Page 116 of The Enslaved Duet

I could have moved to any of their cities. It would have been an incredible comfort to wrap myself in their love as balm against the sucking black hole of missing and misery that lay in my chest where my heart used to be, but I didn’t.

First, I didn’t want them to see how broken I was. They would have questions I didn’t have answers for, and they wouldn’t let things lie if it looked like I was in pain.

I had to get a handle on myself before I could go to them.

Secondly, I needed a job. I thought, given my previous experience in Italy, that it was the obvious place to do so.

I’d been wrong, but I’d sent the bulk of my money to my family members, and I didn’t have enough to book a flight even if I wanted to. I was crashing on my friend Erika’s couch and that was getting old quick because she had a boyfriend who was gross enough to hit on me whenever she wasn’t home.

So there I was, stuck in Milan with my sorrow and without a hope.

I tilted my head back farther, letting the rain pelt me in the face. I could feel the rush of water drenching my black wrap dress, sluicing over my hair like a religious cleansing, a rebirth, or a baptism. I was lost to religion forever, but I enjoyed the metaphor. My fingers unfurled and my palms rounded so that I would feel the rain run through my fingers.

I just stood there like a crazy person, smiling because I was free to stand there like a crazy person, and no one was going to stop me.

I’d fought so hard for so many things that had escaped me, but this, this freedom, was something I would neverevertake for granted.

“Scusi,” a cool, slightly accented voice interrupted my reverie. “Stai bene?”

I righted myself and took in the frankly gorgeous man before me who was nearly as waterlogged as I was. His dark copper hair dripped over his forehead, partially shielding the vivid, nearly electric blue of his eyes as he peered down at me in concern. He was tall—not as tall as Alexander or Dante, but I’d yet to meet anyone who was—and trim but fit beneath his trench coat.

If I’d been a normal girl with a normal past, I might have blushed and flirted with such an attractive stranger.

But I wasn’t that girl.

In fact, the primary reason I found myself drawn in by him was because of the aloof cast to his mouth and the stern set of his features. Even though he was clearly concerned about the crazy woman happily getting drenched in the rain, he didn’t really care.

That apathy stirred something in me, a strange combination of empathy and allure.

I answered him in English, just guessing at his accent. “I’m fine, thank you. I enjoy the rain.”

His lips twitched, drawing my attention to the firm, perfectly formed mouth. “I wonder if it might be better enjoyed from the café behind you, maybe over a hotcaffè latte? I’m not sure if you are aware, but your teeth are chattering.”

I froze and noticed that my teeth did not follow suit. “Oh.”

His mouth pulled even higher in the barest hint of a smile. “Allow me?” I stared at him as he offered me his coat, putting it around my shoulders before gently leading me over to the small café beside the restaurant I’d applied at.

“Do you normally like to play with life and death by standing out in the freezing rain?” he queried drolly as he stepped forward to grab the door for me.

A surprised laugh bubbled up as I thought about it. “Not in this particular way, no, but you’d be surprised how often I straddle that fine line.”

He cocked an eyebrow at me, a hand hovering over the small of my back in an old-fashioned gentlemanly way as he led me into the café and over to a small table. “You look like a goddess from the underworld. I don’t find that surprising at all.”

I beamed at him, surprising even myself with the vividness of my expression. His comparison had solidified my regard for him.

Anyone who likened me to Persephone, I decided, had an unerring sense of character.

“And you the miraculous Hermes who could cross into the underworld unscathed to rescue me and take me back to my mother?” I asked him, testing him because only someone well versed in mythology would know the details of Hades and his Queen’s story.

His eyes twinkled even though his lips stayed flat. I took him for a man who didn’t smile often and wondered what I would have to do to change that.

It was a surprising thought, but I let myself have it because I’d been obsessing over the wrong man for so long, it felt good to care even momentarily about a good one.

“Unfortunately, I think I am the messenger who will be forced to take you back tomymother,” he explained as the small bell above the café door sounded and a beautiful dark-skinned woman swept into the room.

I recognized her immediately and not only because she was fairly well known in the fashion world. I knew the perfectly coiffed head of caramel highlighted waves and the gorgeous slant of her cheekbones because I had met her before.

Willa Percy had been a judge at the St. Aubyn panel when I’d auditioned what seemed like a lifetime ago.