The Good Daughter Read Online Free PDF

doorbell stopped her soft, mothering sounds. Sandro! was her first thought.
    Stupid. He wouldn’t ring the doorbell. But who would this early in the morning?
    She went down the stairs, carrying Daniele. At the bottom, she stopped before a mirror, briefly fingering her hair straight and wiping away the last traces of tears, though her eyes were still red. No help for it.
    A chilly blast of air hit her when she opened the door. A huge man in an expensive black suit stood on her porch.
    “ Buon giorno, signora. I am looking for Sandro.” He had a heavy accent, but he seemed pleasant enough in spite of his intimidating size.
    Still, he was a stranger. Her alert system kicked in. She hugged her son protectively against her chest. “He isn’t here.”
    “ He is not at the soccer field either.”
    “ Who are you?” Whoever he was, he knew where Sandro was supposed to be.
    “ I am only an old family friend.”
    She couldn’t miss the emphasis he placed on the word family, and for some reason her heart skipped a beat. Studying him, she decided he looked familiar. Perhaps she’d seen him at the restaurant? “You’ve come at a bad time. He’s gone.”
    “ When do you expect him?”
    At that moment her phone rang in the background. First the door, now the phone. She didn’t want to talk to anyone. She adjusted her son on her hip. “Never.”
    “ Scusi ?”
    She shook her head. Why had she said that to a complete stranger? Shock, possibly. “He’s gone,” she repeated, struggling to collect her thoughts, which were bouncing around more than a soccer ball in a group of five-year-olds.
    “ I don’t know when he’ll be back,” she corrected herself.
    “ This is most tragic,” he muttered, whispering Italian under his breath.
    Her interest sharpened. “Can I help you?”
    “ No, no, signora . It is a. . .private concern.”
    She wanted to question him more, but her instincts suggested it would be wiser if she didn’t. “I’m sorry I can’t help. It’s cold.” She nodded toward her son. “You’ll understand I don’t feel like chatting.” She closed the door and squeezed Daniele closer to her.
    Never still for long, Daniele squirmed to get out of her arms. Reluctantly, she kissed him and set him down. He moved toward the ruined picture on the floor. She had forgotten.
    “ It’s broken, Momma.” He bent down.
    She snatched him up before he clutched a shard of glass. “Yes, it’s broken, caro . Momma dropped it.” She pulled out a small box of toys and sat him down to play away from the broken picture. “Be good while I clean up the mess.”
    Mess, was right, she thought, sniffing, still fighting not to give in to a disastrous crying jag. Suddenly her life was one big mess.
    It hit her as she swept up the last of the glass. She had seen that man before at the restaurant. He was in the company of known crime boss, Carlo Peruzzo. It was a repugnant thing, the mob frequenting their family-owned restaurant, but what could they do? The restaurant was in Little Italy, and mob guys were known to be Italian. They paid for their food with money like--
    Wait! The woman with Sandro! Nia only saw her profile, but the woman did resemble Carlo’s daughter . . . Marisa, was her name.
    Was that why the big Italian came to her door? Because her husband was having an affair with Carlo’s daughter? Would Carlo be trying to hunt Sandro down over something like that? Or was she getting hysterical?
    Dumping the idea away the same as she dumped the broken glass in the garbage, Nia put the broom and dustpan back in the closet and sat down to play blocks with Daniele. She knew she should be making plans, perhaps call her mother and ask advice, but the thought of admitting to someone else what had happened made her nauseous.
    As much as Nia didn’t want to think about it, the images tangled in her brain, twisted her insides. The fairy tale marriage of the soccer princess and soccer prince…was over. There had never been a