She kept him trembling on the brink until the ache of her own yearning grew too sharp to bear, and then rose and turned to face the mirror. She parted her legs, arching her ass so he could see everything. How gleaming wet and eager she was for him. “Take me,” she said.

He seized her hips. “I don’t have condoms.”

“I know. Of course you don’t. You’ve been busy saving my life.”

He looked worried. “But if you want to…Viv, this is exactly the kind of thing we need to talk about. I think we should—”

“No talk,” she said. “Give it to me. Now. Before I start screaming.”

He eased his penis past the initial resistance, sliding it around in her lube, and drove deep. She clutched the counter, staring at her own flushed face, whimpering at each slick, slamming stroke. They held each other’s gaze in the mirror as if the fate of the universe depended on it. He reached around and toyed with her clit, building her up to a wrenching climax. When she had the strength to prop herself up, he was still waiting for his own release, his face tight with self-control.

“I want to come inside you,” he said.

She thought about it for about half a second, and nodded.

His eyes widened. “You’re sure? You’re okay with that?”

“I want it all,” she blurted. “Everything you have to give me.”

His eyes flashed, and he gave it to her. One last shove, and he exploded. She hung over the counter, limp and soft. Light as air, soft as a cloud. One thought floating all alone in her mind, in a perfect bubble.

Of how much she would love to make a child with him.

Jack set the shower running again, and washed her tenderly, with great, sensual thoroughness. That interlude ended as one might have expected, with herself pinned against the wet tile wall, her legs draped over his elbows, sobbing with delight as he nailed her, deep and hard.

Not a thought about bad moments in her past. Not a thread of panic, of nausea. No “danger keep out” signs. Her old phantoms were gone. They could not withstand the bright light of Jack Kendrick.

Afterward, glowing and relaxed, Vivi sat naked on the bed and stared at the necklaces she’d retrieved from Ulf Haupt’s briefcase. She laid them out on the bed, fiddling with them. Staring at the white gold lacework that decorated the top of each pendant.

Something about them tickled her mind. The lacework was different on each pendant. On her own, there were open spaces in the swirling coils of gold. On Nell’s, the lacework was flat, and protruding on each side. Nancy’s was more like her own, but with the protrusions extending toward the opposite side. A strange choice, for Lucia, whose taste in jewelry had run toward the classic. That asymmetrical, random element. More like something she herself would do. Angular, quirky.

In fact, it reminded her of a sculpture she’d done back in art school, one of the pieces that had been mangled in the Fiend’s second break-in. Three female figures, made of motley chunks of glass, pebbles, and bits of plastic, all wired together. But their stylized hair swirled out like halos, hooking and tangling together. Linking the three figures.

She had entitled it The Three Sisters. Lucia had loved it. Had displayed it proudly, right next to her priceless bronze Cellini satyr.

Vivi placed the pendants side by side. Nancy, Nell, Vivi. She felt a strange, dreamlike feeling as she slipped the lacework of Nell’s pendant into the open space in Nancy’s. A push, and click, the openwork linked together. Seamless swirls of gold. Her heart pounded.

“Jack,” she whispered, her voice shaking. “Come look at this.”

He looked. His eyes widened. “The other one? Does it fit, too?”

“Let’s see.” She slid the protruding part of Nell’s pendant into the openwork of her own. Click. The pieces were all united.

Jack held out his hand, and she passed the thing to him. He manipulated it, putting pressure on every point. One of the protruding bits on Vivi’s pendant moved. At first she choked off a cry, thinking he’d broken it, but then she saw that it was a lever, moving smoothly down—

Click, once again, and something snapped out of the bottom of the three pendants. Three fine, shining sheets of white gold, flush to each other, as narrow and sharp as a razor blade. They leaned closer.

Something was written on them, in letters so small, she could not make them out. Jack dug into his pockets and pulled out a pocketknife with a multitude of attachments, one of which was a small magnifying glass. He held the thing up under the lamp and peered through it.

“Salve Regina Mater Misericordiae,” he read slowly. He turned it over and studied the back. “Primus Modus Doricus.” He looked up at her. “Latin, right? Can you make anything out of that?”

She shook her head. “No, but Nell could! She knows Latin!” She pressed her hand to her mouth. It was too soon for tears of joy, but finally, a window had opened up. A ray of light, at last. “This was the part that I was supposed to figure out,” she said, with conviction.

Jack raised his eyebrows. “How’s that?”

“In the draft of the letter we found, Lucia said it was our love of art, music, and literature that would solve the puzzle. I don’t know the first thing about music or literature.” Vivi thought about The Three Sisters, and tears sprang to her eyes. “But this part was just for me.”

It felt almost as if Lucia had sent her a message. A wave of love, faith, and encouragement to her youngest adopted daughter.

“Oh, God. I’m losing it,” she whispered. “I miss her so much.”

“Go ahead,” Jack said quietly. “You’re entitled.”

He stroked her hair while she hid her face in her hands. She raised her face after a moment. “I want to call my sisters,” she blurted.

“It’s three a.m., New York time,” he said gently. “We’ll be there tomorrow. We’ve waited this long. Can’t you wait a few hours more?”

“Okay,” she said, sniffling. “I guess.”

Jack laid the united necklaces on the bedside table next to the gun, and slid between the sheets. He held the covers up. “Does being a hard-ass broad permit cuddling in bed?” he asked, warily.

“Duh,” she said, sliding between the sheets and into the hot, lovely rush of his tight embrace. “I may be a hard-ass, but I’m not an idiot.”

She let his warmth relax her for a few moments, and then stirred, to look into his face. “Thank you for coming back to save me,” she said.

He gazed back. “Thank you for still being alive,” he replied.

Tears prickled in her eyes, but if she gave in to them again, they might drown her.

Chapter

12

Duncan and Vivi’s sister Nell met them at the airport. Nell was horrified when she saw the battered-looking, hollow-eyed Vivi and insisted on sitting in the back with her little sister and holding her hand while Jack and Duncan debriefed.

At one point, Jack looked back and found Nell’s eyes sparkling at him. “So what does the Latin phrase mean, anyhow?” he asked hastily.

“Hail queen, mother of mercy, first Doric mode,” Nell told him.

“Does that mean anything to you?”

Nell shook her head regretfully. “Not anything particular, no. It’s just a common phrase from the Catholic liturgy.”

They headed to Nancy and Liam’s place, and Jack bucked up his depleted social energy to meet two new people. Fortunately, they seemed mellow and sensible. Liam was intelligent and canny, the older sister, Nancy, likewise. Besides being just as easy on the eyes as her two sisters. He felt at ease with both of them immediately.