Starling (139 page)

up to stroke her hair, and Cass felt a warmth move through her. He
touched her as if she were breakable, but he didn’t treat her that way
anymore. The old Luca da Peraga would have never let his fiancée
hide among courtesans and train with a dagger. Admittedly, Cass
was hoping she would never need to do either of those things again,
but still it meant something to her that Luca had given her the time
and space to make her own decisions.
He turned to face her. “I never should have left you, Cassandra.”
The wind pulled a lock of hair in front of Cass’s eyes, and she studied
Luca through a field of auburn strands.
Cass realized that he blamed himself for what had happened to
her, much like she blamed herself for Siena and Falco’s deaths. She
pressed her lips against his cheek. “I’m all right,” she said. “They
didn’t hurt me.”
“I know what it’s like to be imprisoned,” Luca said. “I don’t want
you ever to suffer like that again.” He produced a small box from his
pocket and flipped open the lid. A brilliant pendant lay nestled on a
bed of velvet.
At first Cass thought it was the lily necklace that Belladonna had
stolen from her at Angelo de Gradi’s workshop. But as she looked
more closely, she saw that this pendant was slightly different; the petals were larger, and the diamond in the center had a pinkish hue.
“I had another one made,” Luca said. He took the necklace from
her and undid the clasp. Holding the delicate silver chain out toward
her neck, he said, “May I?”
“Of course.” She trapped a few tendrils of flyaway hair with her
hand and held them back while Luca fastened the necklace. The lily
sat right in the hollow of her throat, exactly as its predecessor had.
Luca leaned back to consider his work. One side of his mouth
twitched like he was trying but couldn’t quite muster up a smile.
“There’s something else,” he said.
“This is more than enough,” Cass said. It was so like him to inundate her with presents because he felt guilty for what she had endured. But she didn’t need presents. That was one thing her parents
had never seemed to understand either—that what she needed was
just to be surrounded by the people she loved.
“Will you marry me?” Luca blurted out, his face going red. He
tucked his hands into the pockets of his breeches, but not before
Cass noticed they were shaking.
She raised a hand to the pendant and could feel her heart beating
rapidly in her chest. “I—” The image of Falco flitted through her
mind, but didn’t stay long. Falco was gone. And even if he hadn’t
been, Cass knew her feelings for him had been based on excitement
and danger. Falco had taken her out of her mundane world and
showed her a side of Venice that she had never known. Their time
together had been intense and tumultuous, but fleeting. She and
Falco, they had never felt quite real.
What she had with Luca was different. Solid. Even now, when the
danger was gone and they sat simply in the garden, Cass felt connected to him. It wasn’t only about their families, or about the losses
they had both endured. Luca made her a better person. Falco had
mostly made her . . . crazy. Although she would never forget him,
there was no doubt in her mind anymore that she was exactly where
she belonged.
“The necklace is for you either way. I just—I’ve been meaning to
ask you, but I wanted to wait until things had calmed down.” Luca’s