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"I got her name from one of my associates.When he was working art crimes for the FBI, he used her as a resource.I sent her a text earlier, and she responded when I was on my way home from the airport.We can meet her at eleven a.m.tomorrow."
"Great.Maybe she'll be able to tell us why Tomas and Lucinda's paintings are important."
"That's what I'm hoping.What do you say we call it a night?"
"I guess."Reluctance filled her gaze, but she closed her computer and got to her feet."I am tired.I think it was the tea."
"I'll turn off the lights if you want to go upstairs."
"Okay, thanks."
After she left, he rechecked the back door and then turned out the lights in the kitchen and the rest of the downstairs before moving up to the second floor.
He entered his bedroom, which still felt like his teenaged haven.His grandmother hadn't changed much in the room, although she'd replaced the bedspread, but there were still some movie posters from his youth and an old guitar that his grandfather had encouraged him to play.He'd refused to do that because he didn't want to get involved in any part of music.That was his parents' world, not his.
Marcus used to tell him he'd had some talent as a boy, and he'd probably inherited that from his mother or his father.He'd also suggested that maybe Nick would understand his parents better if he entered their world.Of course, as a teenager, he'd said no to all those suggestions.His life would never be a part of their world.
Sitting down on the bed, he kicked off his shoes, then stretched out and stared at the ceiling.He'd been a stubborn kid.He was a stubborn man, too, but being back in Italy, surrounded by his family's heritage, he wondered if he hadn't been a little narrow-minded.Maybe not about his parents, but about the rest of the family.He'd spent time with two of his cousins, but that was it.Now, he was intrigued by the bigger family, by a great-grandfather he knew nothing about.
Isabella was intrigued by her family as well, maybe even bordering on obsessed.Some of that obsession tonight probably came from not wanting to think about almost dying.She compartmentalized her feelings by diving immediately into something else.
He'd done the same thing many times.Frowning, he told himself they were not at all alike, but that thought was beginning to feel wrong because they shared a lot of similarities.Not that it mattered.Nothing was going to happen between them.
Closing his eyes, he tried to turn off his brain, but his mind wasn't cooperating.It kept circulating unanswered questions around and around in his head, creating more tension, more frustration, and a worry that if he didn't figure things out fast, he and Isabella would never get ahead of what might be coming next.
When he heard footsteps above him, his eyes flew open.Isabella wasn't sleeping, either.
After another ten minutes of hearing her pace, he rolled out of bed and went up the stairs, seeing the light under the door.He knocked."Isabella?"
She opened the door a moment later, wearing a T-shirt over a pair of pajama bottoms, her hair a beautiful, wavy mess, her eyes troubled, annoyed, and wary at the same time.
"What?"she asked.
"I can't sleep."
"Well, drink some more tea."
"Is that what you're going to do, because you're not sleeping, either.I could hear you pacing from my room.Are you worried someone will come back tonight?"
"No.Yes.Maybe."She tucked her hair behind her ears."I don't know."
"I think we're safe for tonight."
"But you don't know that."
"That's true," he agreed."Can I come in?"
"Why?"
"Because we could both use the company."He moved past her before she could kick him out and sat down on the chaise lounge across from the bed."I remember this.It used to be downstairs.My grandmother loved to read in it.I wonder why she moved it up here."
Isabella shrugged and sat down on her bed."Who knows?I think this is a junk room/sewing room," she said, tipping her head to the sewing machine in the corner and a box of fabrics.
"Do you sew?"
"Not even a little bit.Do you?"
"Less than that.My grandmother once tried to show me how to sew on a button, but I was not a good student."
