“Fuck, Annie,” Cristiano groaned. “Tell me you didn’t spend your Christmas trips with Nova teaching her to be an assassin. Ryan will go ballistic.”
“Of course I didn’t teach her to be an assassin!” she denied adamantly. “I would never put that kind of life on her. I simply taught her how to take care of herself. I knew they would come for her, and I needed to protect Ryan by protecting her. And yes, I know he will go ballistic if he finds out. That’s why we kept it from everyone.”
Mom jumped to her feet. “If you trained her so well, then how could you think that whoever was on that table was her?”
“Sheena thought of everything.” Anya tried to defend herself. “The blond hair, the same outfit Nova wore out that night. But it was the necklace that convinced me. She never took it off. Never. I knew that someone would have to decapitate her before she willingly allowed it to leave her. And that’s what Sheena did!” She was breathing heavily, her small body shaking with emotion. “And then Ciana drove that assumption home by saying she saw it happen. She couldn’t take her eyes off what was left… She swore it was Nova.”
“Huh,” Cristiano said, his brows pulling together. “You know, I always wondered why that crazy bitch took her hands and feet. She hadn’t planned on Nova getting a tattoo. I guess she took them to freak Ryan out, but also to hide the lack of ink.”
“Keep your theories to yourself, moye zolto,” his wife advised, keeping her gaze locked cautiously on Mom. “We don’t need to think about that poor girl at the moment.”
“I’m just saying, Sheena wasn’t stupid.” He shrugged before taking another drink of his coffee. Standing, he placed the cup on the table between the two couches. As he approached, I felt my heart melt a little. Cristiano had always treated me as one of his own. I was just as much a daughter to him as Samara. The emotion on his face matched my dad’s from the day before when he’d first seen me. “I’m so happy to see you, figlia.”
He wrapped his arms around me in a tight hug and lifted me off my feet. I hugged him back, releasing a light laugh. “You’ve gotten even more beautiful than I remember.” He placed me on my feet and cupped one side of my face. “Happy birthday.”
“Thank you.” I couldn’t help myself and hugged him again. “How was the flight? Have you been shown a room?”
“Don’t worry about us. Your parents have us taken care of.” He glanced at Cali then the empty doorway. “Has my son finally rolled out of bed yet? Now that I know he wasn’t out of his mind last night, I’m curious to know how he’s taking your rise from the dead.”
I still wasn’t sure what Ryan was thinking about everything. He’d been so caught up in…other things, that we hadn’t talked about anything important. Like how angry he was that I hadn’t come home to him right after killing Manuel. An angry Ryan sent people running for cover, but I’d never been a recipient of it. I didn’t know what was going to happen.
51
Ryan
The moment I opened my eyes, I knew Nova wasn’t beside me. My heart dropped, and I wondered if the night before had been nothing more than a dream after all. But then I shifted and felt the scratches on my back and knew it was reality. She’d been a lioness, her nails like claws raking over my flesh, marking me as thoroughly as I had her.
The need to see her, touch her—fucking hold on to her every second of the day—became too overwhelming. I jumped out of bed and jerked on clothes in a rush before going in search of my angel. Somehow I’d been given a miracle, and I wasn’t about to waste even a minute of having Nova back.
Retracing my steps from the night before, I found the family room where Felicity and Jet had been with Garret, but as I drew closer, I heard familiar voices. Glad my parents had arrived, I was already wondering how fast we could get a priest to the house when something Mom said caught my attention and had me pausing just outside the door. Instinct told me I wanted to hear what they were talking about without interrupting, so I fought the need to have Nova in my sights.
“Please don’t tell Ryan,” Mom pleaded in a voice full of a fear I could only remember hearing once. The memory of smoke and being afraid came back to me as she continued to speak. “He’s been through so much, Felicity. You and I watched your daughter’s casket being lowered into the ground. We held each other and mourned her, but the entire time, we both worried for Ryan. Don’t put him through this now, even though your precious daughter is back with us.”
“Don’t you think it would give him peace of mind?” Felicity argued, the frustration thick in her voice. “You taught her valuable skills that have saved her life repeatedly, Anya. You protected her the only way you knew how.”
“He won’t understand,” she choked out. “Please, promise me you won’t say anything. Nova understands why I didn’t want him to know. He loves her so much, and if he knew what I put her through to give her those skills, he would hate me.”
“I hate you!” Nova’s mom yelled, her voice echoing off the walls and down the hall past me. The emotion in her voice stiffened my shoulders. I didn’t like anyone saying they hated my mom. She should be shown nothing but love and respect by everyone, no matter what. But before I could take another step, Felicity’s words stopped me in my tracks yet again. “I hate you for putting her through whatever you did. But I love you for it, Anya. From one mother to another, I want to bow at your feet in appreciation. Nova is alive today because of your love for her.”
“He won’t see it that way,” she cried. “You see it as coming from a place of love, and I do love her. I considered her mine the very minute Ryan decided she was his person. But his every goal in life from the first time he saw her was to protect her. He never suspected that I was the one he needed to save her from the most.”
“That’s bullshit,” the other woman snapped.
I stepped into the doorway, my eyes clocking everyone in the room in an instant before lingering on Nova. The instant relief that flooded me at just seeing her was enough to make my knees momentarily weak. Being away from her even for a few minutes made me physically sick to my stomach.
She stood with Pop, tucked against his side as he watched the back-and-forth between Mom and Felicity. Nova saw me first, her eyes pleading for me to understand. I cocked a brow, silently asking if this was the secret she’d been keeping from me. “I’m sorry,” she mouthed with a nod.
“R-Ryan,” Mom stuttered when she caught sight of me. “H-how long have you been there?”
Keeping my eyes on her, I crossed the room and stopped beside Nova. Pulling her away from my father, I lifted her into my arms. A feeling of utter contentment filled me when she wrapped her legs around my waist and her arms hugged my neck. This was where she belonged. Always. Just like this, in my arms, curled around me so I could love and protect her every second of the day.
“Don’t be angry,” she whispered while I continued to stare Mom down.
With everything else that had happened in the past twenty-four hours, finding out that something I had suspected all along was true was the last thing I was going to get upset about. The truth had been just outside my subconscious, but I’d refused to acknowledge it, allowing Mom and Nova to have their shared secret.