He obviously hurt her and I hate to push, but . . . “Who—”
She shakes her head at the entry to the bathroom. “Not a topic for a public place.”
Frustrated, I nod and we enter a huge bathroom with green marble floors and at least a dozen stalls. Sasha’s phone rings and she digs it from the silver evening purse hanging from her shoulder. As she sits down on a leather couch, I keep walking toward the row of stalls.
Stepbrothers. Mafia. Murdering your own parents. It’s all insanity, and I’m suddenly transported back to the kitchen of my family home, with my father lying in his own blood. I see the blood. I see the gun. I feel the trigger against my finger when I kill his attacker. Shaking myself, I blink, and I’m standing at a bathroom stall and don’t remember how I got here. The same way I blacked out right after Enzo’s death.
Concerned that Nathan shouldn’t have dismissed that incident as trauma, I enter the stall, then lean my head against the locked door. I know that my flashbacks are always trying to tell me something. My father was murdered, ripped from my life, while these mobsters, these monsters, chose to murder their parents for personal gain. But what does that mean to me? Is this about the men who killed my father? Or . . . maybe this isn’t about my father at all, but some lesson he gave me. I blink, and I’m transported back to the kitchen again, hiding in the pantry with my mother.
There are crashing sounds and muffled gunfire, like a silencer is being used, and my mother and I both jump. And then there is silence. Oh God, the silence is deafening, and I wait for my father to come to us, but he does not. I can’t take it anymore. I jerk away from my mother, every instinct telling me my father needs help.
I open the door and gasp at the sight of him lying in a puddle of blood. I dash forward and fall to my knees.
“Dad. Dad.”
My mother drops down beside me, bursting into tears as she starts begging him to stay alive. “Gun,” my father murmurs. “Ella . . . take . . . gun.”
I look down to find it at his fingers and I take it. “I have it.”
“Two . . . men.”
The kitchen door bursts open, a man in a mask and all black appearing, and my father hisses, “Shoot,” and instinct takes over. I raise the gun and fire at the man in black, and he tumbles forward.
My eyes pop open. Two men. That’s what comes to me. Two men. Is it the stepbrothers?
A knock sounds on the door and I jolt. “Open up,” Sasha says urgently and I immediately comply. She shoves her way into the stall and shuts the door behind her. “We have a problem,” she says very softly.
Alarm bells go off. Is she the problem? “What are you talking about?” I whisper back.
“Niccolo is here.”
thirteen
Sasha might as well have punched me in the chest. “Niccolo can’t be here.”
“And yet he is,” she whispers. “And don’t say his name.”
“You just did.”
“I didn’t have a choice; I needed you to know who exactly I was talking about.”
“Right,” I say, laughing without humor. “He who shall not be named. I thought that was his brother.”
“They’re named Bastard and Bitch,” she says, “and this isn’t Harry Potter. There is no magic wand to make the one that is here disappear.”
“And just so I don’t get confused. Is he the Bastard or the Bitch?”
“The Bastard.”
“Are we just going to hide in the stall while the Bastard is in the building?”
“We’re waiting for Kayden to call,” she says, and as if on cue, my phone rings.
I reach for my purse and my shaky fingers fumble on the zipper. “Stupid adrenaline,” I murmur, while Sasha reaches down and opens it, handing me my phone. “Thank you.” I slide my finger across the screen to answer, and will myself to be my father’s daughter and get a grip. “I just heard,” I say. “What’s the plan?”
“Are you okay?” Kayden asks.
“Peachy,” I say, repeating a word I somehow know was my mother’s.
Admiration fills Sasha’s eyes with my flippant remark, but Kayden isn’t as won over by my bravado. “Ella, sweetheart—”
“I’m fine. I promise. What happens now? Do I march out there and let him see me?”
“That is the last thing you will do,” he says, his voice a hard command.
“It gets it over with.”
“It puts you within his reach, before I can ensure that you won’t be in the future. Sasha is going to take you out a side door, where Adriel is waiting with a car.”
“Why not you?”
“If Niccolo sees me, and hears my woman is present, he’ll want to meet you. I need to stay out of sight.”
“Won’t it be weird that I just disappear, and you leave alone?”
“We’re going to make Niccolo think you’re leaving with me.”
“How is that possible?”
“Ella, I know you want to feel some sort of control right now, but I need you to find that in me. I had a plan for every possible problem that could be thrown our way when we came here tonight, including Niccolo.” He softens his voice. “I’ve got you, and this. I promise. Trust me.”
“I do. Completely.”
“Good. Then let’s go home and get naked.”
“Yes, please. How do we make that happen?”
“Sasha knows what to do. Follow her lead. She won’t fail you.”
“Got it.” I look at Sasha. “I’ll follow Sasha, and Annie and I will see you soon.”
“Nothing is going to happen to you,” he says, ending the call. “I’m ready,” I tell Sasha.
“I need to know who Annie is,” she says.
I reach in my purse and remove my gun. “My best friend.”
“Good friends, good times. But right now I think you should zip it into your purse, out of temptation’s reach.”
She’s right. I might shoot Niccolo, and while that would be enjoyable, it would probably mean I’d end up dead, too. And I don’t plan to go down with him. I zip Annie inside. “Now what?”
“We go.” Female voices sound outside the door and she grimaces, whispering, “Go along with my craziness. It’s actually kind of fun.” She releases me, and I nod.
She smiles, and then motions to let me know that we’re a go. A moment later she opens the door and exits into the outer room. “Thank you, Eleana,” she sobs. “Please don’t tell him I got this upset. It makes me look bad.”
I join her outside the stall to find her actually crying, while two thirty-something women stand a few feet away, gaping at her, and now us. “You don’t look bad,” I tell Sasha. “But you need to tell him what you told me.” I glance at our audience. “And let’s not do this now.”
“Sorry.” She swipes at her eyes, wiping tears that I’m actually not sure really exist. She’s just so darn good at screwing up her face that I thought she was really crying. “I did say I’d stop this.”
“We’d better go find Kayden,” I say. “He’ll be missing me.”
“Of course,” she says, and we head for the door, exiting into the blessedly empty hallway. “Nosy wenches,” she murmurs as we start walking. “I should sleep with their husbands.”
I gape. “Sasha. Please say you—”
“I’m kidding. Sort of.” Her cell phone buzzes in her hand and she looks down at the screen, and the slight furrow to her brow has me asking, “What is it?”
“Hold on,” she says, punching in a reply to the message, and then linking her arm with mine. “Niccolo is standing near the stairs we need to take.”
“Can’t we go another way?”
“Not if we’re going to make them think I’m you, when I leave through the front with Kayden.”
“We can’t just walk right by him.”
“Kayden’s going to create a distraction right when we get into Niccolo’s line of sight. So here’s the plan.” She locks our arms. “I’m going to hang on to you, and we’re going to keep our heads
low, like two new girlfriends chatting it up about pasta and coffee, and we’ll zip right past him.” We near the end of the hallway and she stops. “If you suddenly have a flashback that causes an urge to stop, shout, or shoot, just hold on to me and let me get you through it.”
Stunned that Kayden would tell her anything at all, I look over at her. “What do you know about me and Niccolo?”
“That you have amnesia, and think that he did something horrible to you or someone you love. And I get it. He did something horrible to someone I love.” Emotions knife through her eyes, and she cuts her gaze away. “Don’t ask for details.” She squeezes my arm. “Let’s get this over with.”
I nod, and as we reenter the party, I decide that death really is too good for Niccolo. Destruction. Disgrace. Jail. Those things sound good. “Head down,” Sasha warns as we pass the piano, then laughs as if I’ve said something funny. I laugh, too, and, needing a place to put my nerves, I say, “Pasta, pasta, coffee.”
She snickers and says, “Coffee, coffee, and pasta. We’re going up the center stairs and he’s to the left by the food displays.”
“Got it. How is he even here when he’s a criminal, and Donati is here?”
“We’re with politicians,” she says. “They’re all criminals.”
“Right,” I say, and we both fake laugh as some man stops in front of us, gazing down at her cleavage while she waves him off, and drags me around him. “Bastard,” she mutters. “Here we go. Niccolo on our left. Coffee. Coffee. Coffee. Assholes everywhere. Coffee. Your turn.”
“Pasta. Pasta. Pasta. Assholes everywhere and I swear my skin is tingling like he’s looking.”
“We’re gorgeous. Of course he’s looking. And one of us is Kayden’s woman. Someone will have told him, but there’s about to be a planned distraction. Don’t react.” We reach the steps and start our climb, and the sound of glasses crashing to the ground fills the air.
“That was a tray of champagne being dropped right next to Niccolo,” she tells me. “Kayden promised the waiter extra if Niccolo got wet.” The sound of an angry, familiar male voice rips through the air.
“And I’m betting the waiter is getting that tip,” Sasha quips.
Niccolo’s voice lifts in the air again, and his voice, his anger, is familiar, but not quite right for some reason. A niggling memory begins to come back to me. Images flicker and then take control. I am in “his” bedroom, and I’m holding the gun, pacing, certain of what I have to do. Decision made, I walk to the bathroom and grab my purse, then open a drawer and grab the cosmetic bag where I’ve stashed the cash I’ve been collecting for weeks. I head for the door and open it, exiting to the hallway, when I hear two male voices raised in anger, his and another coming from the office down the hall. The office door opens and I hurry back into the bedroom, peering through a crack as they approach and then stop on the stairs in front of me.
“Ella,” Sasha says, jolting me back to the present. “Are you okay?”
“Yes. Sorry. I’m fine.” I realize that I blacked out again, and we’re now at the top of the steps.
“This way,” she says, dragging me to the right, behind a wall, but I can still hear Niccolo’s voice, and I know—I just know—that if I see him, I’ll remember everything I have lost and need to find.
I jerk free of Sasha’s hold, turning back toward the party and stepping just to the edge of the wall, my gut clenching as I find Niccolo in profile. “Ella,” Sasha hisses, closing her hand down on my arm again.
“One minute,” I whisper, planting my feet and holding on to her. “Just one minute. I have to see his face.”
And in that moment, as if he senses my presence, he turns and looks toward us. Sasha and I both jolt backward and start moving down the hallway, but I saw his face. “You’re a crazy person,” Sasha chides. “Crazy, insane, and did I say crazy?”
“Amnesia sucks,” I say. “I had to try and jolt my memory.”
“Did it work?”
“No. It didn’t work.”
“Some things are easier forgotten anyway,” she declares, echoing Kayden’s sentiments and turning us around a corner into a narrow hallway. “Here,” she says, opening a door, and we step inside a dark room that I think is a library.
“What are we doing?” I ask as she locks us inside.
“Undress,” she orders, reaching for her zipper. “We’re switching clothes so the staff thinks you’re leaving with Kayden.”
I don’t argue, wasting no time complying, and in about sixty seconds, I’m stepping into her silver gown while she does the same with mine. “Gorgeous,” she says, running her hands over the velvet. “I might forget to return this.” She eyes my feet. “What size?”
“Seven.”
“Perfect,” she approves, and we quickly make the exchange, trading purses as we head to the door, where she pauses and grabs my arms. “Ella. I hate this, but I have to have that bracelet. People have noticed, and they’ll know it’s not you—”
“Right,” I say, feeling sick to the stomach. “Of course.” But I can’t seem to make myself reach for it, and I’m not sure why.
Understanding fills her face, and she takes my arm and turns my wrist over, unlatching it. “I promise you,” she says, as it slides off my arm, “I’ll get it right back to you, by way of your man.” She closes her hand around it. “The stairs are directly in front of this door. Go down them and exit the palace. Adriel will be waiting at the curb.”
“How are you going to get down the stairs without Niccolo seeing you?”
“Kayden has a plan, but timing is everything, which means I need to move, and move now.” She opens the door and we exit to the hallway, where she shocks me by giving me a quick hug. “We’ll make him pay,” she vows, releasing me. “Go now.”
I grab the doorknob and open the door, entering the stairwell, and by the time the door has closed, I’ve lifted the silver satin skirt of Sasha’s dress and started down the steps. Niccolo’s face, his voice, try to claim my thoughts, but I shove them aside. Right now, I want to be out of this palace, and to know that Kayden and Sasha are as well. Three flights of stairs, and a blister on my right toe later, I exit the palace and step onto a sidewalk, and into the chilly night without a coat, the cold quickening my already fast steps. But there is no Adriel. I’m about to call Kayden when a black Rolls-Royce pulls to the curb, but I don’t breathe easier until a man in all black steps out.
“Adriel,” I whisper, hurrying forward as he rounds the hood of the car and meets me at the passenger side.
“You okay?” he asks, opening the door.
“Great. Peachy.” I start to get in, but he grabs me.
“Sorry,” he says, “but Sasha and I are fuck buddies. We need to make this look good.” He molds me to him, pressing his forehead to mine, while I fight shock and the urge to shove him away. He notices, warning me, “Don’t react. And please keep all weapons away from Kayden when he sees this film.”
“Don’t even think about kissing me,” I warn, “or I will bite you.”
He laughs and lets go of me, turning me toward the car. I step toward its sanctuary, but he grabs me, holding a hand on my belly, his mouth by my ear. “Count to five and it’s over.”
“Four, five,” I say. “Enough.”
He releases me and I disappear inside the car, thankful when he shuts the door. Mechanically, I pull on a seat belt and sink into the seat, while Adriel joins me and puts us in drive. “I’m sorry, Ella. I had to do that.”
“It’s fine,” I say. “I just need to think.” I shut my eyes, and I’m back in my memory of minutes ago. I peek through the door and the two men, him and the other, stop on the stairs, and they are speaking in Italian, fighting. Niccolo’s voice echoes through the room, angry.
My eyes pop open and I know then that “him” is not Niccolo.
fourteen
I’ve barely come to the conclusion that he is not Niccolo when Adriel’s cell phone rings, and he surprises me by speaking in En
glish to his caller, “Yes. I have her here. She’s safe.” He listens a moment. “She wants you to call us once you’re out of the palace.” He listens again and then ends the call.
I turn to face him. “Thank you, Adriel. I know you could have spoken in Italian, but you knew.”
“That you need some kind of control,” he supplies. “Yes. From one control freak to another, I get it.”
He glances at me and then back at the road. “I watched you on film tonight. You handled yourself well in there. I was wrong about you. Kayden chose well.”
“How can you know if you’re right or wrong, when none of us know my past?”
“I thought you were starting to recover some of your memories.”
“Randomly, and too few and far between for any of you to know who you’re dealing with.”
He glances at me briefly once again. “Where is this coming from?”
“I don’t know how to answer that—because I don’t know what you know, or what Kayden wants you to know.”
“Caution, like you just showed, is exactly what would be expected of the woman Kayden would give that bracelet to,” he says, while I grab my wrist, which feels more naked by the moment. “I was with Kayden when we found you,” he continues. “I know there are no fingerprints on file for you, despite the fact that you would have been fingerprinted for your passport. I know that Matteo created a new identity for you. I know Niccolo is looking for you, and I know why we were in that alleyway. That leaves open a lot of possibilities that I’m smart enough to figure out.”
“You know almost as much as I do, which is kind of scary since this is my life.”
“Did something happen with Niccolo at the party that I missed on the film?”
“No. Yes. I don’t know. I saw him, and instead of confirming he was this other person I thought he was, I now know he’s not. I know he’s looking for me, but it’s not because he’s the person I thought he was. It’s because he either thinks I know something I shouldn’t, or I have something he wants.”
“Do you?”