“Why does he make Alessandro nervous?” I ask, surprised by this news.
“Carlo was his Adriel at one point,” Kayden explains. “They were as close as Adriel and I are, united in their rebellion against me, and Carlo got to know Alessandro’s intimate thoughts and weaknesses in ways no other person has. But as they say, there’s a fine line between hate and friendship, especially when a woman gets between them.” His phone buzzes and he fishes it out of his pocket, glancing at his text messages. “Well, this is unexpected,” he says, sticking it back in his pocket. “Marabella says that Giada wants to give me a gift of appreciation for all the time she’s lived here. And per Marabella, and this is a quote, ‘Come alone. She’s nervous enough as it is.’ ”
“Giada?” Adriel says. “As is in my sister?”
“The one and only,” Kayden says, glancing at me. “I’m beginning to think alien abduction stories are true, and she’s been returned to us a different person.”
“Not aliens,” Adriel says, his gaze landing on me. “This is all you, Ella. You woke her up, and I appreciate that.”
“Let’s hope it sticks,” I say, thinking of those missing pages of the journal, praying it wasn’t her, despite really not knowing how she could have gotten it. “And for all we know, she’s going to attack Kayden. He’ll throttle her, and all will be normal in our world.”
“I’ll head on down,” Kayden says, his gaze meeting mine, and the subject of Giada seems to already be set aside. “I want you in this meeting. It’s in our War Room, but I’ll meet you in the store when I finish with Giada and we’ll go together.”
Together. That word works for me, and when I look at him, I feel a punch in my chest with the connection. I sense that he feels it too, though he doesn’t show it, but I’m not sure what that means to him at this point. “Okay. So I should go down there in about half an hour?”
“That works.” He nods, giving Adriel a quick look. “Get me Sasha.”
“I’ll call her before I head downstairs,” Adriel confirms.
Kayden nods and heads toward the living room, and already Adriel is dialing. I stand my ground, waiting for him to finish, making it clear I want to talk to him. His caller, Sasha I assume, answers quickly, and the conversation is over just as fast before he returns his cell to his pocket.
“Sasha’s on her way,” he says. “And clearly you have something else to say, so say it.”
His directness doesn’t surprise me. Adriel isn’t exactly what one would call a warm and inviting personality. “I’ve been keeping a journal.”
“I assumed as much, when I handed you a book labeled ‘journal’ in the store the other day.”
“Right. I forgot that. Anyway. It’s supposed to help me retrieve my memories,” I say, “and it’s helped. That’s how I remembered the necklace. I started drawing it.”
“Where are you going with this, Ella?”
“Two pages were torn out, and one of them was a drawing of the necklace.”
Understanding registers in his eternally hard green eyes. “I didn’t take it, if that’s what you think. If I wanted to document something, I’d—”
“Take a photo,” I say. “I know. I thought it was Giada, but I checked the security feed. No one touched my journal that day.”
“So it was another day and place.”
“I’ve only taken it out of this tower once—that day,” I say. “And the only people who can get in this tower are me, Kayden, and Marabella.”
“It’s not Marabella,” he says. “There’s another explanation.”
“That’s what Kayden said. He thinks I removed it during a flashback.”
“If you space out like you did today in the car, I can see that.”
“Yes, but if it’s Marabella—”
“It’s not Marabella.”
“It would destroy Kayden if she betrayed him.”
“You’re right, but this is one time that I can say I have zero, and I mean zero, doubt in someone.”
“Those we trust—”
“Come up with another theory.”
“Someone hacked our security system.”
“Matteo has about four levels of hack notifications set up,” he says. “He’s truly one of the best in the world.”
“One of the best means there could be another who’s better.”
“You’re reaching, Ella. Someone is always here. If you’re not in the tower, Marabella uses that time to clean and cook for you. And I’m usually in the store, as is Giada.”
“You’re right. Maybe I’m obsessing over the wrong thing.”
“Caution is good. We’ll stay vigilant and we’ll talk to Matteo.”
“That sounds good,” I say.
“I’m going to head downstairs.”
I nod, and he gives me another steady look. “You’re safe here. Not that I think you’re cowering in a corner, because that’s not who you are, but you’re safe. He can’t get to you here.”
“I’m not worried about me,” I say. “I’m worried about what I bring to all of you.”
“If they come for you we’ll be waiting, and we’ll enjoy every moment, because there are lines we can’t cross otherwise. Okay?”
“Yes.”
He studies me another beat and then rounds the island to leave. I stand there a moment that turns into ten before I whirl around and follow, heading through the living room on a path to the bedroom. Once there, I round the bed and walk to my nightstand, opening up the journal to start flipping through it, looking for any other missing pages, but there are only the two. I stare down at one of them that is, and will myself to remember ripping them out, but I don’t. And right now, my memory is at 70 percent, the dark spots all seeming to revolve around the most traumatic events. I didn’t tear this page out. I believe that, so if it wasn’t me, where is it?
seven
Anxious to hear Matteo tell me there is no possible way we’ve been hacked, and to ensure the people surrounding Sara are good people, I hurry downstairs to our tower exit. The door lifts and as has become a habit I duck under it and find Adriel entering from the front door, a grim set to his jaw, the sound of a furious rain pounding outside. He motions to the porch, silently telling me Kayden is there. And though I have no explanation, I get the impression he thinks my joining Kayden is well timed. A knot of concern forms in my belly that something extending beyond Giada’s frequent antics has gone wrong. Before I can ask for details, Adriel is across the foyer and headed toward the Center Tower’s steps.
Steeling myself for whatever has happened, I walk to the door and open it, finding Kayden leaning on one of the two heavy pillars framing the porch. The chill of the rainy night air mixed with the rain is nothing compared to the palpable edginess of his mood. His shoulder holster is back in place now, holding one firearm and not the two Adriel is wearing, but even now, with his back to me, there is an air of danger and power about Kayden that makes him lethal beyond any weapons or his willingness to use them.
I don’t announce myself and he doesn’t turn, though I have no doubt he’s aware that I’m here. We feel each other that way. It’s indescribable and special, the kind of feeling that makes you want to marry a man. I pull the door shut and walk to the opposite pillar, watching the ridiculously large droplets pound onto the driveway and the broad expanse of the gated yard. For several minutes, we just stand there, and it is not the unspoken words between us zigging and zagging but something else bothering Kayden, something I wait for him to share, and hope that he will.
“Rain,” he says softly, “like tears, washes away the blood, but never the death.”
I press my back to the pillar, and for just a few moments he remains in profile, tall and larger than life it seems at times, most assuredly now. It’s the effortless power he radiates, I think, the calmness he projects, which still manages to be confidence
and control. Things often mixed with just a hint of haunted torment, driven by tragedy that few see or choose to see, but I know it well. I see it in his eyes, taste it in his kisses. I hunger to ease the way it cuts him to his soul over and over and over again.
“Kayden, I—”
“Don’t,” he says, turning to face me. “Whatever you’re going to say, don’t say it. Not yet. Not now.”
“Why not? Did something happen?”
“Because when we walk into this meeting, I’m The Hawk. I make decisions that are cold, hard, and often brutal. I won’t change that because you’re present. But those things might change what you’re about to say.”
“They won’t change anything.” I don’t offer him the reasons he doesn’t want to hear right now. “What’s happened?” I repeat.
He moves toward me, and by the time I straighten, he is standing toe-to-toe with me, close enough for me to smell that special blend of spice and masculinity that is the man I love. Close enough for me to feel the welcome warmth of his body without him touching me. “Giada gave me something of her father’s,” he surprises me by saying. “He was a good man, lost too soon, like others I’ve known, and will know in the future.”
His comment about the rain makes sense now. Giada inadvertently stirred the demon named “death” to life, and with it, a reminder to Kayden that he’s human, and so is everyone who counts on him, me included. And I won’t give it legs or life by speaking its name. “What did Giada give you?”
He takes my hand and presses something small and round into my palm. “His lucky coin,” he says, closing my fingers around it and his around mine, the warmth of his touch doing nothing to destroy the chill in the air and around him. “She thought he’d want me to have it, to protect me. Because her father admired me and felt I was making Europe a more stable region.”
He is, but I don’t say that either, not now, when I am certain it’s not what he wants to hear, nor will it mean anything to him in this moment.
“But you see,” he continues, “I don’t believe in luck. It’s dangerous. It’s the devil in disguise that tears down your guard and gets you killed.”
“But you took the coin.”
“That’s why I took her coin.”
Understanding hits me. “So she no longer thinks luck is on her side.”
“That’s right, and I told her that. I told her to believe in herself, and think for herself.” He tightens his grip on my hand. “There is no such thing as luck, Ella,” he repeats.
“I know that, Kayden. My father made sure I know that.”
“There will be more blood and tears. There will be more death. I can’t tell you there won’t be.”
“But there will be less because of you. Not just in Europe; Evil Eye established boundaries where there were none.”
“And I convinced myself that by evoking Evil Eye I could protect you so I could really, truly make you mine. I’m not downplaying your abilities, which are many, but you need my protection in this world, and you seem to respect and understand how to navigate that and stay yourself. And I will protect you. The Underground will protect you—from physical harm. But the life I lead cuts deep beneath the surface.”
My gut is twisted into all kinds of knots. “What are you saying, Kayden?”
“That I want to take you upstairs, strip you naked, and do everything in my power to convince you that I can heal every one of those cuts.”
“You have, and you are, healing wounds. I would never survive without you.”
“Only to create more.” He releases my hand and steps back, putting space I don’t want between us. “And that would make me the same selfish bastard who proposed to you today.”
“You are the least selfish person I’ve ever met, including my mother, who’d have baked cookies for a complete stranger.”
“And yet I tried to make things simple, where they are complicated.”
“But you like complicated. You just said that, and I like it, too.”
“Do you?”
“Your kind of complicated.” I hesitate only a moment. “Kayden, earlier, when you asked me to marry you—”
“After the meeting.”
“The meeting will change nothing.”
The door opens and I want to scream at the timing, but neither of us looks toward our visitor, who turns out to be Adriel. “Carlo is here,” he announces. “And he’s in a mood you might want to address before the meeting. Or, an option I’ll throw on the table: as your newly reinstated second-in-command, I can knock the shit out of him and be done with it.”
Kayden inhales and lets the breath out. “I need to make sure he sees the big picture, not just revenge against Alessandro.”
The buzzer on the security panel goes off. “Nathan,” Adriel says, holding up the security feed on his phone. “And Matteo is behind him.” He’s barely spoken the words when the wind gusts, splattering droplets of cold water all over us. Adriel curses, nearly in the line of fire even half inside the castle, while I yelp with shock, only to have Kayden reach out, shackle my arm, and pull me farther onto the porch, his touch fire and ice. I hate that combination. Just as I hate the wall I feel between us, holding us back, dividing us.
“I’m going to meet Nathan and Matteo,” Adriel growls, disappearing into the castle without shutting the door.
“Let’s go inside,” Kayden says.
“Go ahead,” I say. “I think I’m going to need a minute.”
“I need to deal with Carlo.”
“I’ll be right in.”
He looks like he wants to insist, but his grip on my arm slowly eases, his hand falling away, and I decide the warmth of his touch did do much to wipe away the cold, because now I am even colder. And then he is gone, walking inside the castle, the door shutting behind him. And I’m alone, hugging myself against the rain and storm that now suffocates me, wishing I could just grab him, kiss him, and explain my fears. But he’s right. It’s not that simple, no matter how much we both want it to be.
I turn and face the front lawn again, staring into the downpour he’d claimed washes away the blood. But in its depths I see my father’s death, and I’m certain that my continual return to that image is my mind warning me. The past is connected to the present, but how? Perhaps it’s not a direct link. Perhaps the connection is my mind reminding me of the choices my father made that I should not imitate.
The reality is that had my mother and I not hidden in the closet the day he was murdered, we might well be dead, too. Another reality is that my father trained me for a reason, not as a hobby. He knew that the day when he died could come. He knew his life connecting to ours came with risks for us, not just him.
It’s time to face what I’ve been suppressing—and while my mind resists, there is one part I can accept, if not embrace. If I’m to be honest with myself, no matter what happens with the necklace, and in spite of Kayden’s confidence in Evil Eye, I know in my heart that Garner Neuville will come for me, like my father knew someone would come for him. And it will be the kind of mess you can’t clean up. I can’t let that happen.
But in the midst of that rain, I see something else. I see myself doing calisthenics in another downpour, my father yelling at me to keep going, to never give up. If I run from Neuville, if I hide, who am I kidding? If he knows that I’m with Kayden—and he will, if he doesn’t already—he will use him and everyone around him to draw me out. I can’t hide. That’s where my instinct to go to Paris came from. I can’t hide, so I have to be the aggressor. We have to be the aggressors and end this. And that starts with making sure Kayden understands that Evil Eye won’t stop the insanity of Garner Neuville when he feels personally wounded. There are three ways I think he might approach this, all of which Kayden needs to hear before that meeting.
I open the door and step inside, shutting out the cold rain, but this part of the castle is
always chilly—perhaps because this is where Enzo died. I shiver with that thought, crossing the foyer and starting the long climb to the Center Tower, my destination the dungeon-style arched wooden doorway directly in front of me and the entrance to the store where I’m to meet Kayden. Each of my steps is driven by my need to find him, tear down the walls between us, and make sure he knows the war he wants to prevent is already here.
I’m a dozen steps from my destination when the heavy door begins to lift, and I’m jumpier than I thought, because I reach for the weapon inside the purse that I don’t have with me. Irritated that I haven’t opted for a bra or ankle strap, I vow to remedy that right as Marabella appears at the top of the landing, her graying dark hair pinned at the nape, her robust figure highlighted by a dress with big red roses on it.
She grins at the sight of me, her cheeks even fuller with that smile, then covers her mouth as if she knows she shouldn’t be happy in the midst of the Underground events obviously going on. Without shutting the door behind her, she rushes toward me, meeting me three steps from the top. “I know there is serious business happening now,” she says the instant we’ve stopped in front of each other, “but did you hear about Giada?”
“I did,” I say, and her joy is as palpable as was Kayden’s dark mood, right along with her love for what has become her little family after losing her husband so many years ago. “I was very proud of her.”
“So much pride,” she beams, then echoes Adriel’s claim. “You did this. We are lucky to have you here.”
My heart squeezes with those words that pull me farther into this life, this family, which I want to be mine. Which I want to protect.
“Oh, and Adriel ordered her furniture for her new apartment,” Marabella continues. “She’s very excited about it.” She sobers, lowering her voice. “I am glad she’s out of the middle of the Underground business. It was never good for her, and the truth is, you either have to be in this or out of it.”
“And you, Marabella?” I ask. “Are you in or out?”