"Kirby darling, don't fret," Lucia tried to console me as she grabbed her phone. "We will call Charlene and have her sort out the seating chart for dinner."

I clawed at my damp hair in frustration. "Lu, I'm not fretting about where Atia Russo is or is not going to sit. She can sit on my fucking face for all I care—"

"Oh, quite unlikely..."

"—I'm stressing because you just now told me that either Desirae or Artemisia or both of them were at the villa the same night your husband was murdered."

Lucia's brows furrowed pensively. "And just to clarify, are you upset that they might have seen you murder my husband or is it just that they didn't tell you that they might have seen you murder my husband?"

I let out an exasperated breath. "I'm not even gonna dignify that with a response. What else did you see on the cameras?"

"Not much else, I'm afraid. Even with the infrared, I couldn't tell who was behind the wheel. As soon as the Ferrari pulled into the drive, the cameras lost signal with the security app."

"She took out your WiFi," I mumbled. It was a relatively easy move with the right tools. Tools that Artemisia and I had acquired for the last job in Venice. I collapsed onto Lucia's bed, trying to wrap my head around everything. "Why wouldn't they tell me they were there?"

And then, paranoia began to creep in. What if they were the ones who had set me up? Artemisia's family had a long volatile history with Georgiy. She had every reason to want him dead, especially since he married Lucia. Did she still hate-love me enough to frame me for murder?

And with me framed, I'd be desperate enough to take whatever offer Desirae and the agency threw at me. Just like before.

"In this life, you can only trust yourself, love." Lucia walked over to her wardrobe and opened the carved wooden doors. "Well, yourself and a pair of exquisite stilettos, that is." From the bottom shelf, she grabbed a pair of iridescent gold heels and turned back to me. "We're not going to let a little betrayal ruin the night, right?" Kneeling down in front of me, she slid her fingers up the back of my leg as she slipped my foot into the shoe.

The Italian leather hugged my toes with a perfect fit. In the past, I had always been quick to make fun of Artemisia and her obsession with high fashion, but god damn, there really was something so empowering about a stiletto heel that fit just right.

Lucia's green eyes narrowed with a satisfied smile. They reminded me of my own, but not exactly in a good way. Her fingers firmly lingered around my ankle. "Better?"

I shrugged a little and raised the bare foot with pointed toe. "It helps..."

"Good," she practically purred as she slipped the other shoe on. It was only when she let go that she noticed Artemisia's name tattooed around my ankle. She quickly looked back up at me, pretending she hadn't seen it. "Now, go get ready. Help yourself to whatever you want to wear tonight. Though, it won't matter too much after dinner."

I glanced past her into the wardrobe. Full-length gowns filled the rack from left to right, though some appeared to be rather revealing like the one Artemisia had chosen. "Do you have anything a little more casual? Or did I miss the slinky, formal attire dress code in the fine print somewhere? I'd seriously kill for a pair of Calvins, some sweats, and a baggy tank right now."

"Darling, this is an elite, high-femme, sapphic sex club, not your mother's midwest tupperware party."

"What."

Standing up, Lucia reached over me, tits in my face, to grab the coil of jute rope from the bed. "First, a formal dinner for the top members, along with some sensual entertainment, then we'll open up to the rest of the members with several different kink stations set up throughout the rooms. And I do hope you'll give us a knotty demonstration."

"Ohhh..." I smiled sheepishly as all the pieces began to fit in my head. "Of course. Very on-brand for Artie." Lucia held the rope out to me, but I gently pushed it away. "I uh, should probably just lay low tonight. Ya know, since I'm kinda wanted by Interpol for your husband's murder. Can I just order some room service?"

Lucia let out a disappointed sigh and tossed the rope back onto her bed. "I suppose I could arrange for some of the girls to drop by your room, but consent from everyone is integral. This isn't a brothel, despite my husband's attempts."

"That's not what..." But her last comment about Georgiy made me pause. "What was Georgiy trying to do?"

"He and his partners, you excluded, were jealous of my success with the club. However, it wasn't just the money. You tell a group of fragile, power-hungry, cis-hetero men that something beautiful exists for women's sexual pleasure that they cannot be a part of, and that the point is that they're not a part of it, well, they do everything they can to destroy it. Including, placing a bounty on my head."

I couldn't help but chuckle at that. "That's a little ironic, huh?"

"Once the shock wore off, I certainly thought so." Lucia walked over to the mahogany dresser against the wall and pulled out a scarf with a blue Mediterranean maiolica print on it. Carefully, she began to wrap her hair up in the full-length mirror. "I also thought for sure you were at the villa that night to kill me instead. And I assume that's why you ran into Chaya."

"Wait, you think Chaya was going to kill you? Why?"

"Kirby, she's an assassin. There's no why. She does what she has to do."

I swallowed hard. "An assassin?"

"A spoiled one at that, but that was my own fault. Quite a shame she's turned on me, really. You two would've gotten on well I'm sure. She could have at least taught you some restraint, to not be so sloppy with your kills."

"I'm not—" I shook my head. "Chaya is the one who told me about you. She left a note telling me to find you. She didn't turn on you. She killed Georgiy, not me."

"Hmm..." Lucia barely seemed to consider what I was saying. "You know, when I heard the shocking news that Artemisia had killed herself, I immediately assumed it was her husband. But the more I dug, the more I found out about you... raised in and out of city shelters with a single mother, abusive step-fathers, tragically orphaned before high school graduation, but incredibly talented so the state decided to pay for art school where you then fatefully met Artemisia. Fast forward past some very impressive art heists to one in Paris with a foolish, over-zealous mistake that I don't believe was your own, and a six year stint in Saint-Fleury where you were finally released because of overcrowding."

"And a meritorious credit," I added carefully.

"Like everyone else, I was just as shocked and elated to hear Artemisia's suicide had been staged, and then not so shocked, yet just as elated to find your name buried, but none-the-less attached to the death of her obsessive ex-girlfriend."

My hand went to my throat, feeling the slight bump of scar tissue as I swallowed again. "It was self-defense."

"The first blow, yes, of course it was." Lucia dug through the top dresser drawer again and pulled out a folder. As she unfastened the ties, a thick document slid into her hands and with it, a couple loose photographs.

But I didn't need to look at them to know what they showed.

"Her skull was crushed, Kirby." The gloss of the photos caught the reflection of the light as she held them out towards me, but I kept my eyes fixed to hers. "Tell me I'm wrong about you."

Memories of Cora's pulverized skull flashed through my mind with no need for a photographic reference. Her platinum blonde hair nearly black from the blood. The warm, metallic smell of it everywhere. The way her finger twitched for minutes afterwards, still trying to clench the scalpel she had held to my neck.

I slowed my breathing to steady my heart.

"What do you want me to tell you, Lu? That anytime a lover collapses on top of me from pleasure, I don't feel the weight of Cora Chapman's body going lifeless on top of me instead? That when I'm alone with my mind at night, I don't hear that delicate crack of her skull breaking over and over until it puts me to sleep?" I stood up and adjusted the towel around me, walking towards her. "She brutally murdered one of my friends and several others to lure Artemisia out of wherever she was hiding. And she would have killed me, Raf, and Artie herself. So I'm glad she's dead, and you know what? I'm glad I was the one to do it. But you're wrong. You don't know me."

Lucia nodded, sliding the photos and papers back into the envelope.

I lifted my foot and grabbed the stiletto to give the gold heels back to her, but stopped as I caught a reflection of myself next to her in the full-length mirror. The arches were too perfect. I spun around to check my gams from the back. Every muscle defined.

"I'm keeping the heels."

"As you deserve, darling." Lucia took a long moment to appraise me in the mirror next to her before stepping into the bathroom to turn the shower back on. I was still admiring my legs when her head poked around the door once more. She tossed a tub of hair cream to me. "In case you want to tame those curls."

I hadn't worn my hair naturally curly in years, other than yesterday when we spent all day at sea. I cracked the tub and inhaled the citrusy scent of the curl cream.

"See you at dinner?"

Twisting the cap closed, I nodded. Lucia slipped back behind the door, leaving it open just enough that I could watch her step into the shower.