five

Valentina

A light goes on in the cottage and I jump, remembering how he'd caught me watching them that first day when they all moved in. What he'd said to me, his cryptic message to a twelve-year-old girl:

Some things are better left unknown.

Thinking back on it now, it's like he was reading my future.

Someone moves around inside. I guess it's the new staff who live on site. Esmerelda Hendrick was staff, and often, Nicholas was treated as staff. I'm not sure how Mira could stand having them on their property, actually.

I turn to go, not wanting to be here any longer. It's all too much. I set the binoculars on top of one of the boxes, deciding I don't want them after all. I take the photo with me and walk out of my house and into my car. I put the things inside, grab my dress out from the back and walk across to the Ricci house.

There, I climb the stairs to the imposing front door. When I look at the sculpture beside it, I remember how Dad had lifted the heavy thing out of the arms of the women who were struggling with it when the Riccis were moving in.

I miss my dad. I miss the way we were. Now, I'm torn between the Riccis and my father because they are very firmly enemies, and I am stuck dead center.

Shaking my head to clear it, I unlock and open the door. They've long since told me to treat it like it's my home, and I am used to slipping in and out. I even have my own key and a room here, for when I stay over.

I walk inside. The house is silent. Mr. and Mrs. Ricci are already in town and will meet Cielo and I at the restaurant.

The light over the stove is on in the kitchen, but other than that and the moonlight glinting off the pool, it's dark. The sliding door is open a crack, letting in cool air. Someone must have forgotten to close it.

I drape my dress over the back of a chair and cross the hall into the living room. It's cooler for the breeze blowing in. An owl hoots in the dense grove of trees beyond the cottage. I don't hear that sound much in the city, and I pause to listen before pulling the door closed.

"Been a while," comes a deep voice from the corner.

I jump, spinning to face the man sitting in Mr. Ricci's armchair, watching me.

My stomach flutters, heart racing.

He holds up his glass in a sort of toast. Ice clanks against crystal as he brings it to his mouth, never taking his eyes off me, his gaze sending shivers down my spine.

I steel myself. Those eyes are cruel now. I used to think they were so very beautiful once upon a time.

"What the hell are you doing here?" I ask when I can speak again. The moon illuminates Nicholas Hendrick's face. He's twenty-seven now. He looks older though, his dark hair cut shorter so it doesn't flop into his eyes like it used to when he was a boy. Although he was never a boy, not really.

He sets his drink down and stands up. "That's no way to greet your soon-to-be brother-in-law, is it, Tina?" He crosses the room in that way he has, like he's eating space, devouring it.

I press my back against the door, my hands still wrapped around the handle at my back. "Are you still sore about that?" I ask, hoping he can't hear the hurt in my voice because it's still there. However much I want to hate him, that hurt is still right there.

Nicholas comes to stand a foot from me. I look up at him. He's right. It has been a while. The last time I saw him was almost a year ago. The last words he spoke to me were to insult me.

He's wearing a black suit with a black shirt. It fits. The devil wears black, doesn't he? His turquoise eyes search my face before settling on my eyes, and there it is again. The same feeling I had ten years ago when I first met him, when I'd stood at the swimming pool holding that stupid tin of cookies. That fluttering in my stomach, the hitching of my heart.

That feeling like I can't breathe.

There's something between Nicholas and I that I don't understand, that I can't name. Or maybe it's just that I don't want to name it because it is so utterly wrong that I should feel the things I feel for this man of all men.

"I guess I'm sore at being taken for a fool. But that's on me, isn't it? The company you keep rubbed off on you in the end, didn't it, Mio caro?" Nicholas's eyes narrow infinitesimally.

I can't remember the last time I saw them with that gleam they get when he smiles—when he really, truly smiles and it touches his eyes. He's beautiful then, and it takes my breath away to see it.

I'm reminded of Esmerelda, his mother, and I soften toward him because Nicholas Hendrick is alone in the world. There's a part of me that, no matter what has happened or what he's done, hurts for him at the thought.

"Nicholas," I start, wanting to tell him I'd heard about his mother's passing, wanting to say something kind. But before I can get a word out and, without breaking eye contact, he reaches behind me and takes my hand in his. That fluttering in my belly, the sensation of anxiety or excitement that are interchangeable when it comes to Nicholas Hendrick, is there again. Heat creeps up along my neck and settles in my cheeks as electricity charges through us.

"I see you haven't come to your senses yet," he says, and both our gazes move to the rock on my hand. He turns the ring, touches the diamond. When I look up at him again, he's watching me from beneath thick, black lashes. "You disappoint me, V."

"Don't you mean Mio caro?" It means 'my darling', but he says it with so much venom, it's turned to a hate name for me. V was a pet name I haven't heard in years. I try to pull my hand away, but he doesn't let go. "And besides, everyone disappoints you in the end. Isn't that right, Nicholas? No one is good enough for you, are they?"

He shrugs. "I wouldn't say that exactly. But you? There was a time I expected better from you."

It's quiet as his gaze searches my face, and I lose myself in the turquoise of his eyes. Is his heart beating as hard as mine? I doubt it.

He'd have to have a heart for it to beat.

Besides, Nicholas Hendrick is a man in control. In the decade I've known him, this is the one thing I know to be a fact. He is always in control, and he's proven that over and over every time I've run into him over the last few years. He's proven that I am nothing but a pawn in his life that he can manipulate and maneuver however he wants for no reason other than his own entertainment.

But despite it all, what I feel when I get around him never changes.

He must see right through me because a string tugs at one corner of his mouth. It's not quite a smile though.

I remember the last time we saw each other. The morning after that night.

My face burns.

"I can read you like a book, little girl."

"I'm not⁠—"

He brushes a lock of hair behind my ear and my words catch in my throat at his touch. That one-sided grin widens. "You'd better get better at hiding your thoughts, given the company you keep," he says, voice low.

I slap that hand away, but he's still holding the other one hostage. "Fuck off, Nicholas."

He chuckles "Sold the house, I see. Am I congratulating you?"

"Didn't have much choice and you know it."

He nods once, that grin gone. I don't know if I imagine the slight squeeze of his big, warm hand around mine, with its skin calloused and rough. He's a businessman now, but he always loved working with his hands, building things. Gardening. All of it. I wonder if he still finds the time.