Codes of Betrayal by Dorothy Uhnak Read Free Book Online Page A

where’s your father? I haven’t seen him since last Christmas.”
    Richie’s face changed. He looked sad. “My old man’s not so good, Nick. Ya know, the heart. He can’t travel from Arizona, too much hassle. He feels like shit he can’t be with Papa on this day.” Then, he brightened. “How’s it with you, Nick, the heart? You got any problems? We’re some family for that, huh?”
    The only thing that surprised Nick was that his cousin hadn’t pulled a face, shaken his head, and mentioned the fact that Nick’s mother had died of the “family problem.”
    “I’m fine. You haven’t got the problem either, Richie, right? Hard to have a heart condition with no heart.”
    Richie didn’t answer. He seemed not to have heard. Nick glanced over his shoulder to where Richie was staring, and together they watched as Laura Santalvo walked into the entrance hall and through the crowd toward Papa Ventura’s library.
    She stared straight ahead and moved as though she was the only person present. A silence fell around her, a pathway cleared for her automatically. Laura seemed completely unaware of the sensation she created. It wasn’t that she didn’t realize the reaction around her; it just didn’t matter to her. She headed toward her target without acknowledging anyone until she reached Tommy the Dog, who whisked before her into Papa’s domain to escort others clear of the inner sanctum. He beamed as Laura leaned toward him, brushed his cheek with a kiss, and disappeared into the room with Papa Ventura.

CHAPTER 5
    N ICHOLAS VENTURA AND LAURA embraced. She sat opposite him on the leather sofa, kicked off her shoes, and pulled her legs up under her. Laura Santalvo was family in every way but blood, and her presence seemed to lighten the very air around Nicholas whenever she was near him.
    As she sipped her wine, watched him closely, spoke about her travels, he remembered vividly the first time they had spoken seriously together. Laura was thirteen years old when her father, Salvatore, had worked for Papa Ventura as a collector. One day, making a collection visit, Sal had been stonewalled. Two young punks who didn’t understand the sacredness of the unwritten contract showed the older man the door. When he spoke reasonably to them, quietly, they broke both his knees with a baseball bat and then for good measure cracked his skull and dumped what they thought was his dead body in an empty lot. Where he was found by some neighborhood kids, only just breathing. The next day, the bullet-riddled bodies of the two punks were found in a parked car on a busy neighborhood street: message delivered and received by all who needed to learn from their mistakes.
    What was left of Laura’s father was a shell of a man, non-functioning, almost an infant. He needed constant care, and so his wife, who had three boys and a disobedient daughter to raise, sent Laura for a talk with Don Ventura. Who else could straighten out this girl?
    He remembered the angry though frightened girl, biting hard on her lip; not letting the tears flood from her eyes. Her mother wanted her to drop out of school—to devote herself to the nursing care of her father, so her mother could get a job in the garment industry. Did Laura expect her brothers to nurse their father? She was the girl; it was her duty. He asked her what she wanted to do, impressed by the strength of her voice, the straightness of her back.
    She wanted high school, and college or design school. She was smart, talented. She would not become an old woman caring and tending to a lost man’s fading body. She would not.
    Don Ventura listened closely; nodded; expressed some surprise at the girl’s ambition; wondered where it came from. He told both the girl and her mother a solution would be found.
    Someone’s distant cousin came from Salerno to take care of Laura’s father. Her mother was given a good paying union job. Her father was supplied with a small monthly “retirement” bonus. The