The café isbusy as hell this afternoon, tourists and locals alike bustling through the square, only pausing for their midday coffee break under the autumn sun. There’s a perfect view of the old town hall from here, not that I can see it with the constant thrum of bodies back and forth over the cobblestones. It’s probably why I don’t even see her approach my table.
“Is this seat taken?” I’d recognize her voice anywhere, and I practically spill my coffee in my lap as I turn around.
I expect the nun—out of the sundresses and boots Dakota picked for her in Colorado and back into her convent uniform of wool skirts and blouses, no makeup, and a braid neatly tying back her long red hair. But instead, she’s in a pale-pink tea-length dress, her gold cross necklace glimmering in the sun, and her long legs on display. She’s cut her hair, and it’s styled in loose curls, and the makeup she’s wearing subtly highlights all my favorite features.
“Zephyrine,” I say her name softly as I stand, and she smiles. “You look gorgeous.”
“You too.” She smiles and leans in to hug me. I wrap my arms around her and pull her close, the familiar scent of her wafting around me.
“I’ve missed you so damn much. What are you doing here?” I pull back and look her up and down again. “I can’t imagine the abbess approves of this.”
“She knows I’m here. Or theoretically she does.” She squeezes me one more time and then moves to her chair. I pull it out for her and then remember I have an appointment. I curse before Charlotte’s description of the new client replays in my mind, and I close my eyes, pinching the bridge of my nose and lifting my glasses as I process the trap she’d set for me.
“The abbey is the new client, and you’re here on their behalf?” I raise a brow, realizing I’ve been tricked.
She settles into her chair, pulling the small blanket they’ve set out over her lap. I sink back into my own, still taking in the fact that I have her in front of me again. I wish I’d known it was her I was meeting. I’m still jet-lagged and only half awake. I was barely able to manage the black shirt and slacks, but Charlotte has a strict code about uniforms herself, so I’d grumbled my way through the shave and press before I left. She would have made an excellent abbess if she weren’t in a relationship with three men.
“Close but not quite. The Vatican,” she replies.
“The Vatican?” I nearly choke on the sip of coffee I’d just taken.
Before she can answer, the server appears to ask if Zephyrine wants anything.
“Sie hätte gerne… Einen Kaffee mit viel—viel—Sahne und Zucker. Und… einen Kuchen. Erdbeerkuchen,” I answer for Zephyrine, and the server’s lips quirk at my description of hercream requirements, but she nods her understanding and takes off for the kitchen again. When I look back at Zephyrine, she’s grinning brightly, her eyes raking over me as she takes in my appearance.
“Your German is getting better,” she compliments me. I’m not sure it’s that much better, but I’m trying.
“I figured that if you’re staying at the convent permanently, I’d need to learn if I want to keep talking to you.”
She shakes her head, glancing down and pressing her lips together in a sweet smile.
“I couldn’t give up English completely. Have to be able to whisper conspiratorially with the other girls behind the abbess’s back.”
“How are you getting along there? Are you back in her good graces yet?”
“Oh, I’m in the best of them now that I’m not her problem anymore. How are you doing? Business back to normal at the Avarice now?”
“It’s fine.” I don’t want to talk about life back home. I just want to talk about her. I want to know how she’s doing and how they’re treating her. “Not her problem? How so?”
“Well, I went to the Vatican with the small envoy the abbey sent along with the relics. Everyone agreed it would be best to take them to the museums there so they could undergo conservation and be reassessed. The abbey doesn’t have funds for that, and one of their curators was very interested in delving more into their origins. They’d already been doing quite a bit of research by the time we got there, and we brought copies from our archives for them to look through.” She talks animatedly as the server returns with her coffee and strawberry cake, with a large side pot of cream. She pauses to smile at the server and thank her profusely.
“Did they find anything new?” I ask, as she ladles several spoonfuls of cream into her coffee.
“Yes.” She takes a sip, savoring it as she closes her eyes and sets it back down again. She leans back in her chair, the seriousness returning. “There’s a missing relic.”
“Another one?”
“Yes. There’s one more besides the three we found in the vault. They were all part of a collection of items that Charlemagne was believed to have carried with him during his rule. Whether they were sacred or he was as superstitious as my father, there’s disagreement, but there’s a fourth. The abbey records were incomplete because the fourth piece wasn’t kept with the other three. It was only brought there as the war intensified. They thought the abbey might be safe from the worst of it given how isolated it is.”
“It probably would have been, if not for Schaefer.”
“Right.” Her fingers trace over her necklace, and then she sits forward. “So that’s my new mission.”
“Finding the last one?”
“Yes. I’m hoping that with Charlotte’s help, I can find it and return it to be with the others. Put things right that my family made a mess of. Finish the work Grandad O’Leary started, and hopefully make some small amount of amends for all the harm my dad’s family has caused over the years.”
“The abbess is willing to let you leave to do that?”
