She added, “My wording.”
For one unexpected second, he laughed.
Not the restrained breath she had seen before.
A real laugh.
It ended quickly, but it changed something.
Adeline realized she wanted to hear it again.
That frightened her more than the armed men at the gates.
Later, Bruno entered Alfonso’s room while Adeline was preparing medication.
He brought flowers.
Alfonso looked at them with suspicion.
“I’m not dead.”
“Yet,” Bruno said warmly.
Adeline looked up.
The word was harmless on the surface.
Its tone was not.
Bruno smiled at her.
“Nurse Whitaker. Soon to be Mrs. Marquetti.”
“Adeline is fine.”
“I imagine it must be overwhelming.”
“What?”
“This house. This family. Going from charity wards to all this.”
Adeline checked Alfonso’s pulse.
“I still work in charity wards.”
“For now.”
She met his eyes.
Bruno’s smile remained.
Then he leaned toward Alfonso.
“I wanted to ask if you had reconsidered certain old documents. Enzo is under pressure. We should make things easier for him.”
Alfonso’s gaze went cold.
“No.”
“Alfonso—”
“No.”
Bruno’s eyes flicked briefly toward Adeline’s bag on the chair.
Only briefly.
She noticed.
Enzo watched hands.
Adeline watched eyes.
Bruno left five minutes later.
The moment the door closed, Alfonso whispered, “Move the envelope.”
Adeline did.
She slid it inside the inner pocket of her uniform.
That night, someone searched her locker at St. Bridget.
Nothing was taken.
But every folded paper crane she kept for the children had been crushed.
For the first time, Adeline understood that Bruno no longer saw her as an accident.
May you like
He saw her as a threat.
And she still did not know exactly what Alfonso had put in her hands.
