Chapter 7
The next morning, Damian sent me a schedule.
It arrived on my phone at seven thirty-eight with no greeting and no explanation. Breakfast if I wanted it. A security briefing at nine. A car to my studio at ten thirty. Marcus's number. Adrian's number. Damian's number.
At the bottom, in a separate line:
You can change any of this.
I read the message three times before answering.
Is this your idea of learning?
His reply came almost immediately.
Apparently.
It was not an apology for the lie in the garden. It was not enough. But I had slept badly, and there was a part of me that recognized effort even when I did not want to reward it.
I sent one more message.
I am going to the studio. Alone inside. Security can wait outside. I have a client meeting at eleven.
Three dots appeared, disappeared, then appeared again.
Agreed. I will be nearby.
I stared at that sentence.
Do not make this into a surprise visit, I wrote.
I do not surprise people, he replied.
That was such an obvious lie I laughed aloud.
Mrs. Alvarez, who was setting a tray of coffee and toast on the small table near the window, looked at me with kind concern.
"Something funny?" she asked.
"Your employer believes he is not surprising."
The woman smiled in a way that made me suspect she had known Damian since he was a boy. "Mr. Voss believes many things."
"That sounds ominous."
"It is only experience." She set down a small bowl of sliced fruit. "Eat before you leave, querida. You look tired."
No one had called me querida since my mother died. The word caught somewhere under my ribs.
"Thank you," I said.
My studio was above a stationery shop on a narrow street lined with boutiques and expensive coffee.
I had painted the walls myself three years earlier, a soft warm white that made every fabric sample look better.
The front room had a long oak table, two velvet chairs, shelves of binders, and a wall of framed photographs from weddings I had planned.
Nothing about it looked like a Voss property. That was the point.
Mia was already there, standing on a chair to pin a floral reference board above the desk.
"You are married," she said by way of greeting.
"Apparently."
She climbed down and crossed the room to hug me. I let her. The embrace lasted longer than either of us would usually permit.
"How are you?" she asked.
"Ask me something easier."
"Do you want coffee?"
"Yes."
"I knew you would say that."
We made coffee in the tiny back room while she filled me in on the work I had missed.
The Greer wedding had survived a disagreement about lanterns.
The Langfords had left a review so glowing it made me suspicious.
One of the flowers for next weekend's rehearsal dinner had been discontinued by a supplier who had waited until the last possible moment to mention it.
Ordinary disasters. I held on to them like railings.
Then Mia leaned against the counter and said, "There is a black SUV parked outside."
"I know."
"And another one across the street."
"I know."
"And you are pretending you are not being escorted to your own business because?"
"Because I am trying not to let it become normal."
Her expression softened. "Is he treating you well?"
The question was too broad. It had no room for the answer.
"He is trying," I said.
"That is not the same thing."
"No."
"Do you want me to call someone?"
"Who would you call?"
Mia looked out toward the street. "I do not know. But I could call someone with a bigger car."
That pulled a smile from me. "Thank you."
At eleven, my client arrived with her mother, her maid of honor, and the kind of anxiety that turned every decision into a referendum on whether she was loved.
Natalie Greer was getting married in four weeks at the Conservatory, which meant there was no room for mistakes and no one willing to admit it.
For ninety minutes, I forgot I was Elena Voss.
I was Elena Marchetti, the woman who knew the difference between ivory and bone white under artificial light.
I moved place cards around a scale floor plan.
I negotiated with Natalie's mother about whether six more relatives could fit at Table Nine.
I reassured Natalie that her fiancé did not secretly hate the peonies; he simply had no opinion about flowers and had made the mistake of saying so.
By the time they left, she was smiling.
Mia locked the door behind them and leaned against it.
"You are very good at this," she said.
"I know."
"That was not a compliment. It was a complaint. You cannot let one terrifying man with a private army make you forget you built this."
I looked at the wall of photographs. Brides laughing. Grooms holding babies. Families who had survived their own strange histories long enough to stand in flowers and promise something better.
"I am trying not to."
My phone rang.
Papa.
I answered so quickly I nearly dropped it.
"Are you all right?"
"I am fine, tesoro."
He sounded tired. He was still at the clinic under Voss security, though Damian had said he was free to leave whenever the doctor cleared him. Freedom with an asterisk. It seemed to be the theme of my life now.
"What do you remember?" I asked.
A pause.
"A place. I am not sure it matters."
"Tell me."
"Your mother kept a storage unit years ago. Near the old train station. She put some things there when we moved after the newspaper story. Family papers. Her wedding dress. Old boxes."
I pressed my fingers to the desk. "Why would the ledger be there?"
"I do not know if it is. But if I gave anything to anyone, it would have been her. She knew how to make things disappear without making them feel lost."
My throat tightened.
"Do you remember the unit number?"
"Not yet. I am trying."
"Try harder, Papa."
The sharpness in my voice startled us both.
"I know," he said quietly. "I am sorry."
I closed my eyes.
"I am sorry too."
After I ended the call, Mia came around the desk and squeezed my shoulder. Before she could speak, the studio bell chimed.
Damian entered alone.
He had left the car outside and worn no coat despite the rain. A dark blue suit. Sleeves rolled once at the forearms. A line of tension at the corner of his mouth that had nothing to do with me and everything to do with whatever he carried in his phone.
"I told you not to surprise me," I said.
"I was nearby."
"That is not an answer."
His gaze moved briefly to Mia, then back to me. "I need to speak with you."
"You can speak here."
Mia made a point of picking up a binder. "I suddenly need to be in the supply closet."
"You do not," I said.
"I absolutely do." She disappeared through the back door.
Damian looked amused despite himself. "You have good friends."
"I know."
He stepped closer to the desk. "Your father remembered the storage unit. Adrian is sending someone to check it."
"I want to go."
"No."
The word came too fast. His face changed the moment he heard it.
I folded my arms. "Try again."
He looked at the floor for half a second, then back at me. "I would prefer you did not go because it is likely D'Angelo has already considered the same location."
"Better. But I am still going."
"Elena."
"I am tired of other people looking through my mother's things."
His jaw tightened. I watched him work through whatever his first response had been.
"All right," he said. "We go together."
I studied him. "That was easier than I expected."
"Do not get used to it."
"There he is."
His eyes met mine, and something in the space between us pulled taut. It did not feel like the anger we had been living with. It felt quieter. More dangerous.
A car horn sounded outside. Damian looked toward the window.
"There is another issue," he said.
"Of course there is."
"The Greer rehearsal dinner tonight."
"What about it?"
"Salvatore D'Angelo will be there. His niece is marrying Natalie's cousin."
I remembered the guest list. I had not thought much of the name. Why would I? Before two days ago, crime families had been a thing other people read about in newspapers.
"I am the planner," I said. "I have to be there."
"I know."
"Are you going to tell me not to go?"
"No."
"Are you going to follow me?"
"Yes."
I took a breath to argue.
He raised one hand. "Not secretly. I will attend with you. Publicly. As your husband."
The words were simple. The effect was not.
I imagined walking into the Conservatory with Damian Voss beside me. The whispers. The cameras that would pretend to be there for the engagement party and would turn toward us instead. The way every client in the room might look at me differently afterward.
Then I thought about Salvatore D'Angelo standing near a champagne tower while people I was responsible for smiled at him.
"Fine," I said. "But you do not interfere with the event."
"I will not."
"No threats. No intimidating guests. No disappearing into a hallway with anyone."
"Those are very specific rules."
"I have worked with men like you."
"You have?"
"Not men like you. Men who believe their anger is a venue problem."
He almost smiled. "I will behave."
"That is even more unsettling."
The Conservatory looked like a greenhouse designed by someone who had never dirtied their hands.
Glass walls. Lemon trees in stone planters.
Long tables draped in linen beneath strings of soft lights.
The rehearsal dinner began at seven. By six forty-five, every candle was lit and every guest had a place card.
I wore a dark green dress with a high neckline and long sleeves.
It was professional enough for work, elegant enough not to embarrass the man arriving beside me in a black coat.
Damian had not commented when I came downstairs.
He had only looked at me for one second too long before saying, "You look ready. "
It was not a compliment. It was better than one.
The car stopped outside the Conservatory. Through the glass doors, I could see Natalie and her fiancé greeting guests. A few people turned toward us as Damian got out first, then offered his hand.
I did not need it. I took it anyway.