44. Cassie
CASSIE
The bedroom at the hotel was every bit as gorgeous as the rest of the suite, the huge bed right up against a wall of glass that continued from the big picture window in the adjacent living room.
Sitting on the bed, I could look out over the sea and feel like I was hovering over the water.
I didn’t bother unpacking. I had no idea how long we’d be on the island and I wanted to make it easy to leave quickly if we had to follow Alina to her next destination in the hopes of finding her father.
Instead I took a shower in the luxurious bathroom, outfitted floor to ceiling in earthy brown marble.
My eyelids were heavy by the time I dried off and changed into a clean T-shirt and underwear. I knew the Hawks were ordering food, but honestly?
I just wanted to sleep.
I crawled between the sheets in the King-size bed and sighed as my head sunk into the pillow.
It was the last thing I remembered.
It was dark when I woke up, the suite filled with the scent of men: body wash and shampoo, aftershave and cologne.
It was the aphrodisiac to end all aphrodisiacs, and I stretched happily, feeling lucky even though we were in Capri to hunt the man who’d killed my parents.
The man who’d tried to kill the Hawks and me.
The door pushed open and Hawk walked into the dark room, his broad shoulders and strong jaw backlit by the crack of light that leaked in from the suite’s living room.
“Good, you’re awake.” He sat on the edge of the bed and reached out to touch my face. “How are you feeling?”
“Starving,” I said as my stomach rumbled.
“I’m not surprised,” he said. “We didn’t want to wake you when the food came.”
“I’m glad you didn’t. I think I needed the sleep even more than the food.”
“You want to stay in tonight?” he asked. “We can handle next steps.”
I shook my head. “I’m coming.”
I’d spent the first part of my adult life on the sidelines, letting Bram take care of anything even remotely inconvenient. If we were going to figure out how to get in to the White Night gala, I wanted to be there.
“Then get dressed mouse. We’re going out.”
We met Bram in the lobby, and for a split second, I almost didn’t recognize my brother.
Instead of ripped jeans, a black T-shirt, and his boots, he wore tailored gray slacks, a black button-down shirt, and dress shoes with no socks.
He’d slicked back his hair, and the scar that ran down his face — a scar he’d gotten in the accident with our parents — only made him look more handsome and mysterious.
“Wow,” I said, “who knew you cleaned up so nice?”
He frowned. “Gee, thanks.”
“I’m just saying. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen you in anything but jeans.”
“I’m not an idiot. I know how to dress, and we have to fit in here.” He looked at me. “Who taught you how to dress? Because it definitely wasn’t me.”
I laughed. I’d had to fight him to get a prom dress that wasn’t high-necked and below the knee.
“Lucky for you I have other sources.”
This dress had been waiting in the hotel, courtesy of the Hawks, when I woke up from my nap.
And this dress most definitely wasn’t high-necked and below the knee.
A swirl of metallic gold and green, the dress was microscopic. Body-skimming rather than body-hugging, it barely covered my ass, the straight bodice suspended by slim straps that matched the dress.
It was perfect for Capri, and I wondered which of the Hawks had picked it out.
I’d put my hair up, pulling out a few tendrils to fall around my face, and kept my makeup light and sheer.
“Let’s get the fuck out of here,” Vigo said, adjusting the collar on his silky black vest. His arms were bare underneath, his inked biceps on full display. “I’m starving.”
“You literally just ate the entire room service menu a few hours ago,” Jagger said.
“So? I have a fast metabolism.”
Hawk took my hand as we left the hotel.
He leaned over, his lips brushing against my neck, and a shiver traveled up my spine. “You look good enough to eat, mouse.”
Outside, we piled into one of the waiting taxis and made our way down the winding road to the town nestled at the bottom of the cliff. It had been pretty during the day, the multicolored buildings a bright contrast to the pale blue, crystalline water close to shore.
But at night? At night Capri was a fairytale.
The taxi let us out on the main drag and we walked along cobblestone streets illuminated by the glow of lanterns strung overhead.
Music and laughter spilled out of taverns, bistros, and restaurants, festivity in the air as couples walked arm in arm and groups of friends conversed while they strolled.
Outdoor dining was plentiful, and my stomach grumbled as the scent of grilled fish and roasted tomatoes hit my nose.
I was with Vigo: I was starving.
Bram walked ahead, taking it all in, and I realized that he and I had never been anywhere together.
He’d taken me to Blackwell Bay when I’d been a kid, day trips I remembered both for the sun and sea and also for the sight of Bram, sitting awkwardly on a blanket, looking like he’d never seen a beach before while I built sandcastles.
But we’d never taken a real vacation, had never had an entirely new experience together, not since the vacations our parents had taken us on when we’d been kids, mostly road trips to national parks that involved tents, campfires, and hiking.
I was suddenly glad he was here, not just because he would help us find Dimitri Kaprolov but because he was my brother and I was happy to have this memory with him, this night before anything could be tainted by whatever Dimitri might choose to rain down on our family next.
“Your arms are cold,” Hawk said.
“Are they?” I rubbed my arms and realized he was right: I was cold. “I guess so.”
He paused to take the cardigan I’d brought (just in case) out of my hand, then slipped it onto my shoulders. “Better?”
I nodded. “Thank you.”
“Let’s try this one,” Jagger said, stopping at a stone building with a simple sign that read da Paolino.
We followed a well-dressed couple inside to an intimate dining room with soft lights.
A small Italian man asked how many people were in each of our parties, then held up a finger. “Un momento.”
We waited while he led the couple through a set of open patio doors.
“This is so nice,” I said. “It smells like lemon.”
The scent was tangy and strong, and I was hit with another wave of hunger.
“Wait until you try the grilled mozzarella on lemon leaves,” Jagger said.
I looked up at him, handsome and elegant in a silky dark blue shirt that exposed a large expanse of his tattooed chest. “You’ve been here before?”
“Once or twice,” he said.
The host returned a moment later and picked up five more menus. “Per favore, mi segua.”
He led us through an intimate dining room with soft lights and out onto a large patio.
It was so beautiful I almost stopped walking.
Lemons hung overhead like bright yellow baubles, the trees arcing inward from the sides of the stone patio.
Several trellised eating areas had been arranged around the edges of the terrace to provided a private dining experience.
Underneath the canopy of lemons, candlelight flickered from the tables while lanterns, hung in the lemon trees, glowed overhead.
I couldn’t believe I was here, so far from Blackwell Falls, couldn’t believe something so beautiful had existed the entire time and I hadn’t even been aware of it because I’d been too busy being Coffee Shop Cassie.
Except I wasn’t Coffee Shop Cassie anymore.
Coffee Shop Cassie didn’t wear a tiny dress and the highest of heels. Coffee Shop Cassie didn’t fuck three men at the same time. Coffee Shop Cassie didn’t travel on a private jet to an Italian island, tucked away in the Tyrrhenian Sea like a jewel.
Coffee Shop Cassie was dead.
I waited while Hawk pulled out a chair at our table under the lemon trees, felt the brush of his lips against my bare shoulder when he helped me scoot in.
“This is so beautiful,” I said, looking up into the lantern-lit lemon trees. “Like a storybook.”
“Someday we’ll come back,” Jagger promised. “When we can sleep in and lay on the beach and eat until we’re sick.”
“I already did that in the hotel room,” Vigo said. “But I’m fine now.”
Jagger ordered for the table and Vigo told us about Capri — how the island was a retreat for the Romans, how Tiberius spent the last decade of his life there, how it eventually became a target for Barbary pirates — while we waited for the food.
It was magical listening to him talk while we sipped limoncello and munched on focaccia with fresh rosemary, like falling back through time, the scent of lemon bright in the air.
Then the food started coming and everything was forgotten as we dined on crisp calamari (caught just that morning), fried zucchini flowers stuffed with ricotta, creamy seafood risotto, fettuccini with lemons and clams, and salmon tartare with avocado and ponzu sauce.
There were so many courses I lost count, each one more delicious than the last, but the food was so light, so fresh, that I wasn’t even full when the wait staff cleared our plates.
Jagger ordered an array of desserts and excused himself to go to the men’s room.
“So how do we get to Alina?” Bram asked.
We’d put off talking about Alina and Dimitri, but now that we’d eaten, it was time to get serious. As much as I would have preferred to be in Capri on vacation, that wasn’t why we were here.
We needed to find Alina and stay on her until she met up with Dimitri.
“We get into the White Night gala,” Vigo said.
“Easier said than done,” I said. “It’s invitation only, and the invitations are issued to socialites, tech bros, celebrities, and fashion designers.”
We stopped talking when our server returned bearing several desserts: a flourless chocolate cake made with almonds, a small lattice-topped tart, a piece of yellow cake dripping syrup, tiramisu, and a lemon pouf I knew from the menu was the delizia al limone, a lemon sponge cake with lemon cream and limoncello.
“This looks amazing,” I said, wondering where to start.
Vigo dug into the chocolate cake. “Hmmm, wow. That’s good.”
“We should wait for Jagger.” I looked over my shoulder, past the well-heeled diners around us, toward the restrooms where Jagger had disappeared into the restaurant.
Where was he?
“No way,” Vigo said. “He snoozes he loses.”
Bram picked up a fork and tried the lemon sponge cake. “So how do we get in?”
Jagger slid into his seat. “Like this.”
He set two thick vellum envelopes on the table.
“What are those?” I asked.
He picked up a spoon and went in for some tiramisu. “Open one.”
I hesitated, then opened the flap on one of the envelopes.
When I saw what it was, I shoved the thick card stock back into the envelope and looked around.
“Are you crazy?” I asked him.
“Is that a rhetorical question?” He tried to feed me a bite of the tiramisu, but I frowned and he set down the spoon.
“Where did you get these?”
“The couple that came in before us,” he said. “He’s a private equity big shot. I saw the envelopes sticking out of her bag.”
I leaned over the table so the people next to us wouldn’t hear. “So you stole them?”
“Sure, if you want to call it that,” Jagger said.
“What would you call it?”
Jagger laughed. “Lightening her load.”
“So we have two invitations to the gala,” Bram said.
Silence settled over the table in the moment before Vigo looked from me to Hawk and Jagger.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”