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She nodded tightly. She couldn’t help but feel a twinge of anger. Why hadn’t Ryland told her that he couldturn into a wolf?
“They’re shifters,” he explained.
The ground beneath them started to shake and vibrate. They lurched forward, leaving no doubt in Caroline’s mind that they were moving fast and forward.
Oh, shit! We’re in the back of a truck.
Panicked, she looked around her at the truck bed. Now that her eyes were used to the darkness, she could see their surroundings more clearly. There were deep gouges in the floor where crates had been moved over and over again. The old scents of water and wet earth were heavy, as if there had once been a big garden in the truck.
Caroline laid her head back.
This was bad.
She had no way of contacting Joan to let her know that things had taken a turn. Would Joan take it out on her brother if Caroline never returned? Was Aaron safe? Or would Joan believe that Caroline had abandoned her brother?
“This is all your and your friend’s fault,” Salvatore coughed. “Digging up the past like that.”
“We’re not the ones who dug all this up. Two people who owned vases were murdered. In the same way. Their vases vanished.”
Salvatore shook his head only once, wincing at the pain. “No. Dino wasn’t killed for the vase. He couldn’t have been.”
“Why not?”
“He’s got Bonetti blood. He can’t be harmed. They didn’t do this.”
She paused, confused. “What do you mean he can’t be harmed?” Surely this poor old man didn’t believe that the vases could actually grant immortality. Yes, she’d seen Ryland shift into a wolf, but that didn’t mean people could go on living forever. She shook her head, desperate to make sense of her world again.
“No Bonetti can be harmed by them … the beasts. It’s the way it’s always been.”
Caroline sighed. He wasn’t making much sense.Definitely concussed, poor, sweet old man. “I’m not sure I understand. You should probably just tell me everything you know.” He hesitated, but she pressed on. “We are going to die, or at the very least, be in here a long time. Might as well keep me entertained.” Hopefully, her airy tone would comfort Salvatore and hide her terror.
With a deep sigh, he relented. “The family legend is that we are related to Fabiola, the artist who made the vases. There’s no way to know for sure. It’s been too long, but when my great-grandfather planted his olive groves, he found them. Well, three of them. He kept them safe, and they were willed down with the land.”
She and Ryland were partially correct … Luigi hadn’t buried the vases. Apparently, someone before him buried them, and to get rid of the undiscovered ones and the curse, he had to sell the land.
A few tears rolled down Salvatore’s wrinkled cheeks. “The other vases are hidden in the land somewhere. Buried deep. The lynxes, the Canals, they’ve been after the vases for a long time now. They were furious when Luigi gave his vases away. And then the third was taken by Isadora.”
Caroline perked up. “Luigi only gave one of the vases to the museum.”
Salvatore shook his head. “No. He gave two. The third was taken by his daughter and given to the Fiore family. Her in-laws. I bet they’re just as plagued by the lynxes as us. Even with their flowers spread out all over god’s green earth.”
Caroline’s mind was reeling. Who had told them that Luigi Bonetti had only given one vase to the museum? Ryland had told her, but she couldn’t remember who told him. It was right there on the tip of her tongue. But as she tried to dig through her memory, she gasped.
“Herin-laws!” The Fiore shop back in New York had something to do with this. She was sure of it. The truck smelled like a flower shop. Perhaps the Fiores had shops on the other side of the world too. They had taken her … Why? Because she was looking into the murders? Weretheythe ones who sent the man in black?
Her blood ran cold as she remembered the scarred face of the man following her. Had he been a lynx? How was any of this possible? She couldn’t connect her thoughts together, and it drove her to grunt in frustration.
Maybe the fear made her brain foggy. Maybe she had a concussion too.
It wasn’t every day a girl was abducted by two men from an Italian countryside villa.
“Okay,” she took a deep breath. “If only one of the vases was given to the Fiores, why are the lynxes mad about it?”
Salvatore fidgeted. “I feel sick. I don’t want to talk anymore.”
Caroline was sure it was a lie. She wanted to press the old man more, but he wouldn’t answer her questions. All she could do was sit with her hands bound, on her way to god-knows-where at the hands of god-knows-who.
There was only one thought that kept Caroline from full-blown panic.
