Blue Smoke by Nora Roberts Read Free Book Online

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    When Poppi told Reena she was to come into the dining room with the adults, butterflies batted wings in her belly.
    All the leaves had been put in the table and still it wasn’t big enough for everyone. Most of the children were outside using the folding table or blankets, while some of the women ran herd. But Reena was in the dining room with all the men, her mother and Aunt Mag, who was a lawyer and very smart.
    Poppi scooped pasta out of one of the big bowls and put it on Reena’s plate himself. “So this boy, this Joey Pastorelli, he hit you.”
    “He hit me in the stomach and he knocked me down and hit me again.”
    Poppi breathed through his nose—and he had a big one, so the sound reminded her of the one a bull makes before it charges. “We live in an age when men and women are meant to be equal, but it’s never right for a man to hit a woman, for a boy to hit a girl. But . . . did you do something, say something, to this boy so he thought he had to hit you?”
    “I stay away from him because he starts fights in school and in the neighborhood. Once he took out his pocketknife and said he was going to stab Johnnie O’Hara with it because he was a stupid mick, and Sister took it away from him and sent him to Mother Superior. He . . . he looks at me sometimes and it makes my stomach hurt.”
    “The day he hit you, what were you doing?”
    “I was playing with Gina, at the school playground. We were playing kickball, but it was so hot. We wanted ice cream so she ran home to see if her mother would give her some money for it. I had eighty-eight cents, but that’s not enough for two. And he came up and said I should come with him, that he had something to show me. But I didn’t want to and I said no, that I was waiting for Gina. His face was all red, like he’d been running, and he got mad and grabbed my arm and was pulling me.So I pulled away and said I wasn’t going with him. And he hit me in the stomach. He called me a name that means . . .”
    She broke off, looked toward her parents sheepishly. “I looked it up in the dictionary.”
    “Of course you did,” Bianca murmured, then she waved a hand in the air. “He called her a little cunt. It’s an ugly word, Catarina. We won’t speak it again in this house.”
    “No, ma’am.”
    “Your brother came to help you,” Poppi continued. “Because he’s your brother and because it’s right to help someone in trouble. Then your father did what was right, and went to speak to this boy’s father. But the man was not a man, he didn’t stand up and do what was right. He struck out to hurt your father in a cowardly way, to hurt all of us. Was this your fault?”
    “No, Poppi. But it was my fault I was too scared to fight back. I won’t be next time.”
    He gave a half laugh. “Learn to run,” he said. “And if you can’t run, then you fight. Now.” He sat back, picked up his fork. “Here’s my advice. Salvatore your brother-in-law has a construction business. When we know what’s needed, you can get this for us, at a discount. Gio, your wife’s cousin is a plumber, yes?”
    “I’ve already talked to him. Whatever you need, Bianca, Gib.”
    “Mag, will you talk to the insurance company, see what hoops we can avoid jumping through to get this check?”
    “More than happy to. I’d like to look at the policy, see if there might be anything we’d want to change or adjust for the future. Then there’s the matter of the criminal action against this . . .” She lifted her eyebrows at Reena. “This person. If it goes to trial, Reena will most likely be required to testify. I don’t think it will,” she continued. “I’ve put out some feelers. Typically arson cases are very difficult to prove, but they appear to have this one locked.”
    She wound pasta around her fork as she spoke, ate economically. “Your investigators were very thorough, and the fire-starter very stupid. Theprosecutor feels he’s going to take the plea