He inhales, that perfect chest expanding a moment before he takes the cup and sets it on the counter. I grab another and set it down beside it, and he fills both with coffee. Part of me thinks that this domestic act should downplay my worries and calm my nerves. It doesn’t even come close, but I think it should, and I stick to this strategy. Try something normal. Do something normal.
Kayden sets the pot on the warmer while I tear open several packages of sweetener, my stupid hand trembling with the adrenaline I’m battling, and I drop one of the packages in the cup. Frustrated at my lack of control, I hold up my hands. “What are we doing? I don’t want coffee. You don’t want coffee. We’re just going through the motions.”
“Come on,” he says, lacing our fingers together in that intimate, familiar way and leading me to the table. Rather than putting it between us, he pulls two chairs out to face each other, each of us claiming one. “First,” he says, resting his hands on his knees. “I want you to know that I haven’t lied to you about anything. I didn’t know you until I found you in the alleyway. I don’t know who you are now. And I had no idea you were connected to the necklace until you remembered it.”
“So you were looking for the necklace before you found me,” I say, confirming what seems obvious.
“I was, but not for hire. This isn’t a treasure hunt, and it has nothing to do with money. At least not for me.”
“What does that mean?”
“That necklace is a century old, and property of the British government. It disappeared fifty years ago. It’s worth a large enough fortune to have the Italian and French mafia looking for it, and now, it appears, Raul and the cartel, as well. In any of their hands it’s dangerous, but considering Niccolo is twice as powerful as the others, in his it’s downright lethal.”
“And you’re trying to get to it first.”
“I’m going to get to it first and return it to the British government, where I know it won’t be used to profit Niccolo or anyone else.”
“Because it’s stolen?
“Because it represents the kind of power we can’t allow someone like Niccolo, or anyone in his class of pursuers, to have.”
“When you say fortune, how much money are we talking?”
“It’s valued at a hundred and fifty million euros, but there’s a private collector willing to pay double that.”
“Oh my God. I didn’t even know a necklace could be worth that much money.”
“There’s some history to this one, including the trail of ownership.”
“And it was stolen from the British government?”
“Fifty years ago. And when I say stolen, I mean, it vanished. There were occasional rumors of its reappearance, each time starting a frenzied search. Interestingly, considering your involvement, none of those rumors placed it in the United States.”
“But it must have been, if I was used to transport it to Europe.”
“Maybe,” he says. “But I’m not convinced you weren’t wearing a decoy, meant to draw attention away from the real necklace.”
“Why would you think it was a decoy, if I’ve obviously ended up on Niccolo’s radar?”
“Because from what I know of the original’s construction, there would be no place to slip a note inside. And you found one.”
“Could the note give the location of the real necklace?”
“More likely, it was about a payoff for transporting the decoy. But whoever’s behind that transaction knows where the real necklace is located.”
“In other words, I really need to remember where that necklace is.”
“Not necessarily,” he says. “If the necklace was a decoy, as I suspect, then the important piece of the puzzle is what was on that note.”
“Which wasn’t in English, so my memory won’t help us. I’d have to find it, and/or the decoy, to be of any help.” I tilt my head to study him. “So I’m the key to what you’re trying to achieve. Why didn’t you just tell me this, Kayden?”
He leans forward, his hands settling intimately just behind my knees. “I fully intended to tell you, but I wasn’t ready yet.”
“What exactly would have made you ready?”
“Some way to prove to you that I wasn’t using you to gain the necklace. I selfishly wasn’t ready for that divide. Which backfired, and delivered us to that shower, with a gun between us.”
“It could have been worse,” I say with a halfhearted laugh. “I could have shot you.”
“Your distrust is the only bullet I care about dodging right now.” He sits up again, his hands settling back on his knees. “And that’s exactly why I need you to think about that alleyway.”
“I have been. I don’t remember it.”
“I’m not talking about what happened once you were there. I’m talking about what brought us both to that place.”
“Oh,” I say flatly, hating where this is going. “The necklace.”
“Yes. The necklace and—”
“Niccolo,” I supply, his name ice and fire, and not in good ways. “I am so confused right now. If he’s the man from my flashbacks, I wanted him dead. The last thing I would do is meet him to hand him a necklace that makes him more powerful.”
“Unless you didn’t know it was him.”
“Or he’s not the man from my flashbacks at all, and I’m more deeply involved with Niccolo than I think.” I swallow hard and stand, putting the chair between us. “Is this the real reason you didn’t tell me about this?” I demand, my fingers closing around the wooden back. “Do you think I’m part of that man’s entourage? Were you trying to prove that before you revealed everything else?”
I blink, and he’s beside me. “Don’t create nightmares that don’t exist. You were running from Niccolo’s men when I found you.”
“I can think of no good reason why I was there to meet him, Kayden. Not one.”
“Then let me help you with three. Blackmail, survival, and revenge.”
“You think he was blackmailing me?”
“Blackmail is what he does. He threatens people, those they love, or the general public, to get what he wants. And if he doesn’t, he kills them.” His lips thin. “I’ve long believed that he killed Elizabeth and Kevin.”
“I thought you had no idea who killed them?”
“I have reason to believe Kevin had contact with Niccolo frequently, leading up to the murders. Does that mean he did it? No. Do I believe he did it? Yes. The point is, he will do whatever’s necessary to get what he wants.”
“And he wants the necklace.”
“Or you.” His fingers gently tangle in my hair, lifting my mouth to his. “And he can’t have you.” He lowers his mouth to kiss me, but I firmly press my hand on his chest.
“No. Stop. You can’t kiss me. We can’t do this.”
“Oh, I assure you we can,” he says, leaning in again.
“No. No, Kayden.” I push back and his hands catch my waist before I can escape. “Don’t you see?” I demand. “I am now irrefutably connected to the man who killed the people you loved most in this world. And we don’t know why. We don’t know my motivation, or his leverage over me. You don’t know and I’m in your bed and your home.”
“Our bed. Our home, now.”
“I want it to be, but we have to be realistic. We don’t know who I really am. We need to talk to Nathan. Could I wake up one day and be changed? A different person? I don’t think I can; I feel like this is me. I do. I feel like this is me.”
“Easy, sweetheart. I did talk to Nathan, long before I found out about your connection to the necklace.”
“And—”
“And it’s time to go to bed.” He scoops me up and starts walking.
“Damn it, Kayden, I want to talk about this!”
“I talk better naked, and so do you.”
“We don’t talk better naked.”
“We do a lot of things better naked.”
“I’m trying to protect you.”
“Protect me naked,?
?? he says.
“This isn’t funny,” I object.
“I don’t remember laughing.”
“We have to talk about this.”
“We will.” He enters the bedroom and kicks the door shut. “Eventually.”
I open my mouth to argue, but he sets me down beside the bed and starts undressing me. And I don’t know how I go from being desperate to talk this out, to being desperate to be naked with him, but it happens. Suddenly, I’m tugging on his clothes and he’s tugging on mine, and I end up on my back, his thick erection between my thighs, the delicious weight of him on top of me.
“What if we’re enemies?”
“If we’re enemies, sweetheart, you’re killing me softly, and I like it.”
“Kayden—”
“We choose what we are, Ella. We choose. No one else.” He reaches under me and cups my ass. “In the meantime, just in case we suddenly decide we hate each other, we should take precautions and use my no-fail strategy.”
I instantly know what he’s talking about. “Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.”
“Exactly,” he concurs. “That’s our plan. To stay close. Real damn close.” His cock is nuzzling my sex, and then pressing into me, stretching me, sinking to the deepest part of me, before he says, “How do you like my plan so far?” He doesn’t give me time to reply, kissing me with one deep, possessive stroke of his tongue, followed by another, and he doesn’t taste like a man with doubt. He doesn’t taste like a man who’s sleeping with his enemy. He tastes like a starving man who wants more of me, who takes more of me, and in a blink we’re in a frenzied rush of hot, possessive passion—touching each other, kissing each other, fucking each other every way we can, all of which comes with his silent promise that, right or wrong, he is nowhere near done with me, nor me with him.
But a long time later, I lie in bed with Kayden wrapped around me from behind, awake when he’s asleep. Staring at the glow of the fireplace with one thought. Kayden didn’t tell me what Nathan said about my amnesia—and nothing Kayden does is unintentional. That tells me I won’t like what Nathan said to him. It tells me we are far more fragile than the passion we share says we are.
As if on cue, Kayden pulls me a little closer, and I press into him, gripping his arm where it drapes my upper body, and once again, we are both holding each other a little too close and too hard, and to me that reason is clear. The secrets of that dark alleyway have been haunting us since the moment I opened my eyes and called him beautiful.
six
I don’t remember finally falling asleep, but I wake to the dim glow of sunshine from a nearby window, immediately aware that Kayden is no longer touching me. Rolling over I find him gone, but a piece of paper is lying on his pillow. Leaning up on my elbow, I yank the blanket up over my chilled, naked body and read the note:
Ella,
Wrapping up some loose ends from last night. I will be gone most of the day but I’ll call you when I can. Adriel is in the castle if you need him, and since you’re a feminist with a gun, I warned him to keep his distance.
Kayden
PS: Close is good.
I laugh at his joke, and yes, close is good, but my smile fades quickly with the reference to last night. And while I don’t feel like I could be any other me than the me I am now, I can’t seem to frame the person in my flashbacks who submitted to more than being tied to a bed and left for hours. He took me to a club and had me tied up and whipped, a thought that has me remembering a hard, spine-bending lash that jolts me to a sitting position, my breathing turning into panting.
The sound of my ringing phone makes me glance at the nightstand, and I find that not only has Kayden set my phone there and attached it to a charger but that my journal, gun, and purse are there as well. Needing to hear his voice, I scoot over, grab my cell, and lie back down to answer. “Hello,” I say, only to hear, “You’re late, Eleana.”
At the sound of Gallo’s voice, I momentarily twist back around to glance at the clock, noting the eight fifteen hour. “I didn’t agree to this meeting,” I say, flattening firmly on my pillow where I intend to stay.
“Obviously when I stated that my badge indicated that you would make this meeting, I wasn’t clear enough. Consider this your notice. This is official police business related to both your present and past activities, as well as Kayden’s, which is why he will not be joining us for coffee.”
I jolt upward, clutching the blanket to my chest. “Activities?” I say, telling myself this is a head game. He doesn’t know about Niccolo. He doesn’t know about the necklace. “I have no activities.”
“Furthermore,” he continues, as if I haven’t spoken, “it’s a courtesy that I’m giving you the opportunity to discuss said activities in an unofficial capacity, outside the castle, where the walls have ears. And I strongly believe you want this conversation kept confidential.”
“I have nothing to hide,” I say, managing to sound convincing when the idea that he knows something that puts me at odds with The Underground, or Kayden, terrifies me.
“Awfully certain for a woman recovering from amnesia.”
He’s hit a nerve that Kayden and I opened last night. “We’re talking now. Say what you need to say.”
“On an open line, which is unacceptable. You will come and meet me, and you will do so alone.”
“Detective Gallo—”
“If you’d prefer, I can send a car to pick you up and take you to the station.”
“Kayden works for your boss,” I remind him. “He’ll never let you take me, or Giada, to the station.”
“The quite disturbing text messages Giada sent me last night will ensure otherwise. How much damage do you think she can do to Kayden and his beloved Underground, by the time Kayden frees you both from the interrogation room? You will come and meet me. You will not call Kayden, who I know is not in the castle, nor will you involve Adriel, who I know is in the castle.”
“You do know that using Giada like this makes you a bastard, don’t you?” I demand, not sure if I’m more furious with him or her.
“So you’ve said, but that just tells me how brainwashed you are, and how important this meeting is. I’m waiting, Eleana.”
At this point, I just need to get off of this phone call and decide what to do next. “I haven’t even gotten in the shower,” I say. “I need forty-five minutes.”
“You have thirty. And in case you get the idea to call Kayden, I’m having a car pull to the front of the castle, ready to take you and Giada downtown.”
My jaw clenches. “I don’t remember where we’re supposed to meet.”
“I’ll text it to you,” he says. “And for the record, Giada didn’t tell me who was in the castle. I know things. And you need to know what I know.” He ends the call with that bombshell, which implies that someone close to Kayden is running their mouth.
I pull up Kayden’s number, but as I start to push the “call” button, I hesitate and grab the note he left. Wrapping up some loose ends from last night. And last night he was with a trigger-happy drug lord. Damn it. I’m not supposed to call unless it’s an emergency, and while Giada and me ending up at the police station would be that for sure, the best way to prevent that from happening is to face Gallo and have a proverbial stare-down. If I do it right, maybe he’ll back off and give Kayden some breathing room while I find out who, if anyone, is betraying Kayden. He protects me; it’s my turn to do the same for him.
Decision made, I throw aside the blankets, rush to the bathroom, and make a beeline for the shower. Turning on the water, I let it warm up, and I’ve just stepped under the spray and tilted my head back when there’s a flickering image of a man’s hand coming down on my arm, his pressed white shirt cuff riding up and uncovering a watch. My head lowers and I stare forward. Kayden’s watch.
What the heck did I just see? That wasn’t Kayden. It couldn’t be Kayden. It’s always felt familiar, but never, ever has it come to me in a flashback.
?
??It’s not Kayden,” I say firmly, reaching for the shampoo. “So who is it?” It’s a question I still haven’t answered when I step out of the shower and towel off, then quickly apply light makeup and dry my hair, which now shows signs of red roots. It’s a reminder that there is a small possibility that Gallo might really know something of my past. And that past might, in some way, make me the enemy of The Underground, as I feared last night. Kayden might handle that well enough, but I’m not so sure about his men, especially with me in The Hawk’s bed.
Suddenly eager to get to this meeting and just know what is before me, I quickly dress in dark jeans, a navy sweater, and black knee-high boots. Once I’m dressed, I grab my black Chanel trench coat and head back to the bedroom, where I toss it on the bed and slip on my cross-body purse before reaching for my gun. The minute I touch it, I flash back to standing in a firing range, firing a weapon with my father by my side. Charlie, I think. His name was Charlie, and my eyes lower with the wholeness of that memory. Bit by bit, my father is coming back to me.
I decide right then that my gun is now named “Charlie” and if anyone messes with me, they will know his wrath. Placing my newly named bodyguard in my purse, I’m about to zip it up when my gaze catches on my journal. Since my memories are active today, I grab it and settle it safely next to Charlie. Then I put on my coat, shove my phone in my pocket, and head for the hallway.
On my way downstairs I think about how carefully Kayden has guarded me, and I’m not sure I can leave without Adriel following. Not to mention the fact that the castle security system seems to send an alert to everyone’s phone. There has to be some way everyone leaves without driving the other residents crazy. Stopping at the bottom of the steps, I fish out my phone and dial Giada, hoping she’s gotten her phone back.
“Ella,” she answers. “Hi. I wanted to call you, but I just got my phone back, and you were angry and—”