Sapphire Flames (Hidden Legacy 4)

My sister shook her head. “I’m not involved.”

“You rode in Brick. You’re involved. I’m the Head of the House and I’m ordering you to hold him down so I can stuff this pepper up his nose.”

Alessandro moved into my path, put his hands around my waist, and picked me up. Everything stopped. He was holding me effortlessly five inches above the floor. He was touching me.

Leon made a break for the doorway.

“Put me down,” I growled.

“No, you’ve gone mad with power.”

“Alessandro!”

“It’s eight fifteen,” he said. “We have bigger fish to fry. Call Linus. Or I can keep holding you just like this. I don’t mind.”

Runa put her hands to her mouth, making a funnel with her fingers, and dramatically whispered. “Door number two.”

The fight went out of me. “I’ll make the call.”

Alessandro lowered me back to the floor. He held on to me for another long breath and slowly let go. I marched to the cutting board, dumped the chopped habaneros into the bowl, and pulled my gloves off. “Arabella, please put this into the food processor, pulse on high for three minutes, pour it in a pan, and simmer it for ten. Don’t let it burn. Also, I’m taking your Mercedes for this trip.”

“Yes, Your Highness.”

I made a face at her and reached for the phone.

The moment we got into the car, Alessandro morphed back into a killer. The slick veneer of polish he projected in the kitchen dissolved into calm alertness. He wasn’t on edge, but he was ready, his magic coiled and simmering just under the surface. Right now, he was lying back in the passenger seat, his eyes closed. We were making our way west, to Cat Spring, a tiny town about an hour out of Houston.

Alessandro could look like multiple people. There was Instagram Alessandro, meeting my family, charming and harmless. There was sexy Alessandro, flirting and too hot for real life, posing on my bed and petting my dog. There was Alessandro the Count, in an expensive tailored suit, and Alessandro the Prime, frighteningly competent, his power an impenetrable wall wrapping around him at the trials. None of them was a lie. He put them on like clothes to match the occasion.

But his default was this, a relaxed but ready killer. Assassin in repose. That’s what he was when he didn’t have to be anything else. I wondered if anyone besides me ever saw him like this.

They probably did. Just before he killed them.

“How many people have you killed?”

He glanced at me. “Why is that important?”

“I just want to know.”

“There is no upside to this conversation. How do you quantify it? What’s the right number? More than ten? More than twenty? When do I become a monster, banished from family meals?”

What brought that on? “Do you even know how many people you’ve killed?”

“Do you?”

“Three with my sword in Keystone. Three more upstairs on my orders, so I didn’t do it myself, but I was there. Another two at the escalator. And Lawrence. So, nine.”

“Impressive. If you keep going like this, in a couple of years you might catch up to me.”

“Is that based on the average number of people killed per week?”

He looked at me.

“I’m just asking because an average year has roughly fifty-two weeks, two years would have a hundred and four and at a rate of nine murders a week, it would amount to nine hundred and thirty-six . . .”

“Does your brain ever take a break?” he asked.

It did every time he said my name, or he touched me. Or propositioned me in my bedroom while I was wearing a towel, but he didn’t need to know that. “Do you ever answer a direct question?”

“Yes.”

Touché.

A ranch-to-market road wound its way through copses of oaks. We took a smooth turn and the trees on the left parted to reveal a picturesque lake, perfectly smooth like the surface of a mirror.

My phone chimed a triumphant little note. I knew that sound. That was Alessandro’s Instagram alert chime. I reached for the phone, but he grabbed it first. He really was ridiculously fast.

“Give me back my phone.”

“I thought so. You have an alert that tells you when I post.” He looked unbearably smug, like a cat who had just licked the steak left to rest on the counter and gotten away with it.

“I have many accounts on alert.”

“You follow your sisters, your cousins, your grandmother, and me.”

I really hated technology. “How did you even find my profile?” I’d made sure to not post pictures of myself or link it anywhere.

“I looked at Nevada’s friend list.”

The road forked, and I took a left onto a small private drive. An iron gate seated into a stone wall blocked access. Usually wrought-iron letters announced the name of the property, but there was nothing above the gate except a sign that said private property. The gate swung open and I maneuvered the Mercedes through.

“So let me get this straight, the great Alessandro Sagredo took the time to look for me on Instagram, and when you couldn’t find me, you looked up my sister and went through her friend list one by one until you figured out which of her three hundred–odd followers belonged to me?”

“Yes.”

People in glass villas shouldn’t throw boulders, Signor Sagredo. “And why would you do that?”

He gave me his wolfish grin. “I wanted a picture for the frame on my nightstand.”

I opened my mouth. Nothing came out.

Alessandro shook the phone at me. “Don’t you want to see what I posted?”

When I got my hands on that damn phone, I would throw it out the window. Then I would stop the car and go look for it, because all my contacts and business things were on there, but throwing it would make me feel so much better.

The road turned. A grand driveway rolled out in front of us, flanked on both sides by enormous mature live oaks. Their branches, green despite winter, braided above the road into a beautiful canopy. At the end of that long green tunnel a giant house waited.

Built with beige stone, Duncan’s mansion sprawled at the top of a very low hill like a medieval fortress. Its lines managed a nod to both a Spanish castillo and a Mediterranean villa, but it was unmistakably Texas. Thick walls, terracotta tile roof, circular driveway, enormous mission-style doors; everything about it said Southwest and wealth. One look at the house and you knew it was custom built to match one person’s vision. There was no other house like it.

Alessandro blinked. “What did he call it on the phone?”

“His little ranch.”

He swore.

“Before we go in there, I need to warn you. Linus Duncan is a Hephaestus Prime,” I said. “Named after the Greek God of weapon smithing.”

“I’ve dealt with Hephaestus Primes before.”

“Not like him. He can make an antitank grenade launcher out of scrap metal in seconds and explode our car with it. You have to be on your best behavior. There are weapons everywhere in that compound.”

Alessandro smiled.

“I mean it, Alessandro. You’re too vain to die.”

He reached over and grasped my left hand, his face solemn, his eyes earnest. “Tesoro mio, I’m always on my best behavior.” He brushed his lips against my fingers.

“Stop that! I’m serious.”

“Fine, fine. I’ll mind my manners.”

We reached the driveway and passed through a second set of gates, standing wide open. I parked and we got out.

The tops of two short towers rising from the second story split and twin turrets slid out, bristling with barrels. Behind us identical turrets emerged from the wall.

Alessandro arched his eyebrows, a calculating look in his eyes.

“No,” I told him.

The tall mahogany and wrought-iron doors swung open. An older man strode out wearing jeans, a sweater, and a black cook’s apron. Tall and still athletic, with a Texas tan and a wealth of wavy hair that used to be black and now was mostly silver, he cut a striking figure. His features were bold and handsome: square jaw, large nose, lively hazel eyes under the sweep of wide brows. He saw me and smiled, his teeth even and white. The warmth from that smile sparked all the way to his eyes, making the crow’s feet at their corners stand out. His whole face lit up, as if I had brought him a gift he’d always wanted.

Linus Duncan raised his arms. “My dear, finally. I made fajitas. I used your guacamole recipe. I think I’ve got it, but it might need a pinch of salt.”

“You said he was sort of a friend,” Alessandro murmured.

“I might have understated. He’s more like a favorite uncle we’re all scared of. Best behavior. You promised.”

I ran up the three steps to the front doors and hugged Linus.

Linus’ Houston mansion was elegant and refined, with exquisite molding, frescos, and ten-thousand-dollar chandeliers. At the ranch, however, Linus went full Texas. Everything was stone and mahogany and huge fireplaces.

Alessandro squinted at the deer antler chandelier and drawled in a perfect imitation of a local, “Teeeksus.”

I elbowed him and hissed, “Stop it.”

Ahead of us, Linus turned. “People expect it.”

We followed him through the great room and a sunroom to the outside, to a massive patio of Oklahoma stone and a state-of-the-art outdoor kitchen. Padded chairs ringed a table filled with all the things fajitas required, shredded cheese in a pretty bowl, grilled peppers, guacamole, sliced tomatoes, chips, salsa, and queso. An enormous chiminea outdoor fireplace lorded over it all, the fire blazing in its hearth.