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No. Please. No. Not again. Please, God. Please.

"It's Cesare."

My knees threaten to fold. "He's n-not dead—-" I would've felt it. Would've known.

Massimo whitens. "Dio, no.It's not that," he rejects right away. "Mi dispiace,I did not mean to frighten you."

My knees do give out this time, and even though I'm crying again, it's tears of relief coursing down my cheeks.

He's alive, thank God.

That's all that matters.

Cesare's alive.

Massimo carefully helps me back to my feet, and I look up at him, saying unevenly, "Just tell it to me straight."

And so he does.

Pilar is dead, and Cesare is now behind bars...as the prime suspect behind her murder.

Chapter Twelve

Cesare

HE HAD ONLY BEEN INjail for a few hours when the police was telling him he had his first visitor, and while Cesare was not surprised to seeLa Stregaon the opposite side of the bulletproof window—-

It pained him to see her frailty emphasized, with how her fingers were badly shaking as she reached for the receiver that would allow them to hear each other's voices.

"How bad is it?" Cesare asked calmly.

"The evidence against you is damning." Potenziana felt like she was breaking her own heart as she forced herself to speak to her grandson asLa Strega.

Once he was free, and she was assured of his safety, it would only then that she would indulge herself with the luxury of weeping like a grandmother whose little boy was in danger.

But until then, she had to act like the matriarch whosefamigliawas under threat.

"Whoever killed her," Potenziana emphasized curtly, "had all of their ducks in a row."

"Fucking ducks again."

Potenziana was stunned to find herself almost smiling.

Next time,she promised herself.

Once Cesare was free, this, too, would be another wonderful story about those fucking ducks that they could laugh about.

But until then—-

"If I were to make a guess, those ducks are the killer's multiple scapegoats, with evidence meticulously prepared against each and every one of them. It just so happened that you were the unlucky one to draw the shorter stick, with your visit to Pilar."

Silence followed, and an inscrutable mask smoothened over the chiseled features of her grandson's face.

"If I end up charged—-"

"No!"

Emotion finally cracked through her voice.