A Calling to Thrall (5 page)

Wait a minute. 5:42 pm?

My heart hammered.

I was supposed to meet Erica at Leonardo’s
Self-Service Ristorante at 5:30, and I was late, so late. What if
she got worried and called Daddy? We’d promised both our parents
that we’d stay together on this trip. God only knows how much he’d
freak out if he found out I was on my own.

I couldn’t wait to thank the old shopkeeper for his
gift. I had to go. Now.

With my purse thrown over one shoulder and my
necklace clasped tightly around my neck, I shouted out a single
goodbye before racing through the door. I thought I heard him call
after me, but I didn’t have time to turn back. I was in trouble,
more trouble than I’d ever been in before, and I couldn’t waste
time with even a single arrivederci.

Erica wasn’t at the restaurant when I arrived, and
from what I could tell, she never had been, so I ordered a plate of
pesto lasagna, settled down in a booth by the window, and waited
for her to show up.

By 7:30, I finally figured out she wasn’t
coming.

In all my life, I don’t think I’d ever wished for a
cell phone more than I did right then, but of course my little
pay-as-you-go plan didn’t have international coverage. No, Erica
had the phone with all the options. If I could have just remembered
her number, I might have been able to call her from the
restaurant’s pay phone, but as always, I hadn’t thought ahead. I’d
just programmed her digits into my own phone—the one I’d left on my
bedside table back in Texas—and now my only option was to make the
long trek back to our hotel alone.

It was after 8:00 by the time I made it up to the
second floor lobby, and the lady at the front desk just waved me
through before I could ask for our key. Erica must have beaten me
home after all.

God only knew how much she must be freaking out.

I paused at the door to our room and sent up a quick
prayer.
Dear Lord, please don’t let my over-protective cousin be
on the phone with my parents. I really, really don’t want to deal
with a lecture right now, so please, just take a little pity on me,
okay?

With my final request made and my heart still
fluttering, I took one last deep breath and knocked. The door
opened almost instantly.

“Adair?” Erica pulled me inside before I could even
speak. “Oh, God, where have you been? I’ve been looking for you
everywhere. I—”

“Look, Erica, I am so, so sorry. I just found this
little shop, and I guess I lost track of time.”

“Lost track of time? You lost track of time? Do you
know how close I was to calling the cops? Christ, another hour and
I might have even called your parents.”

I sucked in a quick breath. “So you didn’t call them
yet?”

“What do you think?” She held up her silent phone.
“If your dad was on the other line, I’m sure the whole hotel would
be hearing him right now.”

I was so relieved to be in the all clear that I
couldn’t stop myself. I wrapped my arms around my cousin and
squealed “Thank-you, thank-you, thank-you!” over and over again
while I whirled her around the room.

She rolled her eyes when she finally shoved me away,
but at least she was smiling, too.

“You know, Adair, I think you’re the only person
I’ve ever met who’s more worried about disappointing daddy than
getting abducted by serial killers.” She shook her head. “If I
could—hey, where’d you get that?”

Her hands darted to my neck, and before I could pull
away, Erica’s fingers latched around the pearl still hanging from
my throat. After all the excitement over being late for dinner, I’d
half forgotten it was still there.

“Adair?” She looked up at me with wide, brown eyes.
“Is this…is it real?”

“No,” I said. “I mean, I don’t think so. It’s just
some little trinket this shopkeeper gave me. I asked if I could pay
for it, but he just said ‘no price.’”

“More like price
less
.”

Silky black hair swayed across her shoulders as she
shook her head. Erica had always been a little princess, and even
after an all day shopping and sight-seeing binge, she still looked
like one. Heavy hoops hung from her ears, while a shawl of gold
necklaces blanketed her narrow neck.

She knew jewelry. If anyone could tell me the value
of this bauble, it was her. Only…I wasn’t quite sure I wanted to
know. I wanted this necklace to be mine. I wanted it more than
anything else in my life. But if it was valuable, how could I ever
justify accepting such a gift from a man I’d barely even met?

When she finally looked up at me, her eyes were even
wider than before.

“It’s real.” Her words were little more than a
breath. “The damn thing’s got to be real.”

“But…” I licked my lips. “But it’s not
real
real, right? It’s not like it’s a diamond or anything valuable,
so—”

“Adair, it’s a black pearl. A real black pearl.
These things are rare. Even the little ones you can buy online go
for a fair price, but this…this… I don’t know what to say. It’s
priceless.”

And that’s when my legs buckled beneath me.

What had I done? Oh, Lord, what was I going to do?
By accepting this one token, I’d as good as stolen more than my
father’s yearly salary. Probably a lot more than that. Erica
launched into some speech about how black pearls were formed.
Something about black lips and Tahitian clams, but I couldn’t
concentrate on what she was saying. All I could think about was how
selfish I’d been.

This necklace didn’t belong to me. It could never
belong to me. And now the only right thing to do was give it
back.

The thought alone nearly made me cry.

“I guess I’ll just go back in the morning and return
it.”

“Return it?” Erica said. “You already said that guy
just gave it to you. Why do you want to return it?”

“Because it’s not mine,” I said. “There had to be
some misunderstanding. No one would give away something like this.
No one sane, anyway.”

“If it was me, I’d keep it.”

“Erica…”

“What?” she said. “He gave it to you fair and
square. If anyone says anything—which they won’t—all you have to
say is you thought it was a gift. You speak English. He speaks
Italian. How were you to know this was some priceless family
heirloom he just let you try on?”

My stomach churned.

All night long Erica tried to convince me to keep
the necklace, but I wouldn’t budge. I knew what I had to do, and no
amount of temptation was going to sway me from taking the right
course.

I just wished the damned thing didn’t have to be so
beautiful.

“Well, if you really are going to take it back,”
Erica finally said, “can’t you at least wait a few days? You know
I’ve got my Sorrento tour tomorrow, and I really,
really
want to be here when you go back to that shop. Please?”

Half of me wanted to cave in, but I couldn’t. Erica
was set to leave on a three-day tour of Southern Italy early the
next morning, and I couldn’t wait until she got back. I probably
should have listened to her advice. After all, it was bad enough we
were splitting up for half a week—a fact neither of us told our
parents—but to go to an otherwise empty shop with only an old man I
hardly even knew for company, well, that was just asking for
trouble.

Still, if I didn’t return this necklace soon, I knew
I never would.

I didn’t remove my choker when I went to bed that
night. Wrapped tightly in the sheets, I cupped my pearl in both
hands and prayed that God would give me the strength to give this
little beauty back in the morning.

In a fit of selfishness, I also prayed that I
wouldn’t have to.

But whatever the outcome, I knew I’d do the right
thing. If the shopkeeper wanted it back, then it was his. If
not…

Well, it couldn’t hurt to dream. Could it?

The next morning, Erica was gone before I awoke.

I’d heard her fumbling around to get dressed, but
with a 6 am departure, she’d been up way too early for me to give
her a proper send-off. After I opened my luggage though, I cursed
myself for not telling her goodbye.

Inside was a jumble of tank tops, shorts, and mini
skirts. Several necklaces and a pair of tweezers littered the
bottom.

God, Erica, couldn’t you have at least checked the
bags before taking my only suitcase with you?

I tried to tell myself it wasn’t her fault—she was
in a hurry—but still, that didn’t help me now. Erica always liked
to show a lot of skin, and while many might consider these clothes
questionable on my 5’2” cousin, they’d be down-right indecent on
me. I was at least five inches taller than Erica, and though my
waist could easily fit in her size 5 mini-skirt, the hemline fell
only a few inches below my ass. One miss-step and my panties were
there for the world to see.

Of course, I guess a flash of underwear was better
than the show up top. I ripped two of Erica’s tanks before I
finally found a lace camisole that could hold me, and even then I
had to take shallow breaths just to keep the stitches from popping.
Usually I tried to cover up my chest, but when every shirt at my
disposal was tailored for a B-cup, I had no choice but to settle on
squeezing my double D’s inside whatever top could accommodate
them.

Oh, Lord, Erica’s tight-fitting clothes might as
well have been little black bars for all they covered.

I couldn’t do anything about my bare midriff, but at
least Erica had left behind the dark red pashmina scarf she’d
bought two days ago. I draped it across my exposed cleavage and
prayed no one could tell I wasn’t wearing a bra.

Like it or not, I was definitely going clothes
shopping later today.

With a deep breath and the sole consolation that at
least no one here knew me, I left my room, dropped the key off at
the front desk, and jogged down the early morning streets of
Florence. The town was eerily quiet, but I still kept my fingers
tightly latched around the pearl at my throat.

What if I really had misunderstood that shopkeeper?
What if he thought I was a thief? What if he’d given my description
to the cops, and now every officer in Italy was on the lookout for
me?

Doubtful, but not completely impossible.

By the time I found the leather shop again, the long
run and the constant worrying had worn me out. I panted on the
front step for several minutes before I even tried to open the
door.

When I turned the handle, it was locked.

Oh, no.

The shop couldn’t be closed. Not today. I knew it
was early, but still, I needed to do this now. I couldn’t just
leave. I might never build up the nerve to come back, and then…

The door opened.

He must have heard me jiggling the knob, but when
the old shopkeeper opened the door, I almost felt like he’d been
expecting me. His hands reached out for mine, and he hugged me
close before pulling me inside and closing the door behind me. His
Italian was so fast I couldn’t catch a word of it.

“I’m so sorry.” I gestured to the heavy pearl still
hanging from my throat. “I thought it was a gift. If I’d have known
it was so valuable—”

“Shh, bella. No worry. You back now, and old Pietro
take good care of you.”

His words faded into a heavy mixture of Italian
after that, and I just smiled along as he led me to a room in the
back of his shop. I didn’t really know what to say or do. I’d
caused him so much trouble already. I didn’t dare deny any of his
requests. I knew I probably shouldn’t be alone with him—he was a
stranger after all—but he was just so nice. When he pulled out the
old leather chair in front of his work bench, I sat down without
question.

Oh, God, if only I would have questioned.

“I just want you to know that I’m not a thief. I
just didn’t understand what was going on. So if you want to take
back the necklace…”

I pulled back my hair and waited for the shopkeeper
to unfasten the band, but he didn’t move. He just stared at me with
his head cocked to the side and his lips pressed into a thin white
line.

“Bella no like?”

“Oh, no,” I said. “I love it. I’ve never seen
anything more beautiful. It’s just too much, that’s all. I could
never afford something this…amazing.”

I must have said the right thing, because his
features softened and he leaned forward to stroke my cheek.

“Old Pietro already say no price, bella. This yours.
It meant for you. Wishing stone know what make you happy, and
this—” He fingered my pearl. “She make you happy, si?”

“Oh, si. Molto happy, but—”

He pressed a finger to my lips. “No more but and no
more sad. Is present. Now just sit here and let old Pietro finish
his magic. When I done you be happiest girl who ever live. You
see.”

He was so excited I didn’t even think about
disappointing him. Already the mortar and pestle were out again. He
slid on a pair of thin leather gloves before adding his
ingredients. A dash of golden spice here. A bit of red wine there.
He ground his concoction into a thick cream, and when he was done,
he held it up for me to smell.

“Bella like?”

I inhaled, and tears filled my eyes. Oh, God, it was
the most beautiful aroma I’d ever encountered. Waves of lilac and
honeysuckle rolled over me. I felt like I was lost somewhere
between heaven and home, and I didn’t want to leave.

Oh, Lord, I never wanted to leave at all.

He took my wrist in his hand, and when he rubbed the
fragrant cream across my bare inner arm I didn’t say a word. I
didn’t even move when his fingers traced perfumed patterns into the
hollow of my throat. My skin tingled. His every touch was like a
lover’s soft kiss, and I sighed when he finally stepped back.

I was a fool not to run away right then.

Surrounded by that heavenly scent, I felt more
relaxed than I had in years. My parents’ expectations, my friends’
opinions, my own misgivings, they all just ceased to be. I was
myself. I was Adair Bartlett. I was purified. I was new. And I was
alive.