Betrayal Read Online Free Page B

of you boys have a handkerchief?”
    “No. Here.” Rafe offered Nonna the hem of his T-shirt. “Olivia got tangled up with the wrong people, and she paid the price.”
    “Of her life!” Nonna’s eyes flashed, and she used the hem of her apron to wipe her cheeks.
    “A very wise woman once told me that life ain’t fair,” Eli said.
    “Once?” Rafe said.
    When they were growing up and they complained about getting picked last in baseball or a teacher who didn’t like them, “Life ain’t fair,” had been Nonna’s response.
    Noah had come to think that was the truest piece of wisdom she had taught them.
    From the open screen door, Bao Le spoke. “Olivia’s death is my fault.” Slowly she opened the door, and with the fluid ease of a martial artist, she moved out to join them. Petite and slender, the daughter of Vietnamese immigrants, she was one of Rafe’s most trusted employees.Although Noah would have said it wasn’t possible, with Olivia’s betrayal Bao’s protection of Nonna had escalated. Bao had always been intense; now her large brown eyes glowed with fervor. Three times a day and, as far as he knew, five times a night, she left the house and stalked the grounds, checking with the other guards, looking for any sign an intruder had crept through their net of security. “It’s my fault,” she repeated. “She had a clean background check, but I should have seen the truth.” She offered Nonna a box of tissues.
    “No, Bao.” Nonna broke away from her grandsons. She took a tissue and wiped her nose. “I should have questioned Olivia more. Instead, I thought I should respect her privacy. She never told me about herself.”
    The ultimate damnation. Nonna had a way of listening, as if she was really interested, and everyone talked to her. They confessed everything in their pasts, happiness or sorrow or guilt or self-satisfaction. Sooner or later, Nonna knew all of everyone’s hopes, ambitions… and sins.
    Nonna hugged Bao.
    Bao stood stiff and unresponsive. Finally she gave in, bowed her head, and put it on Nonna’s shoulder. For just a second. Then she sprang back to attention, as if afraid that even a moment’s daydreaming would once more result in disaster. “Someone offered her money,” Bao said, “either before she came to Bella Terra or after she came to work in your house, and she took the bribe. I don’t understand why you cry for her, Mrs. Di Luca. She was the worst kind of person, one who betrays all that is good and honorable in this world.”
    “You’re right, dear. And yet I cry.” Sarah smiled at Bao, but that smile wavered.
    Bao scowled. “I will check your casserole.” She went in and slammed the door behind her.
    “She’s angry that she failed you,” Rafe said.
    “I know. Yet I failed, too. I should have seen that Olivia could betray us.” Nonna dabbed at her red nose.
    As much as it pained Noah to see his grandmother cry, he felt an even deeper sorrow. Sooner or later, she would know Noah’s secrets and sins, and when she did, she would ache for him as she ached for Olivia.
    For like Olivia, he would be dead.

Chapter 4
    “W e were all fools.” Eli collapsed back into the porch swing. With his good hand, he lifted his broken foot onto the seat and grimaced as if it ached from the heat and the work. “How could we not have investigated why someone so desperately wanted that bottle of wine?”
    So true. They had simply assumed someone—Joseph Bianchin, a longtime enemy of the Di Lucas—had wanted the bottle for the prestige of owning the last bottle created by famed winemaker Massimo Bruno.
    Rafe leaned against the porch railing and in a pontifical, mocking tone, he said, “I have a brother… who’s an authority on wine… and he told me that any bottle of wine made by Massimo Bruno during Prohibition had the potential to be worth many thousands of dollars.”
    Eli, the aforementioned brother, turned sideways, rested his casted arm on the back of the swing, and