“I’m sorry Roman,” she whispered.
He gave her an absent, yet sweet forehead kiss and then went to settle hard to one of the lobby sofas. Imani joined him.
“They don’t think it was an accident.” Roman shared.
“Even though they’re calling it one, you mean?”
“Right,” he rested his elbows to his knees and studied one hand as it moved across the fist he’d drawn with the other. “It’ll be official after the investigation, but for now they’re saying a gas leak contributed to the explosion aboard the ship, resulting in the deaths of over half the crew. Including the man I placed on board.”
And cousin to one of his oldest friends, Imani silently acknowledge.
“I should’ve said no when Gav asked me to put Craig on that boat.”
“You said it was best that you sent someone who couldn’t be recognized.”
“Yeah...looks like that wasn’t the best plan, afterall.”
Imani didn’t care for the distant look in his eyes and planted herself on his lap. She squeezed his chin and smiled when he looked up at her.
“This isn’t your fault and there is nothing you can do to fix whatever went wrong if you’re too busy pitying yourself.”
Roman rested back on the comfortable worn leather, and kept Imani’s hand close to his face. “Serenita,” he said and kissed her knuckles.
“What does that mean?” she asked.
“Serenity,” he told her.
Imani looked pleased. “Does that mean you agree with me?”
He linked his fingers with hers. “It means I don’t mind letting my brothers figure out this mess. I got better things to do and better places to do them. Our honeymoon’s not even half over.”
Surprise had Imani’s eyes narrowing. “You mean you still want to go to Italy?”
Roman shrugged. “Dad’ll be pretty pissed if we don’t make use of his gift to us.”
Imani fidgeted with the hem of his denim shirt. “That’s a long time to be away.”
“You think so?” Again, Roman shrugged. “Right now, I don’t think it’s long enough.”
~26~
Six Weeks Later...
Humphrey’s steps slowed when he walked into his office that morning and found Stone waiting there and seated on the corner of his desk.
“I could’ve hung around the house a little longer if I knew you needed to talk to me,” he pushed the office door closed. “Would’ve saved you the trouble of coming here,” he finished.
“No problem. Pop didn’t need to hear this. Not yet, anyway.”
Humphrey seemed intrigued until he read the cover of the bound document Stone offered. “Tesano IX Incident Report”, it said.
Stone tossed the document to the desk when Humphrey bypassed it. “I know your reading list is pretty full, so I’ll summarize. The investigation into the explosion on the Tesano Nine ship is done.”
“And you couldn’t tell me at home, because?”
“I didn’t think Pop needed to hear about the explosive device they found in the boiler room. Officially, it’ll read as a gas explosion.”
“And I needed to hear about it, because?”
“You’re the top guy in charge. My guess is you want to keep being that.”
“Accusing me of something, Stow?”
Stone folded his arms over his chest. “I don’t think I need to do that, do I?”
“You tell me.”
“No Hump. No...I think I’ll tell you what Xavier Auten told us during his report.”
Humphrey rolled his eyes and grinned frigidly. “Auten. Is he still working for us? I guessed his unwanted attention to the opposite sex would’ve gotten him fired or killed by now.”
“Interesting outlook,” Stone mused, observing his brother expectantly. “He next on your list?”
Humphrey braced. “You’re starting to offend me brother.”
“Sorry about that,” Stone left the desk. “I’ll make the rest quick. Xav’s discovered the ship’s captains got memos instructing them to allow certain inspectors on board. The captains nor their crews would question the presence of these inspectors because they were believed to be part of my inventory crew. Xav doesn’t have these memos, only references to them in the Captain’s logs and vague recollections by a handful of the captains. They were entrusted to destroy the memos after reading- security purposes. No one would ask questions since the directive would come from my office-my stamp’s on the memo. After what happened on T-Nine, just getting that bit of info was like pulling teeth.”
“Well I guess congrats are in order little brother. Must’ve been hard finding a bunch of captains to tell you what you wanted to hear.”
