Chapter 457: You Have Made An Enemy Of Your Father

He had been at dinner. He had sat at his own table, in his own house, with a glass of wine at his elbow, and he had listened to his younger son tell a story about a day at the port. He had thought it a sentimental gesture. He had thought, for one brief and idiotic moment, that perhaps Enzo had missed him.

The dog was asleep.

The aide’s message had arrived at a quarter to midnight. He had stood to take the call. And Enzo had risen to his feet, and raised his glass, and given a speech he had never given in his life.

Antonio’s hand closed slowly on the edge of the table.

Five minutes. That was what he had given him. He had sat down, and looked at his phone, and said a false alarm.

And all the while, across the table, his elder son had drunk his water and spoken of the weather.

He accepted too easily.

He had known. Some part of him had known at noon, standing at his desk with the pen in his fingers, watching Dimitri’s face. He had seen the stillness, the faint tightening at the jaw, and read it as defeat. He had read it as the cost of a hard thing, honestly paid.

It had been the face of a man lying.

It had been his face. It was the one he had taught him to wear.

He let go of the table.

The room hummed. A drop of liquid from the broken ampoule ran slowly down the side of the slide and pooled on the steel. It was clear and harmless and quite without value.

He had held this antidote for years. He had never intended to use it. But it had been his, in the way that a lock is the property of the man who holds the key. It had been the only thing in the world that could undo what he had done.

And his son had taken it.

Not for gain. Not for power. For a girl he had never wanted to marry. For a woman who was, by any measure that mattered, nothing to him.

It does not change what I need, he had told him. And Dimitri had said: I know.

He had meant something else.

Antonio drew a slow breath. He picked up the case, closed the lid, and carried it to the shelf beside the door. He set it down with great care, as though it were still precious. Then he turned off the light.

...

His aide found him in the corridor.

"Signore," he said. "Armani."

"Yes?"

"The men watching his building lost him at seven." The aide hesitated. "A car came for him. A tall man in a dark coat. They followed it to a parking garage with two exits. They watched both. He never came out."

"Never."

"We searched his apartment an hour ago. The bed was made. His coat and his passport were gone."

Antonio didn’t move.

"Seven," he said.

"Yes."

"The meeting was at noon."

"Yes, Signore."

Seven in the evening. Seven hours after Dimitri had stood in his study and said I accept. Seven hours in which Marco had gone to a frightened doctor and told him it was time.

His son had not simply lied to him. He had lied, and then, in the same hour, acted on the lie. He had known precisely what would happen when the case was opened. He had arranged for it.

"Where is Marco?" Antonio asked.

"We do not know."

"And my son?"

"The penthouse. Marco’s men are around the building." The aide’s voice was careful. "At least a dozen."

"A dozen."

"Yes."

Antonio nodded slowly. He walked to the end of the corridor and stood in front of the steel door, with his hand flat against the cold metal.

"Get me the telephone," he said.

...

It rang twice.

"Father," Dimitri said.

He sounded awake. Antonio had expected that. He had expected, too, the quiet in the background, the absence of a television or a voice. His son had been waiting.

"I opened the case," Antonio said.

"I thought you might."

"It was saline."

Silence. It lasted three seconds. It was not the silence of a man who had been caught. It was the silence of a man who had decided how he would answer.

"Yes," Dimitri said.

"You lied to me in my own study."

"Yes."

"You stood in front of my desk, and you told me you accepted."

"I did." His voice was level. "I needed the day."

"For what?"

"For her."

Antonio closed his eyes.

"She was treated tonight," Dimitri said. "The real case was already out of reach before I walked into your office. I didn’t need your price. I never intended to pay it."

"And Armani?"

"He’s alive. He’s somewhere you can’t find him. I kept my word to him, which is more than I can say for you."

"You have made an enemy of your father."

"I knew that three days ago."

"Then you knew what it would cost."

"I knew what it would cost her if I didn’t." Dimitri’s voice did not rise. "I made my choice. It was the easiest one I’ve made in years."

"There is no one left to protect you, Dimitri."

"I don’t need protection."

"You have a woman in Rome with a dozen men around her door." Antonio said it quietly, almost gently. "It is not much."

For a moment, the line was silent.

"If you touch her," Dimitri said, "I will burn everything you’ve built. The laboratory. The accounts. The name. And I’ll start with you."

"That is a very great deal of talk."

"It isn’t talk."

"No," Antonio said. "I don’t suppose it is."

He lowered the phone. The line was still open. He could hear his son breathing at the other end, slow and steady, a man holding very still.

Then he ended the call.

...

He made one more call before leaving the building.

Enzo answered on the fifth ring. His voice was thick, as if he had been sitting awake in the dark.

"Father."

"You gave a toast last night."

A pause. "Yes."

"At a quarter to midnight. When my phone rang."

"Yes."

"Did you know what was happening?"