“You’re not going to kill me?” he asked her retreating back, and he sounded genuinely shocked. No longer afraid. Only surprised.
“No.”
“But you can’t help yourself, Rosa. Don’t you feel that? Lamias are not merciful beings. Lamias never forgive. Costanza knew that.”
She went up the stairs, leaving him lying there helpless in the empty pool. “I will also make sure that di Santis doesn’t touch you. You’re not worth the trouble, avvocato.”
“Di Santis?” He laughed quietly. “She’s only a peon. Yours or mine, what does that matter? Listen to your nature, Rosa. It’s in your blood. Why resist it? You are what you are. And so you’ll sign my death sentence, if not now then later.”
She climbed up over the edge of the pool. “We’ll see about that.”
Trevini’s voice followed her, and now there was something in it that went beyond bitterness. “Your grandmother collected the skins of Arcadians. Your father—well, we’ve both seen what he’s capable of. And what does that say about you, Rosa? What does that make you?”
She closed the door behind her, but his words went on echoing in her mind. So she was glad when her cell phone rang once she was in the white-tiled corridor. With shaking fingers, she took it out. “Iole?”
“It’s me.”
“Alessandro! Thank God.”
“Where are you? I’ve tried calling a thousand times.” He sounded harassed. “Bad news. Michele isn’t in New York anymore. He flew to Italy yesterday.”
She stopped with the cell phone pressed to her ear.
“Michele is here, Rosa—in Sicily.”
A DEATHLY SILENCE
AN HOUR AND A half later, Rosa was racing through the twilight in the BMW. She was just turning off the expressway when the cell phone on the passenger seat rang.
“I’m at the driveway now,” said Alessandro. The sound of his engine died away in the background.
“Then wait for me there.”
“No sign of the guards at the gate.”
“Shit.”
“I’ll take a closer look.”
“No!” she said firmly. “Too dangerous.”
“What about Iole? She’s alone up there.”
“Your men are there. They’re—”
Alessandro interrupted her. “If Michele’s managed to eliminate the guards at the gate, he may well have dealt with Gianni and the other two in the palazzo as well.”
She turned up the heating in the car. “Do you think Michele’s on his own? Apart from Valerie.”
“She makes him much stronger than any bunch of trigger-happy killers. He has someone on the inside. The others in the palazzo weren’t expecting that. Nor was I.”
She could have kicked herself for failing to lock Valerie in. Suppose Val’s fear of dogs was only another ruse?
“I’m such an idiot,” she whispered, before she realized what he had just said. But before she could ask any more questions, he admitted, “There’s something else.”
“Damn it, Alessandro…”
“I was not lying to you when I said I had nothing to do with the murders of Mattia, Carmine, and the others. I swear that’s the truth.” He hesitated for a fraction of a second. “But the attempt on Michele’s life, the killer that Guerrini sent to New York—”
“So Trevini was right.”
“I meant it to fail. I intended for Michele to follow the trail back to me and face me in person, instead of hunting my girlfriend through Central Park. That was a cowardly thing to do.”
“You planned it all? For him to turn up here?”
“Not at the palazzo, but in Sicily, yes. That’s why I wanted Gianni and the others to be with you. I couldn’t know that Valerie was working with Michele. And would still be on his side, even after Mattia’s death…I should have factored that into the equation. What a mess I’ve made.”
She could have shaken him—but despite all reason she was moved. “You should have told me.”
“I didn’t want you to have any more to do with it. So that you could put the whole thing behind you. And I will kill Michele, one way or another. I’d have liked to do it on my own terms, that’s all. The bastard foiled me by planting Valerie on you.”
“He isn’t as clever as all that,” she objected. “I think she really did run away from him, or she wouldn’t have stolen his cell phone. But after she got away from Trevini’s men at the airport, I guess she didn’t know what to do next. She must have called Michele again. And of course he’d have known right away how he could use her.”
Alessandro sighed. “I’m sorry, Rosa.”
In spite of everything her longing for him, for his touch, was like a physical pain. “Val