Love's Shadow (Brothers Maledetti Book 2)

by Nichole Van

  Shuffling. The squeak of a chair leg across the floor.

  “Something evil happened, Barbara. Lord Knight’s death was more than it appears. I will get answers . . . one way or another.”

  “But at what cost to—”

  Again, the conversation ended.

  Crap.

  What was Roberto into?

  Lucy

  I leaned further onto the counter, slanting my head toward Alessio. Told my eyes to say, Mmmm, I’m interested, when the rest of me was shouting, Get out now!

  “So tell me about this dig Dr. Moretti is on? Where is it located? It’s fascinating.”

  And please convince me it’s not as creepy as it sounds.

  Alessio definitely reacted to my lame attempts to engage him, angling his wiry body my way, sending a cloud of cologne wafting around us. Uhm, wow. Some things were best in moderation. AXE body spray was definitely one of them.

  “Dr. Moretti didn’t say. He just said he needed to look at another site to complete some important research. I’m so sorry I don’t know more.” For the record, Alessio didn’t look particularly sorry. “He visits many different places and the telefonini . . . uh, the cell phones, they do not work there.”

  The cell reception thing sounded suspicious. Italy wasn’t that large of a country and, in my (granted limited) experience, wireless coverage was excellent, even in rural areas. And what could be so important that it required an overnight ‘research’ binge?

  Professor Ross was looking more and more dubious with every passing minute. My heart pounded. Was Grace caught up in this?

  “Does he go on these night digs often?” I asked.

  Alessio checked me out again, eyes lingering on hips, bust, lips. Another waft of cologne. Nice. “Every now and again. He should be in tomorrow afternoon, I would imagine.”

  The door behind me opened and Alessio instantly sprang to his full (vertically challenged) height.

  “Ciao, Alessio.” A woman came up to the counter, dressed in a blouse and slacks that shouted educated professional. She continued to rattle in Italian, staccato fast.

  Alessio smiled politely and said something in return.

  The lady turned to me, an expectant look on her face. Alessio switched to English. “This is Dr. Barbara Bruno, one of our museum directors. She does the, what do you say, baby farewell?”

  Baby farewell? What?

  When in doubt, smile and nod.

  Alessio motioned toward me, while speaking to Barbara. “This woman had some questions for Dr. Moretti. Will he be in tomorrow?”

  “Spero di sì.” The woman shook her head, but her face looked concerned. “I hope so.”

  She rattled off in Italian and then gave us a friendly wave before walking purposefully across the museum floor, heading toward the ‘Staff Only’ door.

  Crap!

  Branwell

  I studied the rest of the office, trying to decide what to touch next. The glossy computer monitor was too solid and undamaged to hold any usable noise. I pressed a finger on the excavation photographs.

  The whirr of a machine. The scratch of a pen.

  Nothing there.

  The cleaning items were equally unhelpful.

  Carefully, I lifted the ancient bronze mirror with my gloved hand, inspecting it. The mirror side shimmered. Rotating the mirror around, I studied the etched scene. The foreground depicted a seated male figure, probably Eros, pulling a woman, Hinthial I presumed, from the earth. In the background, two figures were embracing while another figure was dripping liquid—blood maybe?—onto a bowl. Scrying or divination of some sort? Overall, the scene seemed completely innocuous—the typical religious iconography of ancient Greco-Roman artifacts.

  The mirror clearly needed a cleaning, which meant it probably didn’t have any recent noise. Listening to ancient Etruscan wasn’t going to help me find Grace. Besides, the thing had ‘Touch Me and Die’ written all over it. Chucky would love to hide in a place like that. I would only touch it if I got desperate.

  Setting it back down, I snagged my phone out of my pocket and took photos of both sides of the mirror. For good measure, I took several additional photos of the room, the calendar, the other objects. I snapped a nice close-up of the old gloves resting beside the mirror on the desk.

  Setting my phone down on top of the calendar, I carefully lifted one of the antique gloves with my own still-covered right hand. Aged yellow kidskin leather that had probably once been white. Supple but old. Very old if the hand stitching were any indication. Large gloves. A man’s gloves.

  There was a small tear in one of the seams.

  I transferred the glove to my bare left hand.

  “Damn. You’re in trouble now, Alessio.” Francesca. “Moretti will have your hide for this.”

  “No, no, it’s fine. The rip was already there. I just maybe made it a tiny bit larger—”

  Francesca and Alessio went back and forth a bit more.

  Not really helpful.

  I skimmed back farther.

  “Careful, the thorn will dig in deeper. Hold still, my lord.” A woman’s voice. Melodic. Italian but formally aristocratic. Florentine Italian from an earlier era.

  “Had I known it would only take a thorn embedded in my flesh to convince you to hold my hand, I would have stabbed myself long before.” A man’s voice. Flirtatious. Warm. Italian, as well, but with a hint of English.

  Surprise blazed through me.

  Bingo.

  The same male voice I had heard while touching the mantel in Lucy’s living room.

  Jack.

  “There. That got it.” The woman’s voice again. Vaguely familiar somehow.

  The rustle of cloth over cloth . . . a woman walking in petticoats.

  A faint scent of lavender. Dust.

  “Thank you.” Jack’s voice. “You are a treasure in so many ways, Signorina Sofia.”

  “A treasure? Such pretty words. You talk a fine line, my lord. Rumor has it your father was much the same during his time here.”

  The whisper of wind through trees. A boot kicking a rock.

  “My father is a legend around these parts then?” Jack.

  A sense of shoulders shrugging.

  “The villagers cross themselves and swear to Saint Christopher whenever his name is mentioned.”

  A male chuckle. “Well, we Knights are hardly an auspicious lot, I suppose. Big, British brutes.”

  A feminine laugh. Light and tinkling in sound. “I do not think it was your father’s height that called forth such a reaction. Rumor runs rampant that he tried to find that which should remain hidden.”

  Silence. Boots crunching on leaves.

  The smell of woodsmoke.

  “And you, Lady Sofia? Do you feel we should forgo understanding our forebears because a small group of people are frightened by customs and ideas so far removed from this time?”

  “Heavens. When stated that way— Did you not study the art of subtle argumentation in school, my lord?”

  “Tis truth—”

  “Perhaps yes. Perhaps no. But what do you English say? There cannot be smoke without fire? These ideas had to originate somewhere, and the peasants on our family lands have lived here since before the Romans. Only a fool would ignore their words.”

  More silence.

  “Am I such a fool, Lady Sofia?”

  Shadowy trees flitted. The smell of green things. The heat of summer sun.

  A petite woman walking ahead. High-waisted dress of white muslin fluttering in the subtle breeze. Green silk parasol twirling over her head. A shadowy sense of dark eyes and curled hair. Familiar, somehow.

  She stopped and turned, bobbed a look up and down. “Perhaps, my lord.”

  Frustration and longing.

  His or hers?

  “Will you plead my case to your brother? As he is the head of your family, I require his permission to begin my excavations. I want nothing further than the chance to finish what my own father began—”


  A loud snick.

  I dropped the glove with a start. Heart racing.

  Damn. That had been the door to the hallway opening.

  “What . . . say?” A woman’s voice drifted down the hallway. Muffled. Garbled. Indistinct. “He is . . . hours . . . miss him . . .”

  I tensed, snatching my own discarded glove and darted over to the closed door, assessing my options.

  Was she referring to Roberto? Would she come in here?

  What to do?

  Lucy

  Crap!

  How to stop Barbara from disappearing through the ‘Staff Only’ door?

  What had Alessio said? Baby farewell?

  She said goodbye to babies?

  No—

  “Maternity leave!” I practically shouted the words, causing several heads to turn my way, including Dr. Barbara Bruno.

  Whew. Got her attention, at least.

  “You were on maternity leave,” I said again, still too loudly. “Congrats on your baby. That’s so awesome. I bet he or she is a cutie.”

  That’s right. I was yelling at a stranger across a quiet museum floor, pretending like it wasn’t ridiculously awkward.

  Go me.

  Barbara smiled, strained but polite. “He is. It’s only been a couple of hours, but I miss him so much already.”

  She turned to walk through the door.

  “I would love to see a photo.” I called, desperate. “I adore babies so much. I am number six of nine kids, so I totally get it.” I motioned for her to come back, just to be safe.

  After a short pause—probably pitting her maternal pride against my possible level of psychosis—Barbara let the staff entrance door close and walked back over to us.

  I mentally fist-pumped. Maternal pride for the win.

  “Thanks for putting up with me,” I said as she stopped at the reception desk, digging into her purse for her phone. “Babies are so much fun. I want at least ten kids—”

  “Ten?!” Alessio stumbled back so fast, his little body nearly ricocheted off the wall. “Why would you want ten children? That is . . . many.”

  So that’s how you separate the men from the boys—talk about your future children. Natch.

  “I loved growing up in a big family.” I nodded at the photo Barbara held up for me. “Oh, he’s adorable. Look at those squishy cheeks. I’m Lucy Snow, by the way.”

  I held out my hand to Barbara. Got a limp fish handshake in return.

  Honestly. Hands have bones and muscles, people. Use them.

  “I’m actually a niece of John Knight-Snow,” I continued.

  I was just babbling at this point, anything to keep their attention. Though announcing that Gruncle Jack was truly my gruncle brought down the house.

  Alessio said something loud in Italian that I translated as, ‘No way!’ and Barbara perked up.

  I could see Alessio weighing the options . . . lots of kids versus cool ancestry. Given that he leaned toward me again and smiled huge, I was guessing he sided with cool ancestry.

  Sorry, Alessio. Not gonna happen.

  For her part, Barbara played a fun game of twenty questions with me, mostly trying to understand how I was related to Jack. Or trying to trip me up and expose me as a fraud.

  It was sorta hard to tell.

  Midway through explaining how Great-Grandpa Michael Snow had decided to settle in Portland after losing his shirt in the crash of 1929, Alessio suddenly stood straighter, looking around.

  “Wasn’t there a large guy with you earlier?” He walked around the desk, scanning the museum and then turned back to me. “Where did he go?”

  Branwell

  Thunk.

  The door out to the museum closed

  I stood in the office, listening for footsteps.

  None came.

  Letting out my breath, I quickly walked back over behind the desk and lifted the old glove again.

  It was extremely unlikely that the issue with Jack was specifically tied to Grace’s disappearance. But given the conversation I had heard earlier between Roberto and the unknown women, they seemed to think there was a link. And that was really all that mattered in the end.

  Holding the glove in my left hand, I skimmed back to find the conversation that had been interrupted—the one between Jack and a mysterious Lady Sofia.

  There had been something familiar about her. The timbre of her voice, maybe. Moreover, I was curious to see their location. Could I nudge my gift, forcing it to show me more? Would things work that way?

  As soon as the thought flitted through, sound assaulted me. But along with the noise came the smells of grass and cypress. A sense of a warm summer wind through my hair.

  Vague shadows swirled, stronger this time.

  Two figures walking along a worn path, fields to one side, an overgrown stone fence to the other. The man tall and looming, dressed in a tailcoat, breeches and boots. The woman petite and feminine.

  She twirled her parasol. He canted his body toward her, top hat leaning, walking stick moving as he strode.

  “Will you plead my case to your brother?” Jack’s voice. “As he is the head of your family, I require his permission to begin my excavations. I want nothing further than to finish what my own father began. Surely you, more than anyone, can appreciate wanting to honor your family heritage.”

  Lady Sofia snorted. “It is precisely because of my family heritage that my brother is so reluctant.”

  They strolled in silence for a moment.

  “I have heard the whispered rumors about your father,” Jack said. “The words the villagers say—”

  “Have you?” Lady Sofia whirled toward him, voice sharp. “Did you hear the one where he warned Signore Martino that her husband would fall to his death within a week’s time? Signore Martino did, you know . . . fall to his death—”

  “Lady Sofia—”

  “No? Or are you referring to the time Papa interrupted an accused murderer’s trial, telling the magistrate that he had the wrong man and pointed a finger at the accused man’s wife instead? The man was acquitted and his wife hung for the crime—”

  “My lady, I meant no malice with my words—”

  “Did you not?” Pain flooded her words. Love. Anguish. “My papa was a good man, Lord Knight. An honorable man. He loved us all. My brother. My sisters.”

  “I do not question your late father’s honor.”

  A beat.

  “Then what are you questioning, my lord?”

  They walked in silence, rounding a bend. A villa rose in the distance.

  Lady Sofia stopped, turning to face Jack. She lifted her face toward the sun. Dark curls framing a delicate jawline. Straight nose in a heart-shaped face.

  Familiar.

  “You know of what I speak, Lady Sofia. You are merely being coy with the issue. The stories that surround your father—all of your family, to be honest—speak to the supernatural. Abilities thought lost to our modern world—”

  Lady Sofia turned and strode away, silencing his words and forcing Jack to jog after her.

  “My lady, please!”

  “No! You speak of things I cannot discuss—”

  “Sofia.” Jack tugged at her arm, tone pleading, slowing her to a stop.

  Her gaze remained firmly on the villa in the distance. Jaw clenched, blinking furiously.

  “I have not granted you leave to use my given name,” she hissed.

  Jack’s shoulders sagged. “Lady Sofia, then. I am sorry, but there is more here than merely my own father’s desire to excavate ancient artifacts. Supernatural things that seem to pertain to your own family as well. Dissemble all you want, but your father’s unearthly abilities are well known. The D’Angelos have lived in Tuscany since time immemorial—”

  I flinched. Hard. My concentration nearly fracturing, bumping my bare hand against the calendar and my phone.

  The D’Angelos—?! How?!

  I scrambled to refocus on the scene before losing it.

  “Your p
oint, Lord Knight?” Sofia said, tone icy.

  A sigh. Frustration. “Villagers say the visions that plagued your father also plague your brother. That the D’Angelo men are cursed and your brother, Lorenzo, will meet your father’s fate too.”

  Lady Sofia tensed. Panic. Fear. Grief.

  “The ancients were more attuned to the supernatural world than we are in our age,” Jack continued. “There are hints that the Etruscans buried something of great spiritual power on the D’Angelo family land. A treasure above all others. Have you considered that this treasure I seek could also be related to the D’Angelo curse—”

  The scene darkened, as if a raincloud passed overhead. Jack and Sofia receded.

  The smell of roses. Musty. Long locked away.

  A howl of anguish. Loss.

  A desperate craving for light and freedom.

  Whirling, it came.

  Fog. Darkness.

  A shape lunged at me, claws extended. Piercing.

  Dragging me under—

  Lucy

  I surveyed the room with Alessio, pretending to look for Branwell.

  “Huh. I think he said something about visiting the restroom. Maybe he got lost?”

  Man, was I terrible liar.

  I just needed to buy Branwell a little more time. Please let him find something.

  Alessio shrugged and turned back to Barbara and myself.

  “I should get back to work,” Barbara said. “It was very nice to meet a descendant of Lord Knight. I’m sure Dr. Moretti will be sad to have missed you. Between you and me, he is too obsessed with the Knight-Snow family and the mysterious events around Lord Knight, but we all have our little things, no?”

  The ‘Staff Only’ door behind Barbara and Alessio cracked open about three inches.

  “Buona giornata.” Barbara waved goodbye and started to turn around.

  Branwell opened the door farther.

  No!

  “Wait!” I snatched Barbara’s hand, forcing her to turn back to me. She started, looking down at my hand holding hers.

  Crap! Now what?!

  “Uhmm, I love your wedding ring. It’s great.”

  Barbara and I stared down at the plain gold band on her finger.

  No diamond. No nothing. Just a thin gold ring.