I paced one way, then the other, rehearsing what I’d say, but couldn’t concentrate, my emotions all over the place. I kept darting looks around the corner and down the block, hoping to see her, at the same time dreading it.

A half hour later, still trying out a variety of opening sentences, I spotted her coming down the street. I waited until she was a few feet away before I stepped out of the shadows.

“Luke—” She gasped my name, froze a minute, then maneuvered around me and practically ran toward her building, me beside her, talking the whole time.

“Why did you lie to me? I’m trying to understand… I thought… I don’t know what I thought… Talk to me, please… Explain this—”

“You’ve got to go!” she said, then dashed into her building.

“I’m not going away,” I called after her. “You owe me an explanation.”

The doorman blocked my path, a young Latin guy, name tag Edwin, chest and arms straining against his tight uniform. He laid a hand against my chest. “Don’t make me call the cops, sir.”

“Edwin.” I turned his name into a plea. “Have you ever been in love?”

He gave me a compassionate look, told me to go home and have a drink. Any other time, I’d have laughed at the irony. I shouted Alex’s name one more time, then turned to go. I was a few feet from the entrance when I heard her voice softly call my name.

We were side by side in the elevator, not speaking, then in her apartment. I tried to think of something to say but couldn’t. The apartment was not what I’d imagined either—large and airy but with old casement windows, a dining table with mismatched chairs, a slightly worn sofa, wooden floors in need of sanding—a stage set for two actors who had not learned their lines.

“Alex… Alexis… I don’t know what to call you.”

“This isn’t a good idea, Luke.”

“Which part? Me being here or all the lies you told?”

“What about you? What about your lies?”

“I was…trying to protect you.”

“From what?”

“I didn’t want you to get hurt.”

“I don’t understand…” she said, her face a diagram of confusion. “I was trying to protect you.”

“Protect me?”

“I never meant it to be like this. I didn’t think…” She closed her eyes, swallowed, tears on her cheeks, and I pulled her close, my lips on hers before she could protest, and she kissed me back, then pulled away, told me I had to go.

“Not until you tell me what’s going on. I’ll tell you anything you want to know about me, anything at all, if you will just tell me what’s going on.”

“It’s too late,” she said.

“For what?”

“For this. For us.” She turned away, light from the windows bleaching her face of color. “It was a job—to find out what you were doing—in Florence.”

I wasn’t sure I’d heard her correctly. A job? Had she been spying on me? But why? “Is this about Peruggia’s journal?”