His lip curls, and I know I’m right. He knows she loved this song. Maybe they danced to it together before they had me, back when Dad was still the dancing type.
“I want to sing to my baby. It might be the last chance I get.” I hum a few more bars under my breath. “She would have been so happy to know I was having a baby. Did you ever notice the way her eyes would light up whenever she saw a stroller? Mom loved babies.”
“She behaved like a good politician’s wife should, that’s all.”
“Don’t be so cynical. You know that’s not true.” Sure, it was good publicity, the mayoress fawning over the babies of Coldlake, but Mom really did cherish every single child she came across. Mom will never get to hold my baby. Smile at my baby. Teach me how to bathe them and rock them to sleep or tell me all the little stories about the ways she raised me. I blink hard as tears crowd my eyes.
“I have to do this without her because of you,” I say, my voice husky with emotion. “If I make it out of here alive. I don’t know the first thing about babies. Sure, I’ll learn. I’ll get by. But it won’t be the same as having my mother with me.”
Crushing silence from Dad.
“What saddens me most is that she died for nothing because we thwarted all your plans. And you’re supposed to be the clever one, Dad.”
Dad’s jaw flexes like he’s grinding his teeth.
“The syndicate and I are against you, and you’re not going to win the next election.”
Dad gives a mirthless laugh. “When my opponent is Christian ‘corpse-fucker’ Galloway? I’ll be just fine.”
We’ll see about that. There are plenty of ways Dad could lose the mayorship. I swear that if by some miracle I get out of here alive, I’ll make sure everyone knows the truth about him.
“How did it feel, killing my mother?”
Stony silence.
“At first, I thought Lorenzo killed Mom. It was his knife in your hand. I never expected to look up into the murderer’s face and see my own father.”
I may as well be talking to a brick wall, but he’s got no choice but to listen to me.
“Do you want to know what happened to that knife? While we were desperately trying to find Nicole—great plan pretending she was dead, by the way—Lorenzo threw it away. He understood how much it hurt me to see it in his hand.”
“What a prince,” Dad mutters.
“Compared to you, he’s a king.”
“I’m glad you’re happy together, you and your pack of mangy wolves.”
“I am happy. I think I deserve some happiness after what you did.”
Dad turns to look at me finally, hatred suffusing his face. I’m happy. I’ve dared to be happy while defying him. “That woman was a liability. Little did I know her daughter was a liability, too. I’m disgusted with you, Chiara. I never raised you to be such a slut.”
“You didn’t raise me. She did.”
“That explains a lot,” he says and turns away.
Asshole.
“You’re not going to feel anything as he kills me, are you? If you’re not going to try and save me, at least think of my unborn child. I’m carrying your grandson or your granddaughter. They’ll have your blood. They’re your legacy.”
“A bastard brat of the Coldlake Syndicate? That’s not my legacy. It’s better that they die today with their whore of a mother.”
I close my eyes and turn my face away. “You’re going to die speaking such ugly words, and you’re going straight to hell.”
“He’s not going to kill me, you stupid girl,” Dad sneers. “He thinks he’s going to punish me by murdering you, but he’s doing me a favor.”
“Who?”
But Dad stares straight ahead, his expression filled with disgust.
“If you get out of this alive and I don’t, I’m going to haunt your nightmares,” I seethe. “Me, and this baby. I know Mom already haunts you. She’s in every room of that house. I can’t wait to help her make your life a misery.”
“I sleep just fine, thank you.”
I don’t believe that for a second. “The police had evidence about the Black Orchid Killer but you had it moved. Why did you do that? I know it was you.”
“You have been a busy little bee,” he mutters, his voice dripping with sarcasm.
“I’m better at scheming than you are. I suppose you thought you’d impress the Coldlake Syndicate when you killed Mom. You should have realized that murdering a woman you’re supposed to protect is the last thing that would endear you to them, but it backfired.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“Why not?”
Dad turns to look at me, his eyes as cold as the day I tried to shoot him by the swimming pool. “Because slitting that woman’s throat is the best thing I ever did.”
I shake my head, tears filling my eyes. “But on my seventeenth birthday.”
“Your mother was getting in the way. I told her my marriage plans for you and she became totally unreasonable. Screaming. Crying. If she were here now, tied to that chair, she’d be in full-blown hysterics.” He glances over me with grudging admiration. “You seem to take after me at least a little.”
I take a shaky breath. “Full-blown hysterics is tempting, considering where we are. Is this the killer’s basement? The Black Orchid Killer?”
Dad turns away again. I can make him talk about Mom, but I can’t make him talk about the killer.
“If the two of you were friends, you’re not anymore. You used him to punish the syndicate, and you used him to try and set a trap. Has he grown tired of being used?”
Nothing.
I try again.
“You and Mr. De Luca impersonated the killer when you faked Nicole’s death. Did that make the killer angry? A man like him must be proud of his murders. His works of art. Has he killed Mr. De Luca? Is that why we can’t find him?”
I suppose Mr. De Luca had his throat slit and he’s buried in a shallow grave for daring to mimic the true killer. Dad doesn’t seem to possess even an ounce of regret over what’s happened to his friend.
“Is the killer someone you’ve known for a long time? Someone you went to university with? Maybe he’s another politician and you’ve got each other’s backs when it comes to covering up crimes. His murders. Your corruption. For a brief moment, I thought the killer was a couple of gangsters from the west of Coldlake. I’ve heard what gangs like to do to their victims. The women are horribly tortured before they’re killed, but it’s not art. It’s not like what your friend does, and besides, you’d never cover up for a street gangster. Not the high and mighty tough-on-crime Mayor of Coldlake.”
“Chiara, have you ever shut up in your entire life?” Dad growls through his teeth.
“I always used to shut up when I was around you. I don’t do that anymore. I never will again.”
I pull against the ropes binding my wrists, but they’re as tight as ever. What is going on? I’m not in a hurry to be killed but I’d at least like to know who’s keeping us in this basement.
I sit back with an angry cry, and despair sweeps over me. When I’m killed? When we’re killed. Me and the baby. “Maybe you can persuade him to let me go if you beg for the baby’s life.”
Dad gives a hollow laugh. “I suppose you don’t even know who the father is.”