But soon enough, he knew, the questions would settle and the talking would cease. And then he would be free to find Francesca. He may not have all his memories, but he knew the layout of the palace like the back of his hand.
Including all its secrets.
15
Fran stirred groggily in her chair, trying to remember where she was. Her first sight was an entire wall of portraits, lit by one softly glowing lamp far down the room.
Then her gaze dropped and she jumped, instinctively pulling her blanket further around her. “Hey,” she said.
“Hey.” Aristotle Andris sat across from her at one edge of the long couch, still perfectly unmussed in his white shirt and soft trousers. He might have been sitting there for a moment or for hours, she had no way of telling.
But what was certain was that this was here. Not Ryker Stavros, not Conti Goba. Regardless of what else he’d learned in the receiving room, meeting his parents and his beautiful childhood friend, he’d claimed his identity. He knew who he was.
For a fleeting second, Fran wondered what that would be like.
Ari gestured to the tray on the low table between them. “I didn’t know if you’d be hungry. You’ve got to be thirsty though. You’ve been asleep for hours.”
“Hours!” Fran straightened, allowing the blanket to fall away as she reached for the water. Shewasthirsty, and she appreciated the business to occupy her hands while her mind raced. “Where are the others—what time is it? And what are you still doing awake?”
Ari shrugged, but his gaze followed her every move. The water poured into the glass, the glass traveling to her lips. It would have been unnerving from anyone else, but Fran knew that drill. She studied others like it was her job, too.
She suspected Ari’s memories hadn’t all returned.
“I refused to let anyone else move you, and for a long while my parents stayed with me here, though we were at some distance.” He gestured down the room where a similar collection of chairs and couches stood beneath another constellation of paintings. “It was my turn to ask them questions.” His expression tightened. “So many things have happened in the past year. It seems like I’ve been gone a lot longer.”
“And how are you doing?” She set the glass down again and leaned forward, her elbows on her knees. Ari seemed remarkably refreshed for someone who’d been through yet another trauma in the past few hours, while she felt as tired as a worn out shoe.
She was pretty sure Edeena Saleri never felt like a worn out shoe.
Ari seemed to consider the question seriously, measuring his response. That was different too, subtly so. Ryker had been less reserved, more rash in his replies. How else would the new Ari, the real Ari, differ from the man she’d only just begun to know?
“I’m not as frustrated as I would have expected,” Ari said. “The role comes more naturally than I feared it would when I first understood who I was supposed to be. I don’t remember all the details—most of the details, if you want the honest truth—but I remember the people. I remember their influence in my life. My parents, my brother, Dimitri, even Stefan and Cyril. I understand who I can trust, which is pretty much everyone I’ve met now. I understand that there are those out there I won’t be able to trust, but I don’t yet know why.” He shrugged. “And I feel stronger, in a strange sense.”
That made her lift her brows. Ari was such a vital force, she couldn’t imagine him ever feeling weak. Before she could ask the question, he continued.
“Up to now—the life I led and the way I led it—came with an acceptance that of course this was the way it was going to be. But now it’s more than simple acceptance. Now I’m choosing to be this person, I’m deliberately making these decisions. It’s a different approach.” His lips twisted. “One my parents aren’t entirely sure what to do with, I suspect.”
Fran lifted her hands to her hair, relieved it remained caught up in its series of clips. She had lost her own sense of deliberate action since returning to the palace, and she needed to reclaim it, too. “Your mother doesn’t know everything about the work camp,” she said.
Ari shook his head. “Not everything, but most of it.” He gestured dismissively. “Eventually I’ll tell her the truth. It’s not information she can’t handle, there’s simply no value in her knowing it now. She would want to do something with it—tell someone, demand answers or justifications. And that’s not practical.”
That sounded so unlike Ryker that Fran felt the smallest twinge of remorse. She pulled off her blanket completely, folding it up as Ari watched. “There wouldn’t—” she hesitated, then firmed her resolve. Francesca Simmons didn’t hesitate. She was calm, cool, serene. She asked for what she wanted because by asking she likely got it. And right now, Fran wanted more than anything to be alone in a space with four walls and a closed door, recovering her equilibrium. “Is there a guest room where I could spend the night without waking Nicki or the others?” she asked. “I can’t imagine they know I’m here yet.”
He nodded. “Of course.” He stood with her, his gaze raking over her body, as if making sure she wasn’t leaving anything behind. “The others have no idea you’re here, and they’re together. Dimitri and Kristos won’t betray your presence until you’re ready—or at least until dawn when Lauren and Emmaline wake up demanding answers.”
“Ha! Well, then I have what, a few hours?”
“At least.” Ari stepped around the table and gestured her to precede him, then shifted slightly and held out his hand instead. After the smallest of hesitations, Fran took it, blinking away the flash of quick tears that sprang to the backs of her eyes at the touch of his fingers on hers. Now, suddenly, this man was a stranger to her—as if she had lost her memories, not the other way around.
“There’s a room nearby that looks over the city, all the way down to the ocean,” he murmured. “Will that suit?”
“I think I’ll manage.”
They stepped out into the hallway and Fran noted it was also softly lit—and abandoned. No guards stood at the ready, Dimitri and Stefan weren’t lurking at the far end of the corridor. “They’ve given you the run of the place?” she asked. “That seems…trusting.”
Ari laughed, stepping onto a staircase at the second corner. “I suspect their largesse doesn’t extend beyond the palace’s exterior doors.” But his manner was easy, as if living under a microscope was no hardship. Then again, after his past year, he might be grateful for that level of security. He squeezed her hand, the gesture once again striking her as more Ryker than Ari, and she found herself wondering at the distinction.
The explanation probably wasn’t all that deep, she decided. She knew Ryker—she didn’t know Ari. And now one had been replaced with the other.
