ログインIMOGEN'S POVI was curled against Silas on the couch with my legs tucked underneath me and a glass of red wine in my hand. His arm was loose around my shoulders and he had a stack of documents beside him that he had been working through all evening, making notes in the margins, reaching past me occasionally for his own drink without breaking his reading.The television was on low in the background. Some Italian news programme I had stopped paying attention to an hour ago.It felt good and that was the strange thing. In the middle of everything that was happening, all the chaos and the moving pieces and the war still playing out around Perry and the company and everything else, there were moments like this one that felt almost ordinary. Warm and still and easy in a way I had stopped trusting myself to hold onto too tightly.I took a sip of wine and looked at the city through the windows when the news ticker changed.BREAKING NEWS. Red letters scrolling across the bottom of the screen
SILAS'S POVPete had the address by the following morning.A serviced apartment in Prati, third floor, corner unit. She had been renting it for five days under her own name which told me either she was not afraid or she had decided that being afraid was no longer a useful way to spend her energy.Pete had stood in the front of the car with his arms folded and his jaw set and given me the look he gave me when he disagreed with a decision but had already calculated that arguing about it was not going to change anything."I will be outside the door," he argued."You will be in the car," I replied.He had not responded to that but he had moved, which was the same thing.I took the stairs when I got to the building. Not because I was trying to be quiet, I just preferred stairs. They gave you a few extra seconds and a few extra seconds were always useful before a conversation you had not had in four years.I knocked on the door of the corner unit.There was a pause. Long enough that I knew
SILAS'S POVI was in the middle of reviewing contracts when Pete came in.He did not knock. He never knocked, we had an understanding about that, if Pete was coming through a door without being called it meant something needed my attention and the polite thing to do was get to it quickly. I had trained him that way years ago and he had never once abused it.I did not look up from the papers immediately. I finished the paragraph I was reading, noted the clause I wanted amended in the margin, and then set the pen down and looked at him.He was standing just inside the doorway with his hands in front of him and his face doing the careful neutral thing it did when he had information he was not entirely sure how I was going to receive.I had seen that face many times over the years."Talk," I commanded.Pete stepped further into the room. "Perry made a move today.""What kind of move."He paused for just a fraction of a second. Long enough for me to notice it."He met with someone," Pete
PERRY'S POVThe private room she had in mind was upstairs in a wine bar three streets over. Dark walls and low lighting and a door that closed properly and a bottle of something red that arrived without being ordered because apparently she was known here.She poured two glasses and handed one to me and sat on the arm of one of the low chairs rather than in it, her long legs crossed at the ankle, watching me over the rim of her glass.She took a slow sip of wine. "Do you love her?""She is my wife," I retorted."That is not what I asked," she said.I looked at her across the low light of the room. "No," I said. "I do not think I do. Not anymore."Something in her expression settled.She set her glass down and stood up from the arm of the chair and crossed the room toward me slowly, the way she did everything, it was like the pace was entirely hers to set.She stopped close enough that I could smell her perfume, something dark and clean, and looked up at me with those pale eyes."Good
PERRY'S POVThe address Dante sent me was a small restaurant in a quiet part of Rome, the kind of place that had no sign outside and no presence online and existed entirely on the basis of people who already knew it was there telling other people who needed to know.I arrived first.The hostess led me to a private room at the back, separate from the main dining area, with a single table and two chairs and a window that looked out onto a narrow courtyard where nothing was happening. I sat down and ordered water and waited.She walked in seven minutes later.Ulla Adel was not what I had been expecting.I did not know exactly what I had been expecting. I had been picturing someone who looked the part, someone visibly worn down, someone whose damage showed on the surface the way damage sometimes did on people who had been through something they could not fully recover from.But she walked into that private room like a woman who had made a very deliberate decision about what she was going
IMOGEN'S POVI could hear Silas from the bedroom, his voice moving between English and Italian the way he did when the conversation was serious and he did not want anyone nearby to follow it completely. I lay still for a moment and listened to the rhythm of it without trying to catch the words.Then I got up quietly, washed my face, pulled on jeans and a loose shirt, picked up my bag and my keys from the side table and slipped out of the penthouse without making a sound.The villa was twenty minutes away.I took a cab and sat in the back with my bag on my lap and watched Rome move past the windows. I had not been back to the villa since the night I left.The cab pulled up outside and I paid the driver and stood on the pavement for a moment looking at the building. It looked the same as it always had. I went in.I unlocked the suite and pushed the door open and stood in the doorway for a second before I went inside.Perry was not there.I did not know whether that was his choice or
Imogen’s povI stood outside the police station beside my car as I waited for my husband to come out.The scorching sun was way too harsh but that didn’t deter me from anything I had in mind. No matter what was going to happen— I was ready to go ahead with my plan.The buzzing of the gates snapped
Imogen’s POVThe first thing I felt was warmth.Not the fever heat that had burned through my body before, but something steadier. A weight, that felt gentle, grounding and wrapped around my hand.Slowly, I tried to open my really heavy eyes.Light shone through the curtains, soft and muted. My ch
Silas’s PovI was pacing when Pete came in with yet another mysterious woman— I had no idea who this was but she was dressed in a maid clothing.This wasn’t what I asked for.This wasn’t what I wanted.But Pete knew better than to test my patience. If he dared bring someone into my space without re
Imogen’s povMy phone’s screen glowed brightly in my face as the message shone bright, but the words all appeared blurry.It was an amber alert.I guess my secret was out.I took a deep breath as I opened the message then a wave of relief had washed over me as the amber message was about a missing







