Aldo Rossi arrived alone, late in the afternoon, carrying a bouquet of white lilies that Elena accepted with a smile she didn't fully feel, the flowers' scent immediately dragging her back to a funeral she hadn't thought about all day.
"I wanted to see for myself that you were all right," Aldo said, settling into the chair Sofia had vacated an hour earlier, his voice warm in the particular practiced way of a man who'd spent decades learning exactly how much warmth a room required of him. "Terrible thing. Terrible. Damian's told the family very little, only that you were run off the road."
"That's most of what I know too."
"No leads yet? No idea who might have done this?" His concern seemed genuine enough on the surface, and Elena reminded herself, even as some old instinct began quietly
