Forgive Me(95)

To quiet the tremor of her hands, Angie kept them folded in her lap. She fell silent while her father waited patiently for her to speak.

During the lull, her ears picked up on the tick-tock of the wall-mounted kitchen clock—a Felix the Cat model with those traveling eyes she found more creepy than cute.

Gabriel decided the silence had lasted long enough. “What is this about, Angie? Is everything all right?”

She answered her father’s question by shaking her head. It took a moment before she could speak. “No, Dad, I don’t think it is.” A line of tears filled her lower lids and blurred her vision. She tilted her head back to hold them in place. It wasn’t the time to let them go.

“No more lies, Dad,” Angie said. “Who is Mom’s family?”

Gabriel lowered his gaze to his lap and then slowly raised his head to reveal a contrite expression. “Why do you want to know?” His voice lacked inflection.

“Because I want to know why my mom has a social security number that seemingly materialized out of thin air.“

Gabriel’s eyes narrowed to slits as the creases of his brow deepened. “I don’t understand. What are you getting at here?” He ran his fingers through his thinning hair and rubbed clean the lenses of his dark rimmed glasses using the cloth tie of his bathrobe.

Angie viewed both gestures as nervous tics, a subconscious reflex of a mind focused heavily on concocting an acceptable story.

“I ran Mom’s social security number through an online form to get a copy of her application. I wanted to find her parents so I could ask them about Isabella Conti, but Mom has no social security application, even though she has a valid number. I don’t know your family or hers, and I want to know why.”

“You know the story.”

Angie slammed her hand against the kitchen table, creating a clap loud enough to make her father flinch. “I know your story!” she bellowed, pointing at him with an accusatory finger. “Now I want the truth. Mom has a connection to a mobster and a phantom social security number. Who has that, Dad? Who? The people who need to disappear, that’s who! Now, tell me the truth. I won’t stop until I get it. You know me. You know how I can be.”

Gabriel took in a few ragged breaths. He knew, all right. “Angie . . . I’m having a . . . a hard time breathing here.”

All of the anger, Angie’s inner turmoil, quieted in a blink, and her focus shifted away from questions about her mother to the health of her father. She leapt out of her chair and leaned over him, feeling his forehead with her hand. His skin felt clammy to the touch. She tuned into the fast flutter of his heart.

“Daddy, are you all right? I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to do that to you. Do I need to call an ambulance?”

Gabriel shook his head. “No, no, I’m fine,” he said, though he was still a bit breathless. “You just caught me by surprise, is all.”

Angie retook her seat, but with a different attitude, no longer on the offensive. She reached across the table and took hold of her father’s hands, then looked him in the eyes. “Daddy, listen to me. I love you. I don’t want to upset you, but I have to know the truth. And I’m going to get the answer with your help or without it. My investigation won’t be subtle. I’m going to turn over every last stone and I might attract the attention of the same people Mom was trying to hide from. I think that’s what’s going on here. I think Mom knew the Conti family. She was connected to them somehow and she went into hiding just like they did.

“Maybe the people Mom ran away from would come looking for you and me, if they knew where to look. I don’t know. But I do know some grudges last longer than generations. Some members of the Giordano family, I bet, would love to find Antonio Conti, same as I think someone would like to find Mom and her family. I don’t know who, but I won’t stop looking until I get the answer. I know the relationship you had with Mom, and I know she wouldn’t keep that kind of secret from you. I know it in my heart. I’ll dig into your past the same as I dug into Mom’s until I find someone who knows something.

“Now, you can make it safer for us both by telling me what I want to know. Don’t make me go looking. Just tell me and I’ll stop.”

Gabriel’s mouth slipped into a grimace. He rested his head in his hands, and his gaze turned distant. “Angie, please.”

Angie shook her head. “You know me. You know how I can be. Who is my mother? Who is she really?”

Gabriel swallowed a breath. He looked to the ceiling, then back at Angie. “You promise you’ll stop asking questions?”

“Yes, Dad,” Angie said.

“It’s not safe if you don’t.”

“I promise, Dad.”

“What I’m going to say will shock you.”

“Just tell me.”

“Angie, sweetheart, what I’m going to tell you—well, it changes everything.”

“I’m prepared for anything, Dad. Honest, I am.”

“No,” Gabriel said, with a slight shake of his head. “I can assure you, you’re not prepared for this.”





CHAPTER 51



It wasn’t the kind of manhunt to which Bryce Taggart was accustomed. Instead of donning body armor and making sure Little Pig was oiled and ready for action, he manned the phones, tracked tips, and fed information to his fellow marshals working as part of the Capital Area Regional Fugitive Task Force, CARFTF for short. Teams from the SOG—Special Operations Group—were on hand and on the front lines doing the kind of fieldwork Bryce hoped to be doing when the Baltimore office volunteered him and Gary Graves for the Ivan Markovich task force.