Emotion wells in my chest. No one has taken care of me in years, not even Gio. I mean, I know Gio would die for me, he would, but Gio is just—Gio. A player. A wild card. A man on a mission he never explained.
Spontaneously, I reach up and rest my fingers on Kace’s jaw, searching his face for some sign of betrayal, some reason to send him away, but all I find is that bond I’ve shared with him. That magnetic pull between us dragging me deeper under his spell. He grabs my hand and kisses my knuckles. “Stop looking for what’s not there and see me again.”
“I just need—”
“I know. We’ll talk. I’ll explain. I promise. Right now, I’m going to get that food down you.”
“Thank you, Kace.”
“Her manners return,” he teases, releasing me and heading down the stairs.
I inhale on the exchange, and God, I want this to be real, I want us to be real, but I’m scared. I turn away from the stairs, grab my purse, and head into the bathroom, the only other room on this level. Once I’m inside, I shut the door, pee, wash up, and then study myself in the mirror. I’m a mess. My hair is all over the place. My mascara looks like something out of a horror movie. My lips are bare. Meanwhile, my hand looks like it’s ten times its normal size. The ER wrapped it with a ridiculous quantity of bandages.
Kneeling in front of my cabinet, I dig out some gauze I bought eons ago and set out to rewrap it.
Ten minutes later, I am thankful that the injury and leaden feeling is in my left hand, not my right. I’ve managed to re-wrap my left in a reasonable amount of bandage, my face is washed and bare, and that’s all I have in me. I can’t handle pain pills and I grab Advil from the cabinet, pop four, and use the glass by the sink to down them. That’s when my gaze catches on my bare feet and pink painted toes. I didn’t take off my shoes and socks. Kace did. On a subconscious level, I trust him so much that I didn’t even notice. I have never trusted anyone but Gio. That means something. Doesn’t it?
Exiting the bathroom, the scent of food teases my nostrils and rumbles my stomach. I quickly make my way to the stairs and pause as I watch Kace move about my kitchen, half-naked without his shirt, cooking for me. I’m not sure any woman could resist the appeal of this man in this moment or really any other. Considering the past twelve hours or so, it’s pretty surreal.
I slip my feet into my pink fuzzy slippers I keep at the end of the bed, and then hurry down the steps, far more steady on my feet than I expected to be when I woke up. But then, the pain pill is now pretty much gone. Kace must sense my approach because his gaze lifts, his eyes lighting on my approach as if the sight of me warms him. I feel the sincerity of his reaction and with it, my sense that what we’ve shared is real, expands.
I join him at my small island and he sets a bowl of soup and a plate of bread in front of me.
“Just in time. It’s hot and ready for you. And for the record, if you like it, you need to text Jenny. If you hate it, you need to text Jenny and still say you like it. It’s her famous chicken dumpling soup.”
I laugh and slip onto a barstool. “I’ll text her with love in my heart and belly, I’m sure. You had me at dumplings. All things pasta and bread work for me.”
“Which is why I know you’ll love spaetzle. I still need to get you a good German meal.” He sets two bottles of pills in front of me and then moves to sit on the stool next to me. “Your antibiotics and your pain meds. How did you hurt your hand? You haven’t told me.”
“The drawer in your vault. It had a piece of wood or maybe wood and a nail sticking out. Honestly, all I know is it hurt. It bled a lot. And here we are.”
“Ouch damn, baby, I’m sorry. I feel like shit.”
“I forgive you, but only because you wrangled me some cookies.” I set the pain medication aside. “I just took four Advil. I have no desire to take another pain pill. All they do is knock me out.”
“Sleep helps the body heal. And so does food.” He steals a torn-off piece of the bread. “It’s almost as good as her cookies.” He takes a bite and then offers it to me.
I accept and the intimacy of the shared food is right there between us, thickening the air and ripening the awareness between us. I taste the warm bread and nod my approval. “It’s wonderful.”
“Good. I’m glad you like it. Jenny will be as well.” He hands me my spoon. “Eat, baby. You’ll feel better.”
Despite his frequent use of the endearment, this time it does funny things to my belly. In defiance of what has happened these past few hours, there is a new intimacy between us that cannot be denied. I accept the spoon and begin to eat, finding the soup delicious. “Speaking of the perfect godparents—” My brows dip. “Actually, are Jerry and Jenny, your actual godparents?”
“Not officially, but that’s what Jenny calls them.”
“Well then, as I said: speaking of the perfect godparents, you had cookies, good food, and clearly love, from what I saw with you and Jenny.”
“The love is mutual,” he says. “And they are pretty perfect.”
“You said they were good friends with your parents?”
“Jerry and my father went to school together. Jerry actually owned another bakery and had about fifty locations before he sold out. He doesn’t have to work, but he kept this one location because he enjoys it. And why tell you that part of Jerry’s life? Because if he wasn’t that successful, my father wouldn’t have had anything to do with him.”
My spoon halts midair with the offer to slide under his wall, and glimpse a bit more of the real man he shelters beneath his rock star image. It’s not exactly penance for the secrets he’s kept from me, as that really isn’t appropriate here, but rather a message I understand. He’s telling me that he hasn’t taken what he will not give. I set my spoon down. “Your father was really that cold?”
“He was,” he confirms, and I don’t miss the tic in his jaw, that tells a story. He’s willingly toed this territory with me but the topic of his father is not a gentle one.
“Jenny is so sweet. I assumed Jerry would be a kind person, as well.” In an effort to ease the intensity of the full force of my interest, I pick my spoon up again and scoop up a big, wonderful dumpling.
“He is. He absolutely is.”
My brows furrow. “Then I’m confused. He and your father seem an odd pairing.”
“It was all about money and convenience to my father. He invested in Jerry’s bakeries. He controlled Jerry to some degree. And he turned him into a babysitter, which thankfully also created a bond between me and Jerry. And Jenny,” he adds, “when she came into the picture.”
“Babysitter? Why would they need a babysitter when you were always traveling?”
“I wasn’t always on the road. I had windows, months at a time, when I was home. When my parents would travel during those months, they’d leave me with Jerry and Jenny.”
I set my spoon down again. “Wait. So, when you were here, they would leave?”
“When business called, my father answered.” He grabs another piece of bread. “And now you know why I have a sweet tooth. I was always around those damn cookies.”
“We aren’t so different. You lost your father, too.”
There’s a sharp spike to his energy but his answer is matter-of-fact. “I never had my father.” In a swift change of topic, he asks, “What happened to your father, Aria?”
He’s officially moved the discomfort from him to me. “I haven’t told you?” It’s not really intended to be a question.
“No. You haven’t told me.”
“Right well—he disappeared. My mother got us out of bed one night, packed us up and we came here.”
“He just disappeared? And your mother left instead of looking for him? There’s clearly more to the story.”
“She told us she knew he was dead. She wouldn’t talk about the details and believe me, I tried to get her to talk, over and over again. So did Gio.”
“Could he be alive?”<
br />
“Gio and I have had moments when we’ve both leaned that direction, but we’re always grounded back in reality by one certainty: if he were alive he would have found us. There’s no way he would have stayed away.”
“I can see that. He loved his family. I was young when I spent time with him but I felt that love. He was a good man.” I can feel the emotion expanding in my chest and as if he reads my readiness for a change of topic, he eyes my bowl. “You ate it all.”
He’s right on that. Somehow I’ve managed to down it all while we’ve talked, while I dare think now that we’ve managed to grow closer in a time one would think we’d be farther away. “How could I not? It was delicious.”
“How do you feel?”
“Much better.”
“Your hand?”
“Hurts,” I say, “but it’s remarkably bearable.”
“Then I have something to show you.” He pushes to his feet and steps to my side, offering me his hand. That hand is always a question, one that I understand now more than ever. His hand is always about trust, him asking for it, and me giving it.
But he asks. He doesn’t assume. He doesn’t demand. The question is: does he manipulate? I’d say yes, he does. His decision to hold back his knowledge of my identity was, in fact, manipulation. I have reasons to doubt and fear Kace, I do. The problem is that I want to trust him. I have always wanted to trust him.
But trust is a two-way street and I believe Kace has offered me an olive branch; he’s shown me trust tonight. It matters.
I press my hand to his hand and he pulls me to my feet, our legs aligned, his hard body pressed to mine. I feel delicate with this man and somehow strong but as I promised him, I will not allow feelings to control me. And so, I warn, “My trust is not unconditional, Kace. In fact, right now, it’s fragile.”
CHAPTER SIX
Kace reacts to my declaration in that perfect way Kace reacts to everything. He doesn’t push back. He doesn’t throw words or anger at me. In fact, he doesn’t use words at all. He simply cups my head and kisses me until I’m weak in the knees, and moaning with the delicious licks of his tongue. Just that easily he makes it clear where he stands, and that’s with me. He catches my fingers with his fingers and guides me toward my living room.
More than a little curious about what he wants to show me in my own apartment, I follow quite willingly, and we sit down on the couch in front of an iPad. There is a bottle of wine and two glasses. “I wasn’t sure if you’d be up to the wine, but you’re off the pain meds, and I think it might be recommended.”
Unease ripples through me. “What does that mean?”
“It means I’m going to take you on a walk down memory lane and I’m not sure how it will affect you.” He fills my glass and then his. “It’s nothing bad. I promise. Try the wine. It’s another blend I favor.”
“How did you get your wine to my apartment?”
He wiggles a brow. “Magic.”
“You paid Steven to make it happen.”
He grins, a charming grin. “I did.” He motions to my glass. “Try it.”
Because he has money and power, and I’m reminded of the men who visited my father before he disappeared. Men in suits and driving fancy cars. Shoving aside the past, I’m now eager for the wine, and I sip from my glass, a sweet spice touching my tongue. “It’s interesting. Good. Drier than the last bottle.”
“It is. This is a French wine, which tends to be drier, at least to my palate.”
“Did you buy it in France?” I ask, curious about his travels and wondering how he will adjust to life here, not on the road. I wonder actually if his life here will last.
“I did,” he confirms. “I need to restock during my next visit. You could help me by going with me in December.”
My mind is suddenly back in his vault, back in that moment when I found that file. When I found Gio’s photos in the drawer. I set my glass down and stand up. He follows and links our hands. “Aria—”
“We can’t just pretend you don’t know who I am. We can’t just pretend you didn’t know before we ever started. We can’t pretend that none of this happened.”
“No,” he agrees, his hands settling on my shoulders. “No, baby, we can’t. We’re not. That was never my intent. Sit back down and hear me out. Please.”
“Well,” I say. “Since you said please.”
He laughs, a masculine rumble I feel all the way to my toes. “Yes, I did,” he says. “I’m learning.” He sobers. “I’m learning a lot about myself through you, baby.”
“I don’t understand what that means.”
“I don’t either, but you’ll know when I do. Sit?”
I nod and sit down. He follows, maneuvering the wine out of the way to place the iPad in front of me. “Watch. Just watch.”
I nod, nervous again. He immediately hits play on a video and I’m suddenly doing just as he instructed, and what I’m watching is a young Kace August, so very young—a teenager, I believe—play his violin. The song is “Toccata and Fugue in D minor” by Johann Sebastian Bach, one of my favorites, a fast, complicated piece he masters in a way few can. This was one of his earlier versions that I remember well. The melody hums through me, his skills on full display. I hit pause. “My God, Kace. Even then you were brilliant. How old were you?”
“Seventeen. And anything I did right that day wasn’t about me. This video isn’t about me. Keep watching, baby.” He hits play.
All the more curious now, my gaze shifts back to the video, and once again, I am lost in his performance, when suddenly the footage shifts and expands. I’m now staring at my father, standing in front of Kace, directing him with fierce sways of his hands. I gasp and cover my mouth, tears springing to my eyes. There’s another shift of the camera and a little girl runs forward and wraps her arms around my father, successfully ending his dramatic direction. That little girl is me. Kace stops playing, laughing a youthful but robust laugh, and I run to him then and wrap my arms around him as well. That day explodes into my mind, crystal clear.
Kace told the truth. We had met before. I can’t believe I don’t remember, but he wasn’t the star he is now and that was a traumatic year for me. All I remember is coming here, crying every night.
I punch the pause button and turn to him, my emotions ping-ponging all over the place. I’m shocked and relieved that he really did meet me in the past, but I’m angry that he didn’t tell me, that I had to find out on my own. And there are other emotions, too, unnamed things that ball in my belly and chest, some of which may or may not even be about him.
Adrenaline surges through me and I stand up. He stands up. I step between him and the table and in front of him.
With my healthy hand and my body, I shove him back down and onto the couch. I follow, straddling him and almost fall on my hand, but he shackles my waist, catching me before I injure myself. His touch is electric, possessive, consuming. The heat between us is fiery, instant. Powerful. His blue eyes potent. “Crazy woman,” he accuses softly. “You’re going to hurt yourself.”
“I’m more worried about you hurting me.”
“No. Never. I would never—”
“You already hurt me. I trusted you.”
“My judgment was poor but for good reason. I will never hurt you. I’ll protect you. You’re not alone anymore.”
Not alone.
I repeat those words in my mind, but I can’t accept that they are real. Not yet. “We met before, I get that, I believe that, but you didn’t tell me.”
“I told you. I knew you were hiding. I knew you’d be spooked. Baby, I didn’t want you to run.”
“Were you going to tell me?”
“Yes. Of course. When I was sure you trusted me.”
“That feels like manipulation,” I say, repeating what has already been in my mind.
“I can see how you might think that, but that was not my intent.”
“I was eleven,” I counter,
not missing a beat. “There is no way you saw me at that restaurant with Mark and Chris and knew who I was.”
“You were familiar.” His hand slides under my hair and he pulls my mouth just above his as he whispers, “Cambiano i suonatori, ma la musica è sempre quella.”
The same thing he’d said that night, “the melody changes, but the song remains the same,” but directly translated, it’s: “the players change, but the music is always the same.”
I return to that moment with him and I reply the exact way I’d replied that night, “No,” I answer in English. “The musician, the player, makes all the difference, which is why he should have an instrument worthy of him.”
“And what inspired that reply?”
“It’s what Antonio Stradivari believed,” I say, repeating what I’d thought that day when I spoke the words. “It’s why he made the Stradivarius.”
“And that, Aria,” Kace says, “is how I knew I was right about who you were. You not only understood Italian, you answered the way I’d expect your father to answer. You answered like a member of the Stradivari family. But it was also more, so damn much more. We just didn’t know yet.”
I pull back slightly to search his face. “What does that mean?”
“Six thousand miles and seventeen years later, Aria, and somehow we came back together. We are right where we’re supposed to be. Right here. Right now. Together. And there is no place I would rather be than here, with you.” His hand moves to my face, his thumb stroking my cheek, the gentle touch sending shivers down my spine. “I’m asking you to believe that,” he says. “I’m asking you to trust me. I swear to you that I will never hurt you or your family.”
A swell of emotions fills my chest. I have never in my entire life felt as connected to one person as I do to this man. My mother used to say, “Stay alert. Listen to your gut and think with your mind.” And I am. I’m listening to my gut. I’m thinking with my mind. I press my lips to Kace’s.
CHAPTER SEVEN
A Wicked Song Page 4