Chapter 7 - The Journey North
The Mercedes ate up the mountain road like a predatory cat, its tires hissing against the damp asphalt as we climbed away from the lake and toward the jagged peaks of the Swiss border.
Noah fell asleep again within twenty minutes, his head pillowed against my thigh, his small fingers still curled tightly around the heavy iron key Dante had given him.
I sat in the back seat, staring out the window as the grand villas of Bellagio gave way to rugged pine forests, gray stone tunnels, and rushing glacial streams. My hands were still shaking slightly from the zip-ties, but the manila folder inside my sweater felt warm against my chest—a solid, unyielding weight that no manager in a tailored suit could ever take away from me again.
"You okay back there, signorina?" the driver, Marco, asked through the rearview mirror. His eyes were kind, framed by deep wrinkles from decades of watching the mountain road.
"I'm fine, Marco," I said, leaning my head back against the leather headrest. "Just... checking the calculations."
By noon, we crossed the border at Chiasso. The Swiss customs officer barely glanced at our passports before waving the Mercedes through with a polite nod.
We caught the 1:15 express train to Bern.
The train was quiet, clean, and smelled of polished wood and strong coffee. I sat by the window, watching the green hills of Switzerland roll past like pages in an old book. Noah slept with his head in my lap, breathing softly, his face relaxed and peaceful for the first time since we left Chicago.
I pulled my father’s notebook out of the folder and turned to the very last page—the one I hadn't looked at yet.
In the bottom corner, written in that same immaculate, precise drafting hand, was a single sentence:
May you like
The foundation is only as strong as the person willing to stand on it.
I closed the book, slipped it back into the folder, and looked out at the mountains rising up to meet the gray autumn sky.
