Chapter 2 - Theo Kept Choosing the Wrong Road
Luciano took Theo out of the showroom before doing anything else.
They went to the small library across the hall, where Luciano sat beside him on the sofa and placed the red toy car carefully into his hands.
Theo immediately curled his fingers around it.
“You’re not in trouble,” Luciano said.
Theo stared at the car.
“I know.”
The answer came too quickly.
Luciano waited.
Eventually Theo whispered, “Bernadette says I mess up the track.”
“What track?”
“The big one.”
The diorama.
Luciano kept his voice neutral.
“How do you mess it up?”
Theo pointed toward the showroom wall.
“I put the car where Uncle Adrian showed me.”
Luciano went still.
Adrian had been Bernadette’s husband and Elliot’s father.
He had also been Luciano’s younger brother.
Two years earlier, Adrian died when his red sports coupe left the estate’s private racetrack during an evening test drive and struck a stone retaining wall.
The death had been ruled accidental.
Excessive speed.
Loss of control.
A grieving family had accepted the answer because the alternative seemed to be endless questions with no promise of relief.
Theo had been four.
Luciano never imagined he remembered anything useful about those days.
“What did Uncle Adrian show you?” Luciano asked.
Theo set the red car on the coffee table.
He pushed it forward slowly.
“He said this is the fast road.”
The car moved straight.
“Then this.”
Theo made it turn.
“Then the little gate.”
Luciano frowned.
“What little gate?”
Theo looked confused by the question.
“The white one.”
The miniature gate that had fallen from beneath the broken diorama.
Luciano leaned forward.
“Why did Adrian show you that?”
“He said cars don’t go through there when people race.”
That sounded right.
The service gate had once separated the maintenance lane from the live track.
It was designed for grounds vehicles and emergency crews.
During driving sessions, it stayed locked.
Theo moved the red car past an imaginary point on the table.
“Uncle Adrian said this stays shut.”
Then Theo’s expression changed.
“But Bernadette keeps saying it wasn’t there.”
Luciano felt a slow chill.
“What do you mean?”
“She moved it.”
“When?”
“Lots.”
Theo struggled to explain.
Whenever he played near the diorama, Theo would place the little white gate where Adrian once showed him.
Bernadette would remove it.
Sometimes Marcus moved an entire section of miniature road.
Once Bernadette told Theo:
“You’re remembering it wrong.”
Another time:
“The gate was never there.”
“And today?” Luciano asked.
Theo looked down.
“I put my red car next to it.”
That explained the sudden snatching.
“What happened?”
“I told Elliot Uncle Adrian’s car went this way.”
He pushed the toy forward again.
Then instead of following the racetrack curve, Theo moved it sharply toward the imaginary service lane.
Luciano’s heartbeat changed.
“Why did you put it there?”
“Because that’s where the lights came from.”
Luciano stopped breathing for half a second.
“What lights?”
Theo looked at him.
“The other car.”
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There had never been another car in the official account.
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