Page 49 of The Eagle's Vault

I savored another spoonful of gelato, letting the icy sweetness cool the churn of my thoughts. Going back wasn’t just a matter of curiosity, it was a risk. Doing it right would include Scarlett’s buy-in, earpieces, monitoring from the surface, GPS coordinates to ensure we didn’t get lost. How cold would it be in the depths? Who were the scientists working on her, other than Daniel Weber? Could we contract with them?

Going after her alone would be a gamble. A danger. But dammit, if she wasn’t calling me.

“You’ve got it bad.” Jayce tapped my leg with her foot, cutting into my thoughts. She inclined her head toward Leigh.

Leigh and Isaac stood a few steps away, engaged in their own debate over ice cream versus gelato.

“You’ve got me wrong for once.”

Jayce waggled her eyebrows at me again. “Prefer her as a redhead?”

Before I could shoot back, Isaac sauntered over. “You’re brooding,” he announced, as if he knew me.

“Just keeping my eyes open.” That part was half true. If Scarlett heard we were wandering the streets eating, she’d demand we run back to the hotel. This was hardly the low-profile order she’d given me.

Isaac stopped beside me. “Let me guess, the vault?”

Maybe hedidunderstand a little about me. “Among other things.”

“I’m curious, too.” He pointed his small spoon at me. “The photograph didn’t show a dial or locking mechanism.”

“Could be a key somewhere.” If there was a key that unlocked her, there’d be a way to bypass it. Pick it, imprint it, fly Will out to Rome to create some tool that would scan the inside and reveal all the beauty’s mysteries.

“It’s like anIndiana Jonesmovie.” Isaac widened his eyes and gave me a toothy grin. “Did you ever want to do that sort of work when you were little?”

Stealing ancient relics to hand over to a museum? I held my laugh at bay. That was precisely what we’d done in London.

Leigh drifted closer, her brown eyes glinting behind the oversized glasses. “Could I see the photos…” She trailed off, hesitation lining her face.

Isaac gave her a look, irritation—at her interruption?—clear from his tight lips.

“Yeah,” I said, fishing my phone out.

Her gaze dropped, a pensive furrow between her brows. But I didn’t push. Instead, I opened the gallery, the images of the notebook unfolding on the screen. The vault stared back at me. I flipped past a few incidental shots until I reached the ones that mattered.

The gelato in my cup was melting, but the vault door held more interest. It was a harsh contrast to the sleek Eisenhart model we’d bested at Cassaforte. And there wouldn’t be any specs on the dark web.

Italian scrawl ran down the margins of one image, a tangle of words that hinted at a story. I zoomed in on the tiny script, my mind scrambling to decipher it. My Italian was passable, but the owner of the notebook had clearly written the notes as reminders to themself, rather than for instruction. They made no sense.

I glanced up, looking at Leigh and Isaac.

They were watching me, their expressions a mix of curiosity and concern. All I could see was the vault, her secrets taunting me, begging me to go back.

I needed to know. I had to find out what lay beyond that stone door.

“Legends say there are treasures buried in those catacombs.” Isaac’s words held a sense of awe and wonder. Maybe we had something in common, after all.

Leigh nodded, adding softly, “There are stories of Mithraic relics and Templar artifacts hidden down there.”

Isaac chuckled at her. “Going full Dan Brown now?”

Leigh fell silent, Isaac’s dismissive tone leaving her fiddling with the hem of her shirt instead of eating her gelato. A flush crept up her neck.

What the hell was his problem? She was practically saying the same thing he had.

Jayce nudged him—harder than necessary—and covered it up with a laugh. “I love his books.”

“You never know.” I handed my phone to Leigh, who skimmed through the photos. “The catacombs have many secrets. Who’s to say what we might find down there?”

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