Page 33 of Sigma
The second time, his hand catches me, lifts me. He waits until I’m steady, and then offers me his hand.
Instead of taking it, I slip off the Louboutins and hold them in the fingers of one hand, trailing the other along the wall.
He drops his hand.
Down, down, down the circling stair, to the heavy door; at the base of the stairs, I step back into my heels. Back through the covered walkway, beyond which now are the purple shadows of the gloaming, hiding the vines and hills. Through the winding, branching maze of hallways. We come a set of huge glass doors, currently propped open. I smell night-blooming jasmine. There’s an ancient, gnarled tree in the small, intimate courtyard, leaning to one side, stretching arthritic fingers heavenward, leaves rustling against each other in the soft breeze. Fairy lights drape over the lower hanging branches, casting a fae amber glow. Flagstones surround the tree, and a ring of irises, crocuses, and lilies—now closed for the evening—surround the base of the trunk. There’s a small, wrought-iron table with a marble top in the far corner, with a pair of matching wrought-iron chairs. A single candle burns on the table, flickering and dancing.
The jasmine is planted along the walls in a narrow stripe of cedar, the scent redolent and heady.
This courtyard is our destination, it seems, and I’m awed at it, despite myself. It’s beyond lovely—it’s magical.
My captor leads us to the table, slides out the chair, and tucks it in under me as I sit. His manners are, honestly, genteel and exquisite.
He takes his seat after me. On one side of the table is a silver stand with a bottle of white wine on ice, two stemmed glasses accompanying it. The bottle has been opened already and recorked, so all he has to do is remove the cork and pour, which he does with deft grace.
He hands me a glass. For a moment, I think he’s about to offer me a toast, which would have probably made me burst into laughter at the absurdity of it all.
Instead, he puts his nose in the glass and inhales, swirling. Eyes me over the rim. “I am Apollo.” He sips, swirls, sniffs, sips. Shrugs.
I sip the wine—it has a lush, soft body, and it’s not too sweet. “It’s good,” I say, if only to fill the silence.
He nods. Gestures with a hand. “Grown and bottled here.” A look at me. “Your parents own vineyards.” It’s a leading statement, not a question.
I nod. “In France, California, and Italy. I’ve only been to the vineyard in Italy, though.”
His eyes meet mine, holding that poker face he’s so good at it. “A lovely vineyard, indeed. The wine grown there is some of the best. The pinot noir, especially, is divine. Notes of blackberry and leather, with a long, elegant finish.”
I frown—I heard the vintner at the estate once describe their pinot noir in almost exactly those same terms. “You’ve been there?”
“Of course.”
At that moment, a middle-aged woman with graying black hair arrives, bearing a tray laden with soup and salad. She’s dressed in all black, wears a long black apron, and addresses Apollo in Spanish.
He listens, nods, responds, and then she sets a soup and a salad in front of each of us, and then places a spoon and fork in precise positions on either side of the arrangements, finishing by laying napkins on each of our laps.
Apollo merely nods, and she retreats.
There’s no more attempt at small talk from him. He eats slowly, as if savoring each bite, his eyes now and again flicking to me before returning to his place. There’s no more staring at me, either.
The food is, as I would expect, of a quality found in a Michelin-starred establishment. The soup is a lobster bisque, the salad field greens and spinach with walnuts, diced fresh cherries, and a light vinaigrette.
I go slowly with the wine, and I notice he does as well, only sipping now and again. We’ve both barely finished the first glass by the time the main course arrives—salmon served on a cedar plank, with whipped feta, garbanzo beans, and some sort of tart pickled root vegetable. The salmon is so fresh it must surely have been caught within twenty-four hours, meaning we must be near one of the coasts, either Atlantic or Mediterranean; taking into consideration the Greek-language novels and dictionaries, I would assume the Mediterranean.
We’re nearly through the meal when a tall man in a gray suit with a blue tie enters the courtyard—he’s older, perhaps fifty, with hair that was once black but is now more silver. As he leans to whisper in Apollo’s ear, I see a pistol in a shoulder holster under his suit coat.
Apollo listens, nods, and dabs his lips with his napkin. “Will you excuse me a moment, Corinna?”
I put down my fork. “All right.”
God, it’s all so odd. The weirdest kidnapping there surely has ever been. The manners, the aristocratic bearing, the tower, the food, the wine…
And slicing my clothes off.
Locking me up in, as he put it, a gilded cage…but doing sopolitely.
I sit alone in the courtyard for five minutes, maybe closer to ten.
Apollo returns alone, takes his seat. “My apologies, Corinna.” He notices I’ve merely waited for him. “You should have kept eating.”