Chapter 9 - The Terrace on the Sound
Three months later.
The early autumn sun rose over the rocky promontory of Sands Point, Long Island, in a breathtaking, cinematic explosion of burning violet, deep copper, and brilliant, honey-colored gold that turned the waters of Long Island Sound into fields of liquid fire.
The air on the high stone terrace of the Moretti ancestral estate was crisp, vast, and smelling of sweet cedar woodsmoke, clean ocean salt, and the rich, invigorating chill of the approaching winter.
The historic granite manor had undergone a total, magnificent resurrection.
The high wrought-iron security gates had been removed, replaced by low fieldstone walls and open fields of wild sweet clover; the sixty-foot halls were filled with natural morning light, classical photography displays, and the crackle of dry birch logs in four massive limestone fireplaces; and down on the deep-water pier below the bluffs sat the Thomas C.—an eighty-foot wooden schooner that Franco had commissioned from the historic shipyards of Maine.
Sitting on a wide teak bench on the terrace, reading the morning edition of the New York Times, was Gianni.
He wore an unbuttoned wool chore coat over an open-collared flannel shirt, his posture completely relaxed, his face transformed by a deep, untouchable serenity that had never existed during his fifteen years as an armed enforcer.
"The European container consortium signed the thirty-year terminal lease extensions twenty minutes ago, Boss," Gianni said, looking up from his paper with a proud, brilliant smile. "Our zero-emission port model has officially been certified by the United Nations Maritime Organization. We cleared fifty million dollars in net operating revenue for the third quarter."
Megan stood at the granite balustrade of the terrace, holding a steaming ceramic mug of dark roast coffee with both hands, leaning her elbows against the warm stone.
She wore an oversized cream cable-knit fisherman’s sweater over dark denim trousers, her dark hair falling softly around her shoulders, her twenty-eight-year-old frame feeling lighter, stronger, and more whole than it had in her entire life.
Beside her boots, resting his massive golden head against her knee, was Sunny.
The retriever was full-grown now, weighing seventy-five pounds of solid, glossy muscle and devotion, his tail thumping a steady, rhythmic cadence against the flagstones as he watched the gulls soaring above the cliffs.
"And the photography academy, Gianni?" Megan asked, turning her head to look down at him.
"The academy broke ground on the Brooklyn campus yesterday afternoon, Megan," Gianni smiled, folding his newspaper. "Two hundred high school students from Red Hook and Sunset Park are already enrolled in the autumn semester. Full scholarships. Your father’s foundation funded the entire darkroom wing."
A soft, clean tear broke over Megan’s lower lash, hot and bright, tracing down her cheek into the morning wind.
Her father had spent thirty years turning wrenches in the dark, believing that his voice would never reach past the edge of the pier.
Now, his name was carved into five hundred feet of reinforced maritime granite, where two thousand free men and women owned the ground beneath their boots.
A soft, familiar step sounded on the flagstones behind her.
Franco walked up the terrace steps, wearing an unbuttoned black wool coat over a gray cashmere sweater, carrying two fresh-baked blueberry scones on a silver plate that Mrs. Higgins had prepared on the woodstove.
He set the plate on the stone table, walked over to the balustrade, and wrapped his broad arms around Megan’s waist from behind, resting his chin comfortably on her shoulder, pulling her back against his chest.
"Morning, Mrs. Moretti," Franco murmured, his deep baritone carrying over the sound of the ocean swells.
Megan smiled—a wide, unreserved, magnificent expression that illuminated her entire face—and reached up, her warm fingers sliding over his wrists, feeling the familiar, powerful thrum of his heartbeat beneath the heavy wool.
"Morning, Franco," she whispered softly against his jawline.
They stood together in silence for a long moment, watching the white sails of a pilot boat cut across the outer whitecaps, the crisp salt wind carrying the clean scent of the open sea.
The rain on East 60th Street was a distant, dead memory.
The broken window was gone.
The wolves who had tried to steal her father's name were rotting in the dark cages they had forged with their own greed.
And as the bells of the distant coastal lighthouse chimed their nine-o'clock chorus across the bay, Megan Collins took a deep, uninhibited breath of the cold Atlantic air and smiled.
She was not a girl running through an alley looking for her dog.
She was the master of her own life, the owner of her own mind, and the sovereign lady of an unbroken empire that belonged, wholly and forever, to the light.
Franco leaned down, pressing his lips against her temple, his arms tightening around her waist with gentle, unyielding permanence.
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"Look at that harbor, Megan," he whispered into the sweet autumn wind, pointing toward the vast, sparkling blue water stretching toward Europe under an unclouded American sky.
"That's our water. And it runs clean forever."
