The correction stops his prepared speech cold. Romano blinks rapidly, processing the implication. If not a personal appearance, then what? The question hangs between us, unasked but unmistakable.
"I want five minutes of her time. Backstage. Tonight."
"Signore, I must protest?—"
"Must you?"
The words carry enough menace to make him sink back into his chair. Behind me, Bruno shifts his position slightly, the leather of his holster creaking softly. The sound is barely audible, but in the office's silence it carries the force of a thunderclap.
Romano's gaze flickers to Bruno, then to Tano, before returning to my face. He is calculating odds, weighing the consequences of compliance against the price of refusal. The mathematics are simple. Emilio Costa's protection offers future security, but my presence represents immediate danger.
"Five minutes," he whispers.
"In her dressing room."
"That's... that's highly irregular. Miss Costa values her privacy?—"
"Five minutes, Romano. In her dressing room. Alone."
Each word falls with the precision of a nail being driven into wood. Romano's resistance crumbles completely, his shoulders sagging as he accepts the inevitable.
"I will... make the arrangements."
"Now."
He reaches for the telephone on his desk, his fingers dialing with the mechanical precision of a man performing actions under duress. The conversation that follows is brief and one-sided—Romano speaking in clipped sentences while listening to responses I cannot hear. When he hangs up, his face has acquired the pallor of old parchment.
"Miss Costa will see you in fifteen minutes. Dressing Room 3, ground level. Her dresser will escort you."
"Alone, Romano."
"Yes, of course. Alone."
I stand, the movement sudden enough to make him flinch. "Excellent cooperation. Your theater has a bright future under such flexible leadership."
The praise carries an undercurrent of threat that makes his hands tremble against the desktop. I turn toward the door, Bruno and Tano falling into formation behind me.
"Signore." Romano's voice stops me at the threshold. "Miss Costa... she is under the protection of very powerful people."
I turn to face him, allowing a smile to play across my lips. The expression carries no warmth, only the cold satisfaction of a predator cornering its prey.
"So am I."
The corridor outside Romano's office leads toward the theater's backstage areas, where the magic of performance dissolves into the mundane reality of costume racks and makeup stations. The walls here are lined with photographs of past productions, their frames chronicling decades of artistic achievement. Rosaria's face appears with increasing frequency in recent images, her progression from chorus member to leading lady documented in careful detail.
Dressing Room 3 sits at the corridor's end, its door marked by a simple brass nameplate.
R. COSTA.
The simplicity is deceptive—this is the theater's premier dressing room, reserved for its most important performers. The space beyond that door represents the intersection of artistic achievement and criminal protection.
I check my watch. Twelve minutes have passed since Romano's phone call. Three minutes remain before my appointment with Rome's most untouchable woman.
2
ROSARIA
My hands shake as I remove the final bobby pin from my hair, letting the dark waves fall loose around my shoulders. The dressing room mirror reflects a face I barely recognize—makeup smeared at the corners, lipstick worn away by three hours of Puccini, exhaustion etched in the shadows beneath my eyes.
