I inhale on the question that might as well be a knife drawing blood. Ella is as much a stranger to me as Kayden. “Ella is not just a name¸” I argue, rejecting that this revelation means nothing. “It’s my name. And I know it’s my name, and that’s more than I had five minutes ago.”
“I understand that,” he says. “But—”
“It’s not enough.”
“Can you remember your last name? Give me that name and I’ll find out who you are and how you might be connected to Niccolo.”
“A last name,” I repeat, willing it to come to me.
“Don’t think,” he reprimands. “Just answer like before. Yes or no. Time is ticking.”
“No, but Ella isn’t a common name. Surely there can’t be that many of us who’ve traveled to Italy in the short window tourists are allowed to be in a country.”
His eyes sharpen, his tone with them. “I take it that’s a no on the last name.”
I force out a reluctant, “No.”
“And we don’t even know if you are a tourist.” He releases me, adding a murmured, “Fuck,” before diving fingers through his hai
r and flashing the tattoo on his left wrist, which appears to be some sort of bird, while I can now tell the box on his right has a chess piece inside. I wait for either to mean something to me, like his watch and his scent, but nothing comes to me.
“You’re sure?” he presses, his hands settling on his jean-clad hips.
The fact that he’s gone from “Don’t think” to this says he’s desperate, and I’m pretty sure he’s not a man who gets desperate often. “I wish I wasn’t.”
“Not even a possible name?”
I give a shake of my head and his lips tighten, his chest expanding on a breath he exhales with the declaration, “Plan B it is, then.”
“Plan B?” I ask.
“That’s right,” he says, giving me a once-over that has my nipples puckering beneath the thin gown, before he levels a stare at me and orders, “Get dressed. We need to be gone before Gallo gets back.”
“Please tell me the extent of Plan A, which is always the best plan, wasn’t just you being an asshole to try and jolt my memory.”
“Plan A was, and is, you remembering who you are, and that will remain the case. I told you. The details of your relationship to Niccolo are a potential game changer.”
My fingers curl into fists by my sides. “I don’t have a relationship with Niccolo. I’d know if I did. I’d feel it. Like I know you’re . . .” My voice trails off while the certainty of knowing this man beyond that alleyway takes root, and reality hits me. I’ve been swept away by this man so much so that I chose him over a detective, and I’m about to leave the hospital without even knowing where we’re going.
“I’m what?” he presses.
“I know there’s something you aren’t telling me.”
He reaches for me, pulling me to him, his hand nestling intimately over the bare skin under my gown and above my backside. “Please don’t do this,” he pleads, his gentle tone defying the tension wafting off of him. “I know you’re scared and confused, but don’t start doubting me now. I am not your enemy, Ella.”
The way he’s holding me, the way he says my name, weakens my knees and does funny things to my belly, which only drives me to challenge him. “Prove it. Tell me how we know each other.”
He walks me backward until I hit the wall, pressing me against it, his hands settling on either side of my face, his arms caging me. “We don’t have time for this right now,” he says, his gentle tone now hard with demand, but that spicy vanilla scent of him reminds me of why I need the answers he’s not giving me.
“Make time, Kayden.”
“Tell that to Gallo, who, according to my calculations, will be back here with that fingerprint kit in thirty minutes. If we let him run your prints, Niccolo will find you, even if that requires torturing or killing Gallo to connect the dots to that police report and us.”
My eyes go wide. “What? No. No. He wouldn’t—”
“He’s a mobster, sweetheart. People say he cut his own heart out when he was born, while his mother watched.”
My hand goes to my throat. “I can do without the dramatics, Kayden.”