He shook his head. “You don’t owe me anything.”
“Don’t be careless.” She met his eyes. “I don’t offer favors lightly.”
“Good. Neither do I.”
Ben arrived in Rome before noon the next day. He caught a taxi to the Pantheon and walked a few blocks to Residenza di Spada, his uncle’s home in the city. He turned his key in the massive door that faced the road, only to have the latch click and the door swing in, revealing Fabia behind it.
“You didn’t call me!” She was dressed in a summer dress and sandals. It might have been fall, but it was still warm for most of the day. “I told you last night I’d pick you up.”
He slung an arm around her shoulders. “I didn’t want to ride on the back of your scooter from Termini.”
“I can drive, you know. There’s a car here.”
He shrugged. “Easier to take a cab. I’m fine.”
“You’re injured.” She turned his chin to the side. “I cannot believe you haven’t been to see the doctor.”
“It’s better than it was.”
“Which makes it even more horrific that you didn’t go. Dr. Mariano is coming this afternoon.”
He groaned. “Seriously, Fabi, all I want is a nap.”
“So take a nap. And then Dr. Mariano will check you out and I won’t be as much of a pest. Also, Chloe has been trying to call.”
He checked his watch. “I’ll call her tonight.”
“Also…” She ushered him into the kitchen and nudged him toward a kitchen chair. “There is more mail.”
He cut his eyes toward the counter where she stacked the mail. “What is it?”
“Chloe forwarded some things from New York. And…” She glanced over her shoulder. “There’s another one.”
Another envelope from China.
His expression hardened. “Just put it in the drawer.”
“I’m not putting it in the drawer, Ben.” She grabbed two glasses from the cupboard. “That is formal correspondence delivered by courier. It screams ‘Dangerous Vampires Wrote This—Don’t Ignore!’ Don’t you think you ought to—”
“I’ll open them when I feel like it,” Ben said.
She filled both glasses with water. “It’s been six months.”
“And she hasn’t called me once. She hasn’t sent me a message.” Ben walked over and grabbed the manila envelope with the New York return address. The thick linen envelope with a wax seal went in the drawer with the others. “This is not from her.”
Fabia waved at the counter. “You don’t think those letters are from Tenzin?”
“I think they’re formal communication from the Eight Immortals on Penglai Island. Which is not a letter from Tenzin.”
“Isn’t her sire one of the Eight Immortals?”
Ben sat back at the counter and opened the envelope from Chloe. “Yes.”
Fabia put a glass of water in front of him along with two pills. “Take these. You’re splitting hairs. She might be trying to communicate through her father.”
“Why would she need to do that?” He threw the pills in his mouth, letting the bitterness dissolve on his tongue for a second before he swallowed the water. “Tenzin has my phone number. My email. My address here and in New York. She knows how to reach me if she wants to.”
“Maybe…” Fabia shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“And I do. The reason she’d communicate formally through her father—whom she does not get along with, by the way—would be to create a formal obligation instead of a personal one.” He started sorting through the envelopes Chloe had forwarded. “She wants me to pay attention to her, but she doesn’t want to apologize for running away. I know how she works. I’m not falling for it.”
Fabi watched him, gathering envelopes as he tore through his mail. It was a mix of personal and professional. A few letters from Cormac, the vampire in charge of New York. One from his uncle with updated pictures of Sadia, his new sister whom Giovanni and Beatrice had adopted the year before. He handed the picture to Fabia, who stuck it on the refrigerator next to all the other pictures of the little girl.
“She’s getting so big,” Fabia said.
“I know.” There were charity solicitations he’d have to sort through. A gallery opening for a friend. “I need to get to LA soon.”
“Christmas, maybe?”
“They’ll probably come here.”
Ben sorted the mail from his life in New York and tried not to think about how many of the letters he wished he could ask Tenzin about. He wanted to show her the pictures of Sadia. He wanted to take her to the gallery opening. Did she want to donate to the New York Restoration Project? Probably. He had no idea.
“What happened between you two?” Fabia asked for the hundredth time.
“I was honest. She wasn’t,” he muttered. “I’m not apologizing for being honest, and I’m not going to come running because she summons me. If she wants to call me or write me, she knows where I am.”
“She doesn’t think like you, Nino. She doesn’t think like anyone else.”
He set down the mail and looked up. “You know what? She knows what risk is. If she wants me to pay attention to her, she can stick her neck out and apologize, just like I stuck my neck out with her.”
Fabia didn’t say a word. She walked over, put her arms around Ben, and hugged him.
Ben took a deep breath and hugged her back.
“I don’t know exactly what happened, but I know you miss her,” she said. “I’m sorry.”
He felt his heart crack. “Why didn’t I fall in love with you?”
Fabia pulled back and winked. “Careful what you wish for. I can be a monster too.”
4
Lately, video calls with Chloe were inevitably interrupted by a cat.
“Down, Pete!” Chloe nudged aside the lanky feline that had taken over her life. “Sorry about that.”
“No problem. As long as I don’t have to watch Gavin rubbing up against you, I can put up with Pete.” Ben couldn’t stop the smile when he saw Chloe on the screen. He might have been a cranky bastard lately, but if anyone could lift his mood, it was Chloe. “How’ve you been?”
“Good. Better than you, judging by that face. I think you need to leave Italy. You seem to be getting beat up a lot.”
She was sitting on the floor of Gavin’s penthouse, and he could see the dark windows in the background, which meant Gavin was probably hanging around somewhere. Ben had waited to call until the morning in Rome so he could catch the two of them at night. Once daylight hit, Gavin would be locked in his day quarters and unavailable.
Ben gingerly touched his swollen eye, which was slightly less swollen that morning. “It’s fine. I needed some information, and I played the easy mark to get it.”
“If Arthur were here, he’d probably try to analyze your subconscious need for punishment and what that says about your current romantic life.”
Gavin and Chloe had only been together a few months, but Ben’s human friend and his vampire friend were making a relationship work. They both seemed happy. It was more than many couples managed.