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J ulia looked around, taking in the scene from outside the kitchen door.

The day had turned grim, and gray clouds blanketed the sky, weighing the air with humidity.

A rickety wooden pergola sagged with trumpet vines over a rusty tile table with broken cane chairs.

A jumble of weeds, grass, and mossy stones looked like it used to be an herb garden.

Beyond that was the vineyard, such as it was, curving behind the villa at a sharply lower elevation.

She spotted a narrow path down the hill and started walking that way. The ground was uneven and embedded with fieldstone. The wind dropped off precipitously, and the air smelled damp and earthy, like something decomposing.

She reached the vineyard, thinking of Mike and scanning it with his eyes.

He would have loved to have a vineyard, but this neglected mess would have broken his heart.

Greenish-brown vines coiled in curlicues around the underbrush, throttling tiny white wildflowers trying to find the sun.

Wooden stakes meant to guide the growth had long ago been toppled by the grappling vines and swallowed up by the tangled thicket.

It struck her that unlike a ruined villa, untamed nature never rested.

Mike would clear this place with his bare hands.

The thought popped into Julia’s head, and she didn’t try to shoo it away.

I wish Mike were here.

I would give anything if Mike were alive.

I would give all the money in the world.

I miss my husband.

Julia let the thoughts come, one after the next, and found herself not only thinking about Mike but feeling him, experiencing loving him as if he were still alive.

She could even pinpoint the moment she fell in love with him because it happened on her birthday.

They’d been seeing each other but they hadn’t gotten to the I-love-yous yet, and they woke up in bed that morning.

It’s your birthday! Mike had said, kissing her.

I hate my birthday. Julia didn’t have to explain. He knew why.

That’s about to change! Mike had jumped out of bed in his plaid boxers, then ran out of the bedroom and back in a few minutes later, wearing two giant white cartoon hands and a Mickey Mouse hat with big ears. We’re going to Disney World!

What? Julia had asked, astonished, and Mike had pulled her from bed with his cartoon hand.

Get dressed! I packed your bag! Courtney and Paul are downstairs! Our flight’s at noon! Happy birthday, babe!

Julia’s mouth had dropped open. She hadn’t known what to say. All she knew was what she’d felt, which was a rush of warmth, gratitude, and for the first time, true love. I love you , she’d blurted out.

I love you, too, Mike had said, his smile full of happiness.

It was the most thoughtful thing any man had ever done for her, and so much like him, a grand gesture, a spontaneous showing that he cared, listened, and believed he could make her happy, which itself was an act of self-belief and will.

Mike tried all the time, in every way, and she tried, too, and they had been happy together until the moment she never wanted to remember, the night he was stabbed to death.

Julia could feel grief approaching closer and closer, like a tidal wave of darkness. But this time, something told her not to hold it off. Maybe letting it come was the way to get a sign from him.

“Mike,” Julia heard herself say, looking around.

“Mike?” Julia found herself sinking to her knees, surrounded by twisting, coiling vines so thick that they formed a wall, closing her in.

“Mike, are you there?” Julia whispered like a prayer, feeling foolish but not letting that stop her. “Will you give me a sign?”

There was no response except the faintest of breezes. Did that count? Was that him? Was that his ghost? Or a shift in barometric pressure?

“Mike, I’m sorry I don’t talk to you. I should have, all this time. I never even tried.” Julia heard herself, guilty and desperate. “But can I have a sign? Please?”

No response except the shuddering of the leaves.

“Mike, please?”

Nothing.

Mike, I’m sorry I didn’t save you.

I tried but there was so much blood.

Mike, please forgive me.

Mike, please don’t leave me alone.

Mike, I love you and I always will.

Julia felt tears brimming in her eyes. She wiped them away, but they kept coming. Soon she began to cry full bore, lost in emotions pent-up for days. She’d been white-knuckling through airports, flights, and crowds. Maybe even through life.

Choking sobs emanated from deep within her chest, leaving her body so racked she vomited.

It wasn’t the sign she was hoping for.

“Hi, Anna Mattia.” Julia entered the kitchen from the back door, keeping her face down because her eyes were puffy and her nose leaky. She crossed to the sink to wash up.

Anna Mattia stood aside, then put a comforting hand on her shoulder.

“I didn’t get a sign.” Julia rinsed her face, then twisted off the water.

Anna Mattia handed her a dish towel.

“Thank you.” Julia dried her face then hung the dishcloth on its little rack.

She straightened, recovering her composure because she’d remembered something after her crying jag.

She needed to go through Rossi’s belongings for her DNA.

“Anna Mattia, I didn’t see Signora Rossi’s things. Did you store them somewhere?”

“No. All gone.”

“I know, but where? Are they in storage?”

“No.” Anna Mattia frowned with disapproval. “Signora burn.”

Julia figured it was the language barrier. “I’m talking about her personal belongings like her clothes, books, or whatever. All her stuff.”

Anna Mattia shook her head, frowning. “She make Piero burn.”

“What?” Julia didn’t get it. “I mean her things, all of her things.”

“She burn.”

“She didn’t burn her clothes, did she?”

“Yes. She ’ave many.”

Julia blinked. “Do you mean she burned everything she owned?”

“Yes, sorry.” Anna Mattia nodded gravely.

“ Everything? ” Julia repeated, shocked. She’d never get Rossi’s DNA now.

“Yes.” Anna Mattia frowned, more deeply. “I say, give the church. People need. I say, sell, make money. She say no. Piero say, she is Signora. We must do.” Anna Mattia looked frustrated, gesticulating. “She don’ want people touch her things, ’ave her things.”

“What about her laptop? Did she burn that, too?”

“Yes.”

“But how ? Do electronics even burn? There must have been so much stuff.”

“ So much!” Anna Mattia threw up her little arms. “ Too much! Piero make a big, big fire. I worry trees catch to the fire.”

Julia couldn’t imagine it. “Where did you do this?”

“Come.” Anna Mattia led the way, and they went out the back door.

They took a right turn and went a direction that Julia hadn’t explored yet.

It was a hill, its ground uneven, and they descended on a trampled dirt path.

Ahead was a stone carriage house in abject disrepair, as ivy-covered as the villa.

A red Fiat Panda was parked in a bay on its open ground floor.

Anna Mattia pointed at the carriage house. “We live.”

“Very nice,” Julia said, but they both knew otherwise.

Anna Mattia continued walking, and Julia could see beyond the carriage house to an open equipment shed with stone sides and a corrugated tin roof.

An old Kubota backhoe, a John Deere mower, and other heavy machinery were parked inside.

They reached the shed, passed it, then kept going around the back.

A vast clearing came into view, an area flattened, blackened, and scorched.

Julia felt stricken. “When did she do this?”

“When she is sick.”

“Did she have chemo, radiation?”

“No. She say no, is too late.” Anna Mattia looked over, her hooded eyes flinty. “She say doctor try kill her.”

“She was afraid the doctors would kill her? That’s crazy!” Julia hated the term but she didn’t have a better one yet. “Was she crazy, Anna Mattia?”

Anna Mattia pursed her lips.

“Please, tell me. She seems crazy. She won’t see the doctors. She lives like a hermit. She has no friends. She lets her villa and her vineyard go to ruin. She doesn’t fix anything or keep it up, even though she has the money. Why?”

Anna Mattia nodded, cringing. “ Paranoico .”

“Paranoid?” Julia didn’t want to think Rossi was paranoid, delusional, or crazy, if they were blood-related.

Her bewildered gaze returned to the scorched circle.

On impulse, she walked over, her footsteps crunching on charred debris.

Ash darkened the toes of her espadrilles, and her footsteps stirred up a residual burned odor.

Seared shards, chips, fragments, and pieces of fabric and wood lay everywhere in unrecognizable pieces.

Julia stood at the center of the blackened circle, and a wave of despair swept over her.

Suddenly she noticed a tiny white speck among the black.

She walked over, picked it up, and brushed off the ashes, amazed to see a pearl.

One side was blackened from the smoke, but the other was still white.

She held it in her open palm, and it was as perfectly round as a miniature moon, with its own dark side.

Julia walked back to Anna Mattia. “Look at this. I think it came from a necklace.”

Anna Mattia peered at the pearl, clasping her hands together. “Signora love pearl. She ’ave many necklace.”

Julia felt frustrated. “But she burned her jewelry , too?”

“Yes.” Anna Mattia clucked, shaking her head.

“Why?” Julia didn’t get it. She’d come here for nothing .

“Don’ know.”

“Anna Mattia, I don’t know why she left me the money and the villa, either.”

“ Ché ? What?” Anna Mattia frowned, stepping back. “You are family.”

“No, I’m not. Why, did she say she had family?”

“No, no.” Anna Mattia blinked. “I think you are family from America. Piero think. We presumiamo .”

“You presumed? You assumed?”

“ Sì .” Anna Mattia nodded, agitated. “She give you money, villa—”

“Right, but I don’t know her.”

“ é vero? ” Anna Mattia’s hooded eyes widened in disbelief.

“I don’t know her at all. Did she have any children?”

“No.”

Julia felt dumbfounded. “How do you know? Did she tell you?”

“ Sì , yes. No marry. No childr’. Never ’ave childr’.”

“What about any sisters or brothers?”

“Don’ know. She ’ave nobody . We think you are family from America. Signora tell nobody not’ing .” Anna Mattia searched her face. “Who are you?”

Julia thought it was a damn good question. “I’m adopted. You know adopted ?”

“ Sì , yes. We ’ave.”

“So if Rossi had no children, I don’t know how or even if I’m related to her, at all.”

“But she give you sign.”

“What sign?”

“ Perla .” Anna Mattia gestured at Julia’s fist, and Julia opened her hand. The pearl shone like a whitish-gray moon in her palm. Anna Mattia pointed at it with her knobby index finger. “This, a sign .”

“Really?” Julia wondered, rolling the pearl from its light to its dark side. “You think it’s from her? Or my husband?”

Anna Mattia shrugged.

“Where’s Rossi buried?” Julia asked, on impulse.