Thirty Days to Choose His Son

The heavy oak emergency-room door swung shut behind Dante. Thunder rattled the windows, then Leo's heart monitor took over the room: beep, pause, beep. The ventilation system pushed cold air over the bed, carrying the sharp smell of disinfectant. Dante never looked back. Our seven-year-old was struggling to breathe through a 104-degree fever. Clara had called because Toby was scared of the storm, and that was enough to pull Dante away. My hand was still raised from trying to stop him. For seven years, I had excused the late calls, canceled dinners, and birthdays interrupted by Clara's emergencies. Dante was protecting his late underboss's widow. He was honoring a debt. That was what I told myself each time his chair at our table went empty. I dropped my hand. A nurse came over with a clipboard. “Mrs. Moretti, we need your consent for the aggressive pneumonia treatment. Leo's condition is critical.” The pen shook against the paper as I signed Elena Volkov Moretti. One signature. One parent. After the nurse left, I sat beside Leo and searched his school backpack for his favorite book. His diary slipped out instead. It opened to a recent page. Leo had covered a stick-figure man with thick black marker and crossed out the word “Father” until the paper had nearly torn. The marker had pressed grooves into the next two pages. A small pocket beneath the drawing held the wooden whistle Dante carved for him in Sicily, the summer Leo was four. That summer, with lemons growing above the terrace and the sea below it, Dante had put the whistle around Leo's neck and promised that no one would ever come before his son. Leo had worn it until the cord frayed. I closed my fingers around the worn wood. Dante returned at dawn with two guards and a cup of coffee. The guards stayed close to the door, men who had watched Dante order executions without blinking. Neither would meet Leo's eyes. Dante looked tired. He did not look sorry. “The storm was brutal,” he said. “Toby was hysterical. Clara couldn't handle him alone.” I kept my eyes on Leo. He had woken during the night, though the fever still dulled his gaze. He looked past me to the foot of the bed. “From now on, can I just call you Mr. Moretti?” Dante stopped with the cup halfway to his mouth. Coffee ran over the rim and onto his knuckles, but he did not move. Behind him, the guards glanced at each other. Leo turned his face back to the pillow and pulled the hospital blanket up to his chin. Later that day, Dante's black sedan entered the estate and continued past our main house. It stopped outside Clara's guesthouse. He had not asked whether Leo was stable. I went to the library and used the secure line to call the Moretti family's Consigliere, keeper of its oldest laws. “I am invoking the Severance Pact.” The old man took a long moment to answer. “Elena, you understand the terms. The thirty-day trial. The forfeiture of all claims if you complete it.” “I understand. He has thirty days to put our son first. Once. If he does, the pact is void and everything is returned to him.” The Consigliere asked, “Are you certain?” I looked at the wooden whistle beside the phone. “Begin the trial.”