“Oh, God, what’s happened now?  What’s wrong?  Is it the house, is it the kids?”

He turned her to face him.  “Shhh.  Take a breath.  It’s not bad news. It might even be considered good news.  It seems that Paul Gardner’s father put 1.5 million dollars in trust for you after the accident.”  Not sure how the news might affect her, he tightened his grip around her waist.

She squinted up at him. She studied him before laughing.  “That’s a really good one Ben.  You had me going there for a minute.”

“It’s no joke, Red.   Your aunt refused to take the money at the time, but it’s still in trust for you.  Uncle Vinnie’s been administering it and it’s grown to over 10 million dollars.”

She turned her head to look at the Misters Luciano standing 50 feet away.  The two older men looked innocent enough in their three-thousand dollar Italian suits.  She was sure they were wearing Brioni; it was a label that Ben favored.  It was deceiving.  All afternoon they’d known this and hadn’t said a word to her even as Uncle Vinnie was steering her toward a car she was sure was totally out of her price range.  She opened her mouth and closed it.  Opened it and closed it again.  She shook her head.

“I need to give this some thought.  I’d like to go home now.   Give my keys to those devious old men over there and just take me home.”

Ben took the keys from her hand and approached his uncles.  “Can I trust you two to get her car to my house?”  They looked at him as if to say “what did we do?” but they agreed to drive Lane’s Escalade to Ben’s house.

He turned and walked back to Lane.  He took her hand and they walked to his car.  He could almost hear the wheels turning as he opened the passenger door for her. He bent and kissed her.  He walked around and opened his door.  “I can hear you thinking.”

“I’m shocked.  I’m flabbergasted.  I’m curious.  I’m angry.”  She took a breath.  “And apparently, I’m a millionaire?  What the hell, Bellini,” she said quietly.

Even if she hadn’t told him, he knew she was angry. Lane very rarely cursed and he couldn’t remember her ever referring to him by only his last name.

She turned to face him.  “How the hell long have you known this? What impact does it have on the case?  God, do I owe a fortune in back taxes?  What the hell, Bellini?”

Bellini twice in 60 seconds, this wasn’t good.  He was about to tell her to calm down, but he knew that telling her to calm down at this point might be like signing his own death warrant.  Telling her to breathe should be all right because she’d often said that when she was upset sometimes it was as if she forgot to breathe.

They’d never had a fight.  Not during the three years they’d been friends, and not during the eight weeks they’d been a couple.  They were less than 15 minutes from his house; if there was going to be yelling, he’d like to be safely off the streets, but he wasn’t sure he could stall for 15 minutes without responding to her questions.

He took a deep breath and exhaled. “It was what uncle Vinnie told me before I left Papa’s.  I called Tanner from the parking lot and he’s been checking into it.”  He paused, “Some people might be happy to find out they had 10 million dollars.”  He had said it lightly, but as soon as the words were out of his mouth, even before he saw the look on her face and long before she turned away from him to look out the window, he knew saying it was a mistake.

He always held her hand when they were in the car.  She hadn’t pulled her hand away.  Surely, that was a good sign.

Lane wasn’t the type to give anyone the silent treatment, but she needed a minute to collect her thoughts.  This wasn’t Ben’s fault.  He hadn’t exactly kept anything from her.  He’d told her as soon as he could, and she understood that he wanted to talk about it in private.  Still his sweet uncles were devious, conniving, deceitful old men.  They could have told her. She smiled and shook her head slightly.  Oh, of course, Italian macho crap.  They told the man.  It was his job to tell the little woman. Little woman like hell. She’d show them little woman.  She took a breath and exhaled. Then took another, counted to ten and exhaled. It isn’t Ben’s fault, she reminded herself.

They were stopped at a red light.  She turned toward him and removed her hand from his grasp.  Uh-oh, he was in for it.  Home was just a few blocks away now.  He didn’t want to have a screaming match in the car.  It crossed his mind that she might be going to get out of the car.  Instead, to his utter amazement, she reached over, took his face in her hands, leaned over, and kissed him.

Kissing was good.  He wasn’t sure how she’d gone from “What the hell, Bellini” to kissing him, but then again he wasn’t going to ask.  He’d pulled into his driveway.  As a lawyer, he’d learned that sometimes it’s better to remain silent.  He wasn’t going to say anything until they got inside.

He turned off the ignition, got out, and walked around the car to open her door. She got out, grabbed him, and kissed him again.  He was really confused.  Minutes ago, he was sure she was about to hand him his head.  It felt like they were making up before they’d even had a fight.  I could live with this he thought and then he wondered if he should be waiting for the other shoe to drop.  She took his hand and led him to the sofa in the great room.  She gave his chest a little push so that he sat down and then she sat straddling him.

“I was mad.” She leaned in and kissed him moaning as their tongues danced.

“It wasn’t your fault.  You didn’t do anything.  I’m not mad at you.”  She kissed him again.

“I just needed to remind myself.  Now, I’m calm.” She loosened his tie and unbuttoned his collar before kissing him again.

Yeah, she was calm but he was confused.  The doorbell rang.  She kissed him again and shifted so he could stand.  He tried to adjust the erection that had literally popped up in the last couple of minutes.  As she followed him, toward the door, she whispered “But I may kill your uncles.”

He opened the door to see his uncles.  Sal held the keys toward Lane.

“May we come in?” Sal asked as he stepped into the foyer.

“I suspect the lady may have some questions for us.”  Vinnie said as he followed his brother.

God he didn’t want any bloodshed.

“È arrabbiata,” Ben warned.

Lane smiled and gestured toward the great room.   “The first rule, gentlemen, is English shall be spoken in my presence.” They followed her to the great room and waited for her to sit.

“Uncle Sal, we’ve met before?  When I was four?  Perhaps in the hospital while I waited for the authorities to find my Aunt and for her to come to Kansas City?”

Salvatore Luciano smiled, but it was his brother, Vinnie who spoke.  “No, my dear that was me.  My brother was at the jail with young Gardner.  I was at the hospital with Mr. Gardino.  That is young Gardner’s father.  I had spoken to the doctors and knew that the prognosis for your father was less than favorable.  That was when Mr. Gardino instructed me to set up the trust.”

Sal continued where Vinnie had left off.  “I stayed with young Gardner through the arraignment, got him released on bail, and met my brother at the hospital.  You were so young, so small, and so alone.  Vinnie had convinced the doctor and the police that since your Aunt would arrive soon there was no need to involve children’s services.  We would take care of you, watch over you, and keep you safe until your Aunt could come get you.  We didn’t take you from the hospital.  We took turns staying with you through the night until your Aunt came.”

Vinnie picked up the story.  “I spoke with her to tell her about the trust that Mr. Gardino had asked me to establish.  She refused it.  Called it a bribe and said she didn’t want his blood money.  She took you from the hospital and went back to Iowa.  Mr. Gardino still insisted that I set up the trust.  He said the decision should be yours when you were old enough to decide.  When you were 21, I tried to find you, but your mother had died and your Aunt had married years before and she had moved.  We didn’t know where you were.  You didn’t have a social security number when you were four.  It’s not like today when parents get social security numbers for babies as soon as they’re born. I searched for Angelique Valle everywhere.”