Page 65 of Enduring Caine
Were these the ones Vincenzo was looking for? Did one of them hold the key to the TPC’s investigation? And if so, did Elliot need the photos I’d taken anymore? Was I taking on a huge risk for something unnecessary?
My stomach clenched. Or it could have been the delivery Johann was telling Henri about. Maybe he’d lied to me about smuggling in foreign wine? Or maybe he timed that delivery to arrive with this one as a cover?
“What’s this now?” snapped Giovanni, striding over to them. “The delivery was supposed to be Saturday.”
A bodyguard trailed behind the delivery men, holding a sheet of paper. “Sorry, signore, but Leonardo said you were waiting for—”
“Saturday!” Giovanni ripped the paper from his guard and thrust it toward Cristian. His sudden rage left me speechless, showing a hint of the man Antonio often described, which I hadn’t seen yet. “Deal with this.”
Cristian unfolded the sheet, scanned it, and approached the delivery men.
“Perhaps we should move the tour to its next stage?” Giovanni came to my side, gesturing toward the door, making it clear his question was an order.
Antonio and Cesca nodded, and I moved behind them to leave.
“Wow!” The delivery man responsible for holding the crates on the dolly took off his cap and wiped a sleeve across his brow. He scanned the walls and ceiling. “It’s like a museum in here.”
One of the crates began to tip. The man pulling the dolly swore under his breath and rushed around to catch it before it fell, and he knocked into me.
My wine glass crashed to the marble floor, shattering and spilling what little was left—thankfully missing the rugs. “Oh my god, I’m sorry!” I knelt to pick up the shards, but Giovanni gripped me by the elbow before I got to the floor.
“I’ll have one of the maids clean it up.” He gave me a tight smile, as though he were the one apologizing for the interruption. “Go see the stars and the wine cellar. We still have tomorrow morning if there’s anything else you want to see.”
Chapter 28
Samantha
“There!”Ijabbedafinger against the window, toward the third shooting star I’d seen. “Did you see that one?”
“I missed it.” Antonio stood behind me, arms wrapped around my waist, head on my shoulder. “I was too distracted by my own my guiding star.”
The view from the top of the tower was breathtaking. Seven stories up, the room provided an unobstructed 360-degree panorama of the sky, the sea, of Cittavera, and the countryside for miles. The peaked ceiling was low at the edges, with wide, short windows surrounding us.
In that moment, it was easy to forget where we were. No stolen paintings, no smugglers, no sneaking around, risking my life. Just me and the man I loved watching the stars track across the clear night.
“You’re a cheeseball.”
“But you love it.” He tightened his grip with his good arm.
“Sometimes,” I chuckled.
“Wait until the sun comes up,” he whispered. “This was my peaceful place. I used to spend hours up here, sketching.”
“When the tower was built, was there a room here? Or was it open?”
“Originally, there were two more stories and the top floor was open. The roof was added a century or so ago, long after the earthquake that knocked off the top stories. The people in town say the windows were added fifty or sixty years ago.”
I rubbed my hands over his arms, let my eyes flutter closed as I inhaled deeply. Vanilla combined with amber from him, plus damp stone from the tower.
His left hand rose, caressing his knuckles up my belly between my breasts to stroke my necklace. “Did it work?”
I’d spied one security camera in the top far corner of this room when we entered, one of the low-profile dome style that were harder to spot. We couldn’t speak openly, but Antonio’s meaning was obvious to me. “No idea. I hope so.”
He lifted the pendant and made a quiet noise of question.
My gaze fell to the flat disc, to the rear of what he was inspecting. I sucked in a quick breath. “Fuck.”
Elliot’s camera wasn’t there.