Chapter 10 - The Meeting Where Enzo Forgot My Hands Could Understand Him

The plan was Lucia’s.

I hated it immediately.

That did not mean it was bad.

Enzo had requested a family business meeting to discuss what he called “leadership instability.” He wanted board members from three Marquetti companies present. He also insisted Paul Danner attend because, according to Enzo, replacing Salvatore’s longtime interpreter in the middle of a corporate dispute would create confusion.

Lucia wanted the confusion.

A certified interpreter named June Park would sit beside Salvatore. Danner would be allowed into the room as Enzo’s “communication adviser.”

I would watch from a separate office through the building’s internal conference system.

“No one knows I’m here?” I asked.

“Marco, Lucia, June, and Salvatore,” said the technician setting up the monitor.

“Eli?”

“He is downstairs with security and a vending machine he has already insulted twice.”

That sounded right.

The meeting began at ten.

Enzo arrived smiling.

He kissed Salvatore on both cheeks as if family affection could erase surveillance, missing money, and a driver following my brother.

June interpreted everything Salvatore signed.

Danner stood behind Enzo.

For the first twenty minutes, nothing happened.

Budgets. Vendor contracts. Insurance renewals.

Then Enzo said aloud, “The problem is perception. People think you’re losing control.”

June signed it faithfully.

Salvatore answered, “People who profit from that perception keep repeating it.”

June voiced the sentence exactly.

Enzo’s smile thinned.

He glanced at Danner.

Danner signed low against his thigh.

“Different without me.”

Enzo answered with one hand beneath the table.

“Too clear.”

I wrote both phrases down.

The meeting continued.

A board member questioned unusually high vendor expenses at two restaurants.

Shoreline appeared on a spreadsheet.

Enzo’s gaze flicked toward Danner.

Danner signed, “Move past.”

Enzo interrupted aloud. “We’re getting lost in minor operating costs.”

My pulse accelerated.

Salvatore did not look toward the camera.

Good.

If he had, they might have guessed.

Lucia pressed harder.

“Shoreline Beverage Distribution is dissolved. Why are our companies still paying invoices to entities using its name?”

Enzo laughed.

“Ask accounting.”

“We did.”

His smile disappeared.

Danner’s hands moved.

“Cole found same.”

I stopped breathing.

Enzo’s answer came fast.

“Father handled Cole.”

The room around me vanished.

I replayed the sign in my mind.

Father handled Cole.

Not Vittorio.

Whose father?

Enzo’s father was Vittorio’s younger brother, Carlo Marquetti.

Carlo had died six years ago after a stroke.

Everyone had been looking at Vittorio because Daniel worked for Vittorio.

But Enzo had not signed Uncle handled Cole.

He had signed Father.

My hands shook as I wrote it down.

Inside the conference room, Salvatore signed, “We will suspend all Shoreline-linked payments pending audit.”

June voiced it.

Enzo stood.

“That will disrupt half our hospitality businesses.”

“Then they should have chosen real vendors.”

Danner signed sharply to Enzo.

“Stop him now.”

Enzo stared at Salvatore.

Then he smiled again.

“You always did enjoy proving you were smarter than everyone thought.”

The insult was old. I could tell from Salvatore’s face.

He did not react.

Enzo continued. “Uncle Vittorio spent his whole life cleaning up after your limitations.”

June’s expression tightened as she interpreted.

Salvatore’s answer was almost calm.

“My limitation was trusting people who preferred speaking for me.”

Danner went still.

For one second, he looked directly at the conference camera.

At me.

Not because he could see me.

Because he realized someone might be seeing him.

His hands dropped to his sides.

The meeting ended five minutes later.

I was still staring at my notes when Salvatore entered the observation office.

He closed the door.

“What did you see?” he signed.

I turned the notebook toward him.

Cole found same.

Father handled Cole.

Salvatore read the words twice.

Then his face changed.

“My uncle Carlo,” he signed.

“You think Enzo’s father did something to mine.”

“I think Enzo believes he did.”

“That is not the same thing.”

“No.”

I appreciated that he did not pretend certainty.

Then Marco entered without knocking.

His expression told us something else had happened.

“Danner’s gone,” he said.

“What do you mean gone?”

“He left through the parking garage before we could stop him.”

Salvatore’s eyes narrowed.

Marco placed a phone on the desk.

“And Brett just called.”

My stomach dropped.

“What did he say?”

Marco looked at me.

“He says he knows where Daniel Cole spent his last night in Chicago.”

Brett refused to explain anything over the phone. He only said he would talk if Lucia was present and if Salvatore promised not to send anyone after him.

Salvatore watched Marco interpret the request aloud, then signed a response without hesitation. “He gets counsel. He gets a public place. He gets my word.”

Marco’s eyebrows rose.

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I understood why. A month earlier, Brett had been a restaurant manager making cruel jokes at my expense. Now he might be the only living witness to my father’s last night in Chicago.

The next morning, for the first time in four years, Brett would sit across from me without a desk between us.