Page 68 of The Beast Who Broke Me
My phone buzzes, and I’ve never been so grateful for a call in my life. It’s my real estate guy, who’s been dragging his feet on the Clemenza townhouse settlement, and normally I’d be pissed, but right now I’d take a call from the fucking IRS if it meant not answering the Clemenza’s question.
But the news is strange.
“Got a situation at your new property,” the guy says. “Looks like someone’s been in there. Front door was forced.”
I can’t imagine anyone who knows who previously owned that property, or who owns it now, would have the balls to break in. So that means whoever did it is probably unaware of the connections.
Still, it pisses me off. “You told me you had security on the place,” I snap.
“I said I’d get it set up after settlement. Settlement hasn’t passed yet, which means?—”
Nowhe’spissing me off. “Goddamn it, hire someone today. And in the meantime, I’ll go round and have a look myself.” I hang up on him before I start threatening him.
Caligula is staring straight ahead, expressionless.
“Someone broke into my new townhouse,” I tell him.
I wait. He knows which townhouse I’m talking about. The one on Park Avenue where he grew up, the one I bought for twenty million dollars while his mouth was on me. The one he was supposed to earn back.
The one that always raises his hackles when I call itmytownhouse.
He picks up the spoon again and stirs the stew.
Something crawls up the back of my neck. I don’t like it. “Get dressed,” I tell him. “You’re coming with me.”
He doesn’t argue. Doesn’t ask why. Just puts down the spoon and gets out of bed, reaches for his clothes.
He’s playing me. This whole broken-doll routine is a performance, the same way covering for me with Fontana was a performance. He’s resetting the board, making me feel like a monster so I’ll give him an inch, and then he’ll take the whole goddamn mile.
That’s what’s happening here.
“Move,” I say, when he’s dressed.
He moves.
The Clemenza townhouse sits on a stretch of Park Avenue where the real old money lives. It’s got a limestone facade, tall windows, black iron railings with that Art Deco scrollwork. Butthe front door has been splintered open. I push it wide with the flat of my hand, gun raised, and pull Caligula in with me. If someone’s watching the street, I don’t want him standing on the front step like a target.
The foyer is dark and big and empty. Marble floor, high ceiling, a staircase curving up on the right. There’s a large dark stain on the marble in the middle of the foyer near a large wooden display table.
“That where you found your cousin?” I ask him.
He looks at it. “Yes,” he says.
That’s all. Just “yes.” No color draining from his face, no sharp inhale, not even a flinch.
“Why don’t you show me around my new property?” I ask. “Since you know it so well.”
I want him to react. Want him to snap at me, tell me this ishishouse, tell me to go fuck myself for making him play tour guide in his dead grandfather’s home. I want the viper back so I can be angry at the right person, instead of this hollow thing wearing his face.
“The living area is through here,” he says, and walks ahead of me into the dark.
I grab him back and go first. He falls in behind me. This place is big, and set out weird. The magazine article I read about it said it was two townhouses renovated into one. That meant some occasional compromises about layout. But the Clemenza moves through doorways and around corners without hesitation, naming each room as we pass. “Dining room. Morning room.Library.” His voice is the same for each one. He could be reading a bus schedule.
It’s just empty room after empty room, and no signs of an intruder, which makes me even more wary.
“Upstairs,” I say, when we’ve come back around to the foyer. “Behindme,” I snap, when he takes the stairs without waiting.
Second floor. He leads me to a closed door at the front of the house. For the first time, he hesitates before naming it. Then: “My grandfather’s study.”
