Page 17 of Queen's Ransom

Disappointingly, through all the comings and goings, she’d only caught brief glimpses of Helena. A smile here, a parting wave there, in and out she went. Between their banter and the interrupted moment last night, Celia had been both excited and anxious to spend some time together today, had debated suggesting another training session so she could turn the kiss-fueled fantasies that had helped her get off in the shower last night into reality. She wanted to try that ankle move Helena had used, except Celia would use it to yank Helena closer and haul her leg over Celia’s hip, bringing their bodies together so she could feel the heat and curves against her own.

But as the day had gone on, Celia grew more worried than curious—about her friend’s seemingly breakneck pace and about being the cause of it. If Helena appeared around the corner, Celia had a mind to box her into the kitchen booth and make her take a breather.

But it was Chris who stepped into the dining room from the foyer, rain dripping from the ends of his hair and the tails of his leather duster. He strode toward the kitchen, and if Celia didn’t already know something was up, if she didn’t know her brother so well, she might have missed the moment, after Chris hung up his coat and tied back his hair, when he forced down his shoulders and wiped the wrinkles from his forehead. But she knew both things, and it was as if those wrinkles transplanted themselves inside her, creating uneasy waves of apprehension.

She tried to ignore them, focusing instead on her family, whole and safe here, thanks to the Madigans. Mia was curled in a blanket on the chaise in the glassed-in back patio, her e-reader and the cats in her lap, while Marco sat across from Celia working on his homework.

Until he caught sight of his uncle and slammed his textbook shut. “Uncle Dante! Where you been all day?”

“Had some work to take care of, then hunting down parts for your mom.”

Parts she needed not for a repair but for answers. Using her connections, she’d tracked the serial numbers on the nose badge and brakes to two shops in the city. Chris had thought he’d have better luck getting the receipts for those parts, finding out who they’d been sold to, if he visited the shops in person. “You get them?” she asked.

“I did.” The forehead wrinkles briefly reappeared, then smoothed out again as he came to stand next to Marco. “Whatcha working on?”

“English,” Celia said. “If it wasn’t obvious by how fast he slammed the book closed.”

“I’m done,” Marco squawked.

“With the grammar part.” She eyed the paperback on the corner of the table. “You’ve still got a chapter to read.”

“Suck it up, champ,” Mia teased from the patio.

“We can’t all be speed readers,” Marco shouted back.

Behind them, at the kitchen island, Gloria clicked her tongue against her teeth. “You’re cutting it close for dinner, Christopher. So is your soon-to-be husband.”

Celia rested her chin in her hand, pressing her fingers against her lips to hold in her laughter. Another benefit of Chris’s return, plus a new son-in-law… not being the primary focus of their mother’s attention. God love her—Celia couldn’t ask for a better mom—but sometimes the heaping helpings of Italian-Catholic guilt were too much to stomach alone.

Chris rounded the island and pecked Gloria’s cheek. “He’s on his way.” He eyed her stained hands. “Should I warn him you murdered someone?”

Marco raised his own hands, palms and fingertips the same purple-red as his grandmother’s. “I had nothing to do with it, Agent Perri. I swear.”

Chris chuckled. “Evidence to the contrary, Plato.”

“Beets.” Gloria dug her fingers into the magenta ball of dough she was kneading. “A local farm box came today, and the beets looked amazing. I’m making fettuccine noodles.”

“Murder pasta,” came the voice Celia had wanted to hear all day. Helena sauntered in from the kitchen’s hallway entrance on the other side of the booth. “She got the recipe from Hawes.”

“You two might be dangerous,” Chris said to Gloria.

“No might about it.” Helena circled around him and slipped into the booth beside Celia. “He’s already made a list of all the pastas he wants to make with Mama Perri.”

Chris patted his belly. “I see no problem with this.”

“I don’t either,” Helena said. “So long as some of that pasta stays in the freezer here.”

Celia nudged her shoulder. “If he doesn’t share, I will.”

Helena grinned, her smile chasing away any lingering chill in the air. It morphed into a smirk that she aimed at Chris. “I don’t think you’re needed here anymore.”

Gloria laughed out loud, and across the table, Marco snapped his fingers with a hissed “Burn.”

Chris thumped his head. “You done with your homework?”

“Yep.”

Celia nudged the paperback. “Not all of it.”

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