Sempre: Redemption (Forever Series #2)(36)

Doing his best to ignore the sensation, he spent the next hour going through the house, sifting through desk drawers and scouring rooms, looking for anything the girl might want. He thoroughly tossed the place, turning furniture upside down and destroying things with no regard in his search. He came up empty in the way of personal effects, but he found a bit of hidden cash and some jewelry he could sell for her. The rest wasn’t salvageable in his eyes, nothing worth saving.

No photographs. No mementos. No nothing in the way of admitting she was family or that anyone who ever lived in that home cared she existed.

He was in a downstairs closet, throwing things around, when he hit a wall panel and knocked it loose. He kicked it aside, peering into the hole, and caught a flash of something silver. He reached inside, felt around, and grabbed a handle, having to use some force to yank it out, a heavy cloud of dust coming with it. Corrado coughed forcefully as it infiltrated his lungs, his eyes stinging.

After stepping back out of the closet, Corrado surveyed the object with puzzlement. It was a vintage Halliburton aluminum briefcase, heavy and expensive. Age had dulled the outside, but it held sturdily together.

He tried to pry it open to no avail, striking at the lock, before conceding and throwing it to the floor. He considered leaving it there, frustrated, but something nagged him not to. It had clearly been hidden away for years, maybe decades. He couldn’t fathom what the briefcase contained that warranted such protection.

It was a riddle to him, a puzzle . . . a mystery he needed to solve.

Giving up, he snatched it from the floor again and headed outside, tossing it into the back seat of his rental car. He stared at the house, still feeling his skin trying to slink away. Dusk had come upon him, nighttime approaching fast as the sun dipped behind the desert cliffs. After debating for a long moment, he went back inside and gathered some books and clothing in the room with the open window. Finding a container of paint thinner in the cellar, he splashed a bit on the belongings before pulling a book of Luna Rossa matches from his pocket. He struck a single match and stared at the flame briefly before tossing it onto the pile.

It ignited swiftly as Corrado made his way back out to the car, leaving the front door wide open. He pulled away from the property, heading for the highway out of Blackburn. There was enough wind blowing and dirt in the dry air to cover his tire tracks, enough oxygen in the house to be certain the entire thing would go up in flames. Given the isolated location and the darkening sky, it would be hours before someone spotted the smoke, sufficient time for it to burn to the ground.

An orange glow lit up the bottom floor of the house when Corrado glanced in the rearview mirror. Mixing with the burn of sunset, it illuminated the ground surrounding it. The tension in his muscles receded as he watched it, the clawing at his skin fading away.

A small smile lifted the corner of his lips. What better way to send the evil back to Hell than a fiery grave?

13

While Dia was on her way to Durante to visit her parents, Haven awaited a visitor of her own. She sat in the living room of the quiet apartment, the notebook from the federal agent laying on her lap. She had flipped through it countless times, rereading passages as she hoped the words would somehow change.

They weren’t, though. Every time she looked at them, they seemed to get worse. It was all there in black-and-white, everything she had promised to never tell spelled out with utter simplicity.

She felt like she was going to be sick.

There was a knock after a while, firm and determined. Haven set the notebook down and opened the door, her heart hammering against her rib cage. Dr. DeMarco walked in without a word and she closed the door behind him. “I’m sorry to bother you . . .”

“You’re not bothering me,” he said, pausing in the living room. His eyes lingered on the wall splattered with art and photos before he turned to her. “I’m glad you called. Where is it?”

She pointed to the table where the notebook lay. “I had no idea they had it.”

Dr. DeMarco picked it up and sighed. “I did.”

She gaped at him. “You knew?”

“Agent Cerone showed it to me. He thought I would crack if I knew what you’d written.”

Her stomach dropped so hard it was like she had taken a ten-story fall, stopping just shy of slamming into the concrete. She swayed, needing to sit down. “You read it?”

“He read a few passages to me, but I couldn’t help that.”

Her head swam as she ran through possibilities of what he might have heard. “I’m sorry. I really am. I was upset when I wrote some of it and—”

“Don’t apologize,” he said, shaking his head. “You have every right to feel how you feel.”

“But they know the truth,” she said. “The government knows about me now.”

“Yes, but there’s nothing they can do about it. You have an expectation of privacy with your diary. They can’t use any of it without your cooperation.”

Those words sent waves of relief through her. “They can’t?”

“No, but it doesn’t mean they’ll forget about it either. The journal may be inadmissible legally, but there are other ways for them to utilize it. And trust me when I say they will. They already are.”

“How?” she asked. “What can they do?”

“Exactly what they’ve done.” He held up the notebook. “He didn’t drop this off out of the kindness of his heart. He did it to get to me . . . to prove a point.”