The Woman at the Docks (Grassi Framily)

"I wasn't exactly... showering," I reminded him, shaking my head at myself. It was easy, with a little distance from it, to cringe at how deep I had sunk so quickly.

"I wasn't judging you, Romy," he said, shaking his head. "I think any normal person would have been just as shocked and saddened as you were."

"Have there been any new developments?" I asked.

"We don't have to talk about that now."

"It's okay. I'm okay. I can handle it. I promise," I added when he looked dubious. "And I even give your permission to forcibly shower me if I am not okay and turn back into a bed troll again."

"Okay," he agreed, taking a deep breath. "Working with our new information," he started, meaning knowing that my sister was a big part of this trafficking scheme, "we have found some corroborating evidence. About Celenia being involved. About the people she has been known to hang around with in Venezuela. They've been general menaces to society in mostly small ways. But a few of them have a couple attempted rape and rape charges."

"No surprise there," I grumbled into my wine that suddenly didn't taste quite as delicious as it had a moment before.

"Has anyone seen her?"

"No. No one has seen any of these people since before the news stories broke about the containers."

"But you don't think they're gone."

'They're not gone," he insisted, shaking his head. "Sorry I'm not sugar-coating that, but I need you to know that this isn't the end. They didn't learn from their ways, find God, and repent for all the evil they've done. People who traffick other people don't go back to nine-to-fives."

"It's profitable," I figured.

"Depending on who is being sold and for what purpose, each individual can be sold from between five and forty grand."

"That is what a life, a soul is worth to my sister. Forty-thousand dollars. That's despicable," I concluded, finally tripping into the anger stage of grief.

"Maybe we shouldn't be doing this," he suggested, reaching across the table to place his hand over mine, making me realize I'd been bending my fork.

"I need to know, Luca," I told him. "I'm not a little kid. I can't be protected from the truth."

"Okay," he agreed, nodding. "But that is pretty much all we know right now. They're hiding out. But they won't be forever. I want you to be prepared for a day when they're not."

He wasn't saying the words, but he was still getting them across.

My sister and her counterparts had to pay for what they had done. And what they had done was make a fool of the mafia. And that could not stand.

The mafia didn't do slaps on the wrist. They didn't do stern talks. They didn't do second chances.

You screwed them over. Then you paid with your life.

"I don't know if I could stand knowing you were about to go and kill my sister," I admitted. "Even knowing what she turned into. All I would picture in my head would be her walking down the street in flannel mermaid pajamas while we fled from our abusive father."

"You are more comfortable not knowing anything from here on?"

"I think that might be best."

In general, I wasn't a head in the sand kind of person. I thought information was power. I thought it was foolish to avoid the truth when it was right there for you to grab hold of, take in.

But just this once?

"Just this once, I think I would rather imagine her finding God and repenting for her sins," I told him, even if that was naive, even if that made me weak.

"Okay," he agreed, nodding.

"Okay? Just like that?"

"Just like that," he told me. "Look, sweetheart, I think this is time for a two-birds, one-stone conversation."