Page 23 of Fastest Kill

"Signor Foscari, I didn't recognize you in the dark. This is a surprise," she greeted warmly.

"I doubt anyone could surprise you, Despina Alesci," Serapis said and looked past her shoulder to Dario. "Nipote, I'm glad to see you looking well."

"You got some balls on you, Zio, I'll give you that," Dario replied and folded his arms. "What do you want?"

Serapis looked smaller than Dario remembered. He was the same man physically, with brown skin, black curly hair, and silver running through his beard and at his temples.

In the years he had spent masquerading as their great-uncle, he had seemed ageless in the unsettling way that retrospectively made sense once you understood what he was.

Now he just looked tired. Not elderly, not broken, but the kind of tired that lives behind a person's eyes. He was holding a bottle of Amarone della Valpolicella, his favorite Veneto wine.

It was such an absurd detail that Dario knew about his uncle that, for a moment, he couldn't do anything except stare at it.

"I believe we need to talk," Serapis said, looking at the Alesci family. "About Alvise Morosini and what he is and about what he will do to everyone you love if we don't stop him."

Despina looked at Tore. Tore shrugged before he read the wine label and nodded.

"Come in," he said, taking the bottle. "Have you eaten? Dario made enough kofta to feed a small army."

"Thank you. I'm fine, but I could use a glass of that wine if you are opening it."

Serapis didn't look like the fierce enemy had survived having his magic stripped and going over a sea cliff. He looked like he had been traveling for a long time and was grateful to sit down, which was somehow worse.

What the fuck has happened? Dario wanted to ask his uncle before hugging him because a twisted part was worried about him.

Serapis sat where Tore indicated, in a low chair with its back to the wall, so that every person in the room was visible from it.

Tore's house, Dario reminded himself, giving a dangerous man the seat that would make him feel least threatened.

Dario remained standing, his back to the other wall. Frederica moved beside him, forming a united front while keeping herself within reach of her parents in case they needed protection.

"How did you survive the cliff?" Dario asked finally. He was not interested in small talk. "Did you use Gabriella to break your fall?"

Serapis gave him a wry smile. "Tempting as that sounds, I didn't have the chance. She hit the water first, broke the surface, so I didn't crush myself against it. I broke my leg and was struggling in the waves when a teenage boy spotted me. He was night fishing when he wasn't supposed to be. He was a good boy who didn't want his parents to know where he had been and had no interest in asking questions about where I'd come from. He got me to shore, and we parted ways with each other's secrets."

Dario grunted. That explained why no one had reported a man washing ashore. That fucking kid was smart. "Altun did strip you of your magic, though, right?"

"She did. She was thorough, but she always was the best of us," he said it without any apparent resentment. "I am what I have always been, nipote. A Foscari from Venice who's older than he should be and who has access to knowledge that has kept me alive, where power alone wouldn't have. Knowledge is never lost, and magic always returns. Altun knows this better than anyone." He set the wine on the table beside him. "I'm assuming you've found Morosini's name in Ettore's files by now."

"We have. I just don't know how he fits in with you," Frederica said, her hand casually resting on the gun she had tucked into the belt of her jeans.

Serapis looked at her with a pleased expression."You are Despina's daughter. Your mother's intelligence work in the eighties was remarkable, and I can see you have inherited her famous gut instinct."

"You old charmer," Despina said, shooting him a wink. "You didn't expect me to raise an idiot, did you?"

Serapis chuckled. "Of course not. I can see why Dario likes her so much."

How the fuck would he know that? Dario's eyes narrowed.

Beside him, Frederica made an unladylike snort. "'Like' is a strong word. We are working together. Stop stalling and tell us about Morosini."

Serapis tapped his fingertips on the arm of the chair. "Alvise Morosini isn't his real name. He has used a great many over a very long life. His real name is Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim."

Dario ran the name through his memory and found fragments about a figure who appeared in academic footnotes.

"He's a Renaissance scholar. Sixteenth century, if I'm remembering correctly. He's been dead for five hundred years," Dario replied, and ignored the surprised look Frederica gave him.

That's right, I'm not just big, dumb, and pretty.