Chapter 9 - THREE MEANS FOREVER
By two o'clock in the morning, the flashing blue and red lights of the Chicago Police cruisers had finally disappeared down the long gravel driveway of the Valenti estate.
The twenty-four engagement guests were long gone, though half of them had given sworn statements in the library to the District Attorney's investigators before picking up their coats.
Paul Vance and Judge Arthur Cross had been taken out in handcuffs—Vance for the attempted shooting in the greenhouse and his role in the harbor assault six years earlier, and Judge Cross after the oilskin ledger inside Marco's coat matched the exact routing numbers of four depleted county juvenile trusts.
Vivienne hadn't been arrested yet, though her lawyer had already called twice. Before walking out the front doors with a female detective to give her deposition, she had placed her four-carat emerald-cut engagement ring on the hall table beside the spilled wine stain.
She hadn't looked at Damian. She had looked at me.
"I really didn't know they hurt Marco," she had whispered at the door, looking smaller than I had ever seen her in her mud-stained silk gown.
"You still held a pair of scissors over a ten-year-old boy's wrist to protect your lifestyle, Miss Cross," I had answered quietly.
And then I had closed the heavy front door behind her.
Now, the great house was finally quiet.
I walked into the warm kitchen, no longer wearing my white maid's apron. My hands were still smudged with chimney dust from helping pull Noah and Zoe out of the dining room hearth panel, and Chef Enzo had left a big pot of homemade chicken noodle soup simmering on the back burner along with a plate of warm sourdough rolls before going home.
Sitting at the rough-hewn wooden kitchen table—not the formal marble banquet table in the other room, which Damian had ordered locked up for the week—were Noah and Zoe.
They were sitting on the same wide wooden bench even though there were six empty chairs around them, their shoulders pressed together under a oversized plaid flannel blanket.
Both of them had hot bowls of soup in front of them.
Zoe wasn't wearing the fake wire-rimmed glasses anymore. Her dark curls were brushed clean of plaster dust, and she was wearing one of Noah's soft blue sweatshirts, the sleeves rolled up three times around her small forearms.
Damian stood beside the stove in his white shirtsleeves, his black suit jacket and tie long discarded, his dark tattooed forearms braced against the counter.
In his hands, he held a spool of heavy, waxed crimson sailmaker's cord from his brother Marco's old tackle box in the study, along with the small wooden bead carved with the letter N that he had recovered from the evidence bag.
He walked over to the kitchen table and pulled up a wooden chair directly across from the two children.
For a moment, the forty-year-old man whose name made city councilmen and union bosses lower their voices looked almost nervous.
"Zoe," Damian said softly, holding up the tiny wooden bead and the fresh red cord. "Your bracelet got broken in that plastic bag. I know I'm not the one who tied it the first time... and I know you don't know me very well yet. Wait—actually, you probably think I'm a pretty terrible uncle for not finding you even when you were right downstairs."
Zoe stopped blowing on her spoonful of soup. She looked at Noah first.
Noah gave her a firm nod. "He's the best, Zoe. When I had nightmares the first month I lived here, he slept in the armchair in my room for a week."
Zoe looked back at Damian with those wide, clear hazel eyes that looked so much like Marco's old Polaroid.
"You aren't terrible," she said in her quiet, clear voice—no longer whispering out of fear. "You beat up the bad man with my dad's boat coat."
A real smile broke across Damian's exhausted face, crinkling the corners of his dark eyes.
"Yeah, well, your dad always bought heavy coats," Damian said huskily. "May I fix your bracelet?"
Zoe held out her small left wrist across the wooden table, right next to Noah's.
I stood by the kitchen island with a mug of tea, watching as Damian's large, scarred hands worked with extraordinary gentleness. He threaded the crimson cord through the wooden N bead, measured it loosely around Zoe's thin wrist so it wouldn't pinch, and then looped the cord back through itself.
One hitch.
Two hitches.
Three tight, interlocking fisherman's knots.
"My grandpa taught your dad and me how to tie this on the boats," Damian told her softly as he trimmed the excess cord—not with the kitchen scissors, which he had thrown into the outdoor dumpster an hour ago, but with his brother's small pocketknife. "Because the harder the waves pull on this knot, the tighter it holds. It never comes undone."
Zoe touched the three little knots alongside the wooden N bead, then pressed her wrist against Noah's wrist so the N and the Z clicked together.
"Three means forever," Noah said, his voice thick with sleep and happiness.
"Forever," Damian promised, resting his large hands over both of their small ones. "Both of you are Valentis. By blood, by name, and by heart. Nobody is ever separating you again, and nobody in this house will ever tell you to forget your mom or your dad. In fact, tomorrow afternoon, we're framing your mom's picture from the watch and putting it right on the mantelpiece in the living room."
Zoe leaned forward across the table and wrapped her arms around Damian's neck, smelling of lavender soap and chicken soup. Damian closed his eyes, holding his brother's little girl tight against his chest while his other arm pulled Noah in against his side.
After a long moment, Damian looked over Zoe's curls at me standing by the sink.
"Natalie," he said quietly. "What did Vivienne say your sister's tuition was at Wright College?"
I blushed, setting my mug down. "Mr. Valenti, you don't have to worry about that. I'm just glad I didn't get fired tonight."
"Well, technically, I am firing you from the housekeeping staff," Damian said, his dark eyes crinkling with warmth.
My heart skipped a beat. "Sir?"
"Marta is staying on to run the household linens—with a proper bedroom on the second floor and a raise for keeping Zoe safe," Damian said. "Which means I need a full-time family governess to look after both of my kids, help Zoe catch up on the four months of third grade she missed, and make sure nobody ever bullies them at school. The position pays double what you're making now, includes full tuition coverage for your sister Chloe until she graduates, and starts tomorrow morning at nine."
Noah looked up from his soup bowl, grinning from ear to ear. "Does that mean Miss Natalie eats at the table with us instead of carrying trays?"
Damian picked up a clean ceramic bowl from the counter, ladled it full of warm chicken soup, and set it down at the empty place right beside Noah and Zoe.
May you like
"Pull up a chair, Miss Reed," Damian said softly. "You're family now."
I sat down at the warm wooden table beside the two children, and as Noah reached over to pass me the basket of bread, the small wooden bead on his wrist tapped gently against the table—safe, unbroken, and finally home.
