Page 60 of The Rook’s Obsession

His fingers find me between my legs, and he laughs. Sounding dark and satisfied. “Soaked,” he says. “I knew it. You loved every fucking second of that.”

I don’t respond. I can’t. His fingers are working me exactly where I need him. He circles my clit once, twice, and then he’s pressing against it, rubbing with the same relentlessness he used when he was fucking my mouth.

It doesn’t take long until I’m wound tight, and on the edge of another orgasm. When I come, it’s so intense, causing me to cry out. My nails dig into the table hard enough to leave marks.

But that doesn’t make him stop, he keeps going, drawing it out longer until I’m pushing back against his hand because it’s too much and not enough all at once.

Only then does his hand go still between my legs, his breath hot against the back of my neck.

“Mine,” he whispers, and I’m so spent, I don’t have the strength to argue.

NICK

By the time I open my eyes the next day, Ivy is already dressed. This time, she wears her own clothes rather than a costume. Dark jeans, a fitted black top, boots. No wig or mask. Just Ivy, standing by the window of the safe house, gazing out.

“Good morning.” Propping myself up on my elbow, I run a hand down my face. The clock by the bed tells me it’s well past two in the afternoon—I guess the time change is fucking with me, though the fact that it took hours to fall asleep didn’t help. “When did you get up?”

“Oh, I don’t know. A while ago.” She glances over her shoulder. There’s a twinkle in her eye I would never have seen a few weeks ago. “Get up. I’ve been waiting to show you something, and you chose today of all days to sleep in.”

I don’t bother asking what it is she wants to show me, because I know better by now. She’ll only dig her heels in and refuse harder than ever to give me a clue. Instead of pressing the issue, I get up and splash my face with water before getting dressed. She’s waiting by the door when I finish—even though she’s trying to hide it, I can tell she’s excited about something. I like seeing her like this. Like a kid, almost. The kid she used to be.

I shut that down before it has a chance to take root and get any bigger. It’s bad enough I can’t forget what I heard last night. She slid into that role so easily. It was damn uncanny, and I’m still a little thrown by it.

No trace of that today. Today, she’s smiling as we take the stairs down and step out into the kind of day that makes a man glad he’s alive. The air is warm but not heavy. It carries traces of coffee and bread from the bakery two doors down. Something green and alive from the nearest canal. She turns left without hesitating, moving at a pace that says she’s walked this route a hundred times. I fall in beside her and let her lead the way.

It’s about three blocks in that I realize I’ve never seen her like this. This isn’t the woman who turned a grown man into a puddle on the floor last night. Not the woman who fanned through passports like they were playing cards. This is something else. She moves through the streets as if they belong to her. Not the way Vincenzo’s world belonged to her, like she had to survey her surroundings all the time. More like the way a place belongs to someone who chose it on their own. Freely. Her shoulders are lower and her stride is easier. She looks up at buildings when we pass them—not checking sightlines. Actually looking, the way people look at things they like.

“Should you be showing your face around here?” I ask. Really, it’s amazing I waited this long before I couldn’t help voicing that question.

She gives me a sideways glance. “This part of the city was mine. They never came here. Vincenzo wouldn’t be caught dead in a tourist area, and his people followed his lead. There are too many cameras around, for one thing. Too many foreigners, too much exposure. He stuck to private places—clubs, restaurants, places where he could control the guest list.”

We step around a man walking a small, fluffy dog. “I figured that out early and made it work for me. Everything on the other side of the canal was his. Everything on this side was mine.”

“Nobody ever checked up on you?”

“I was careful. No patterns or regulars. Nothing anyone could trace.” She pauses a beat. “I needed something that was just for me. I think everyone does.”

I can’t argue with that. Years of living inside someone else’s machine, being shaped and directed? Of course she carved out a space they couldn’t touch. The fact that she managed it under that level of control says more about her than any dossier ever could.

She leads me down a side street that opens onto a small piazza. There’s a church on one side, so old the stone is worn smooth in some spots. Across from it, there’s a restaurant with a faded green awning and tables spilling out onto the cobblestones. It’s the kind of place a guidebook would call a hidden gem, which usually means it’s neither hidden nor a gem, but this one might be the exception. The tables are half-full with locals and a handful of what look like tourists, considering the selfies they keep taking. The smell coming from inside is the kind that makes your stomach sit up and pay attention.

“This is my favorite place in Milan.” She says it simply. No fanfare. At the same time, she glances at me when she says it, like she’s checking whether I’m paying attention. The fact that she cares whether I am tells me more than the words do.

We take a table outside, shaded by the awning. She doesn’t look at the menu. When she orders, she does it in Italian, speaking so fast I catch only every third word. Whatever she says makes the waiter smile and nod like she just complimented his mother’s cooking. He disappears inside, and a moment later, a woman comes out.

She’s around our age. Olive skin, dark hair pulled back at the nape of her neck, wide brown eyes that go even wider when they land on Ivy. “Dio mio,” she breathes. Then she’s moving, rounding the table, pulling Ivy out of her chair into a hug that lasts longer than a casual greeting. A lot longer. She then holds Ivy by the shoulders and looks at her the way you look at someone you’ve been worried about, then says something in rapid Italian that I don’t catch but makes Ivy laugh. She actually laughs, the real kind, the kind I’ve heard more often lately but still not often enough.

“Lucia.” Ivy switches to English with a glance in my direction. “This is Nick.”

Lucia turns to me, wearing a smile that warms up a degree at a time. “Nick,” she repeats while looking me over with an openness that borders on appraisal. Is she making sure I’m worth Ivy’s time? “Very nice. Welcome.”

Then she turns back to Ivy, takes her face in both hands, and says something else in Italian. Whatever it is, Ivy’s expression goes soft in a way I’ve rarely seen from her. Lucia kisses both her cheeks—lingering, familiar—before squeezing her hands and disappearing back inside with a promise to bring something special.

All I can do is sit and watch the whole exchange. The way Lucia touched her, the comfort of it. The intimacy. Ivy didn’t stiffen or pull back, the way she does with almost everyone else in the world. The way Lucia looked at her wasn’t the way a friend looks at a friend. Or maybe it was, but it was the way a very specific kind of friend looks at a very specific kind of friend.

Food arrives. Small plates, nothing I ordered, but all of it is incredible. Bruschetta with tomatoes so red they look painted. Some kind of whipped cheese with honey and pistachios. Thin slices of prosciutto draped over melon so ripe and juicy I almost can’t believe how good it is. There’s a carafe of white wine cold enough to sweat.

For a little while, it’s enough to sit and eat and enjoy the rich, fresh flavors. But while I do, I can’t help wondering how to ask a question without sounding like the kind of man I don’t want to be.