“But Stefan will be searching for you.”
“Stefan thinks he knows me and what I am doing, and Stefan let me leave that island. It is not as if the captain had orders to make me stay—if he had, I’d still be up in that guest compound, poked and prodded by doctors. No. He wanted me to be freed, once he had me long enough to ensure I was no danger to anyone, especially myself.”
“Oh-kay…” Fran had no idea where Ari was going with this, but she could see how he’d drawn these conclusions. It wasn’t as if they’d snuck off the island. They’d merely asked and it’d been done. Ari’s reasoning that it had been a deliberate allowance was on the money, but she suspected that his understanding diverged sharply from hers after that point. “But why?”
Ari shook his head, remaining far too cheerful. “That is the question, isn’t it? And a good one at that.” He spread his hands. “But such questions will be answered in time. For now, I am Conti Goba, son of Maria and Josef of Makila and without a care in the world. Within that framework, I could be anyone I wanted to be, take on any personality. It is very freeing, no?”
A pang struck deep in Fran’s heart and she searched Ari’s face, instantly worried. Did he guess the truth about her? Could he possibly know? “It could be…” she said, her tone cautious.
“It is,” he insisted. “When I came up out of that water, the seas eerily calm after what had clearly been a terrible storm, I knew two things. One, I was alive. Two, I was Ryker Stavros, the luckiest pilot to ever ditch into the sea. Things went downhill from there, but I wassomeone. I had a purpose, a past, a place in this world. It was my job to remember them, and that proved impossible.” He spread his hands. “But Conti, he has no such obligations. He could be anyone. And so I have decided I am going to fashion him exactly the way I want.”
Fran grimaced. Ari’s optimism was probably the healthiest attitude he could take, but she’d encountered her share of troubles falsifying her own identification. The fact remained that the men in the tavern had offloaded Conti’s papers pretty easily. For all she’d hoped they’d do exactly that, it made her nervous. “Unless good Conti is in jail. Or dead. Or wanted for murder.”
“You worry too much,” Ari said, apparently unwilling to be brought down by her pessimism. Fran wondered at that. Was he truly that good natured, or had nothing bad ever happened to him?
Even as she thought the words, she rejected them. Ari had been held as aprisonerfor a year, forced to live in what amounted to little more than a kennel, and made to work in a country where he had no rights. He’d doubtless been beaten, abused—probably starved at some level, and certainly threatened with it. Regardless of his lifestyle before the accident, this was a man who’d endured true hardship.
Then again, perhaps this was also a man who recognized hardship when it was presented to him—and when it wasn’t.
His next words confirmed that line of thinking. “I think first we must find something to eat. Someplace off the beaten track. We have money and I have papers, and it is a happy day in the city.” He took her hand. “I am walking with a gorgeous American girl, too. What could be better?”
She let him draw her down the street, away from the seedy bar. No one appeared to be following them, but how long would that last? “We should get new clothes.”
“After lunch,” Ari agreed, but he didn’t slow down, and his long strides ate up the pavement until they were out of the marina district and into a more pleasant area of the city. This wasn’t truly the tourist area, but it was right on the fringes, and small shops began to line the cobblestoned streets. The first one that looked like a café drew Ari’s attention, and a moment later Fran found herself inside a cool, shadowy hideaway.
“Ah! This is perfect.” Ari turned brightly toward the older woman who stepped out of the back room, and began speaking to her in Garronois. Though there were plenty of chairs and tables in the small space—most of them empty—the woman raised a hand and beckoned them to follow her.
“What’s this?”
“Something to make that last hint of worry disappear from your eyes,” Ari said.
He led her past a kitchen down a short hallway flanked on either side with restrooms, and then outside again. Immediately, Fran understood. “A courtyard!”
“You see? Conti Goba takes care of his woman,” Ari grinned. He turned to the old woman, and relayed more information to her. The woman nodded several times, then bustled away.
Ari chose a table and drew out a chair, seating Fran with a flourish. Rather than sitting as well, he held up a hand. “I’ll be right back,” he said.
Instantly she tensed. He was giving her the slip, she reasoned immediately. He was seating her in this interior courtyard and then escaping. She should let him go—he wasn’t a prisoner—but how could she face the queen if she did that?
Her panic must have telegraphed itself to Ari. “No, no!” he said, shaking his head. “You worry too much for a such a beautiful woman. I will be back, sweet Francesca. I would no more leave you alone than I would stop breathing.”
With a short bow, he pivoted on his heel, leaving Fran staring after him. “What in the world?” she muttered after the café door settled behind him. Surely Ari’s gentlemanly affection was some kind of elaborate act.
Then again, who truly was Ari Andris? The articles she’d read on him had all been uniform in their compliments, but she’d taken that to be political propaganda. Yes, he was tall and strong, yes he was a credit to his family and his country. But all of the accolades of sensitivity, humor, shrewdness, and politesse…that she’d assumed was exaggeration.
Yet here he was, without a meaningful memory to his name, acting with more grace and chivalry than, well…anyone she’d ever known.
Before she could puzzle out more, Ari was back, bearing a tray of glasses and a large carafe of water. “The good mother, she has guests in the front room of her café, so splitting her time is a hardship. I told her I could as easily carry water to us as she could, and this way we could wait for her convenience.”
He sat the glasses on the table, then poured them both drinks. Fran did her level best not to stare as he handed her a glass. “You should drink more water than you do, Francesca,” he murmured, watching her as she downed the water. “It’s a very different climate here than America. More tropical.”
“It’s certainly that,” Fran said with a grimace. She watched as Ari settled into his own chair, his long legs sprawling out in comfortable relaxation. “How did you know this place would have a courtyard? Have you been here before?”
“Not at all,” he shook his head. “I suspect this part of town is a place I never explored, which is a shame. That woman in there—she works hard, but she is happy. Her kitchen is filled with pots and pans and laughter and love, here in this tiny little restaurant tucked into a street I’ve never seen. It’s not right, that I do not know it.”
Fran lifted her brows. “You can’t expect to have seen everything in the city, though. It’s a big place.”
“Not that big,” Ari countered. “And I have lived here all my life, I know it in my bones. Yet here this lovely woman lives and works and feeds her neighbors, and I did not know she existed—didn’t know this street existed. What else have I been missing, I wonder? What life might I choose to live, once my memories come back to me?”
