Smoke: The Carelli Family Saga, Book One

by Eden Butler

  “Go,” I told him, not bothering to watch him as he left. He had a job to do and so did I.

  My son, I thought, rubbing the kid’s back again, moving away from my family’s stares as that sensation in my gut moved up my chest, wondering why I didn’t hate the way that sounded.

  Wondering why the idea of being Mateo’s father didn’t scare me like I knew it should.

  4

  Maggie

  Smoke didn’t look like the gangster he was, walking around O’Bryant’s General Store in a pair of faded Levi’s 510s and plain-toe black Timberlands. In fact, he looked more like the men pouring concrete by the new park entrance next to my building than the smooth “businessman” everyone in town thought him to be as we neared the checkout.

  But he looked as relaxed in those jeans and tight Yankees tee as he did in the designer suits that filled his closets. Truth was that the man looked good in anything he wore, and I suspected he knew it.

  “This one’s open.” He nodded toward the checkout, smiling at the older cashier waving off a teenage boy, his arms full of two canvas bags.

  “Mr. Carelli!” she called, her round cheeks dimpling as she stared at Smoke. The woman’s graying, curled hair fell around her face, small tendrils obscuring her eyes, and she brushed it back before she wiped down the scanner at her side. “Good afternoon. How are you on this gorgeous summer day?”

  “Good, Ms. Ada. We’re good,” he said, glancing at me, helping me place the items for my oil change onto the belt. “How’s your sister?” Smoke’s smile was warm, and like always when he spoke, particularly to older folk, his attention was focused directly on their eyes. “She get her daughter’s situation taken care of?”

  Ms. Ada’s smile lowered a fraction, her gaze moving to the side, but she kept the same welcoming expression on her face. “She did, thanks to you. I can’t tell you how grateful…” The woman went quiet when Smoke cleared his throat, giving me a glance that didn’t make it to my face before he dipped his hand to his pocket, motioning to the stuff we’d put onto the belt for her to ring up. “Right,” she said, hurrying with our items. “Let’s get this taken care of.”

  It wasn’t the first time someone gushed to him in my presence. It wouldn’t be the last, but like every other time I’d heard a great heap of gratitude for something he’d handled, some secret business that the Carelli’s had “taken care of,” Smoke dismissed the praise. It was his way.

  “Car trouble?” Ms. Ada asked, putting the blue oil filter into a canvas bag, her smile bouncing between the two of us.

  “Maggie here wants to learn how to change her own oil.” Smoke’s expression was amused, a little expectant, as though he could predict what would come next and my reaction as if he’d written it in a script.

  I started to get the feeling the man knew me a little too well.

  “Oh, why on earth would you want to do that, honey?” Ada grabbed the wrench, wrapped in cellophane that I insisted purchasing myself instead of borrowing the one Smoke said he had at his garage, and waved it in my direction. “You’ve got yourself a strong, capable man right here who clearly can take care of you.” The wink she gave me was obvious. “Mr. Carelli always seems to smile a bit more anytime you’re around, the whole town talks about it. It’s sweet. You make a fine couple. You should let him fix your car, sugar. Every girl needs a man to look after such things for her.”

  Another wink coupled with a wide grin that reminded me of all the waggling eyes and exaggerated looks I got from Smoke’s siblings and parents anytime he and I stood too close to each other. They weren’t stupid. And we could be a little obvious. But nothing was out in the open. We never pawed at each other. We weren’t all moony and sweet-eyed in public.

  But we had spent the past six months going at each other like two teenagers with a fresh round of pubescent hormones and parents who told them they were forbidden to do a damn thing with one another.

  Still, us being at the same store, at the same time, buying car things together, and him being the sort of man who liked to fix things whenever they needed fixing, absolutely didn’t mean I needed to be taken care of, no matter what this sweet old lady thought.

  From the corner of my eye, I spotted Smoke covering his mouth. Then, he took to shaking his head before I inhaled, pushing the cans of oil down the belt. “Well,” I said, folding my arms, “I am all the capable man I need right now, Ms. Ada.” Smoke glanced at me, his grin a little annoying, then insufferable when I slapped his hand as he tried paying for the purchases. “And that,” I said, pointing to the total on the register, “I can take care of too.”

  “Yes ma’am,” he said, tucking his wallet back in his pocket, not bothering to hide his laughter.

  Ms. Ada’s smile fell completely, and a fresh wave of guilt filled my chest. I was being a rude bitch, something the old woman didn’t deserve. There was no call for my attitude, not when the woman was just speaking what was likely on the mind of most of the women in town—a big lot of them who probably thought Smoke hung the moon, no matter if it fit in with my way of thinking.

  Spotting the little jar on the corner of her till, the one with the picture of the too thin kids with no summer meals and the sweet faces, I paused, digging in my purse for a twenty.

  “Uh, you have a good afternoon…” I told the woman, stuffing the cash into the nearly empty jar before I grabbed Smoke and my bag and hustled us both out of the store.

  “Stubborn…ridiculous…” he was saying, laughing as we moved down the sidewalk.

  “Oh, shut up!”

  “She was being sweet.” He paused at the intersection, taking the bag from me despite me trying to hold onto it. “And,” he continued when I frowned at him, “she’s harmless.”

  “This whole town is harmless,” I admitted, following at his side as we moved through the intersection and down the sidewalk that led to his building. “And they seem to make a lot of assumptions…” I let the statement hang, not wanting to bring up a conversation I was sure Smoke didn’t want to have. We’d never discussed a relationship between us because of the impossibility of it all. It was established from the beginning, and no matter how many times I ended up in his bed, that wasn’t going to change.

  Smoke nodded to Mr. Confer, a tall man in his forties with a kind face and a salt and pepper beard I’d seen coaching the pee wee football team in the park every Saturday morning, but kept his attention on the street and the cars and small crowd that congregated near the bakery and coffee shop. “It makes sense. You’re around. The kid, he’s around a lot…”

  “We…don’t have to be.”

  Smoke slowed his steps but didn’t stop, moving just behind me like he thought about turning around but changed his mind. “No,” he said, catching up and shooting a look at me I couldn’t read. “You don’t.” Then, he stretched his neck, a habit I’d noticed he had anytime he was irritated or tired. “But, I’m used to the kid yanking on my chain and I’m used to you yanking on my—”

  I jabbed him in the ribs before he could finish, laughing until my throat ached as we moved down the sidewalk. “You’re annoying.”

  “A little,” he admitted, “but I serve a purpose.” When Smoke looked at me the way he did just then, my head went a little fuzzy and I forgot about those rules we’d established when this all started. For a second, I let myself forget about all the impossibilities.

  “Si,” I said, staring at his mouth, then quickly glancing at his eyes, blinking when he curled an arm around my waist and pulled me close. “But…” I put a few steps between us, reminding myself that wasn’t what I needed from him today. “On today’s agenda is an oil change lesson.”

  “Fine, bella…” He grabbed me again, moving his mouth to my ear, making his voice deep, teasing. “Then let’s get dirty…”

  “Did I get it all?” I didn’t trust his grin. Or that smirk. Or the way Smoke kept nodding. It was too quick. Like he was full of shit and wanted me to believe he wasn’t. “Where’s the damn mirror?
”

  “You can’t be worried about what you look like in the middle of an oil change, bella.”

  “I’m not, Mr. Carelli.” He laughed—he’d been doing an annoying lot of that shit— clearly amused by me exaggerating his last name. “I’m worried that I still have oil all over my face because someone didn’t tell me about how much oil would still be in the pan when I released the drain plug.” The thick scent of the oil coiled into the back of my throat, not helping to ease the soreness I felt there.

  “I did warn you.”

  “Liar…”

  “In fact,” he slid the pan out of the way, stretching an arm toward me to wipe the crumbled paper towel across my forehead, “I think I said, ‘head’s up,’ just before you pulled the plug out.”

  That smile was lethal, and it was the only thing saving him from a full throttling as we hunched under my Outback. “Yelling ‘head’s up’ isn’t exactly giving me all the instruction I need to do this right.”

  Smoke whistled, holding up his hands like he was ready to give up. “I went over the instructions before we got your Subaru off the ground. Step by step.”

  “Pfftt. You’re full of shit. ‘Jack up the car.’” I held up one filthy, oil-drenched finger before lifting a second. “Slide a container to catch oil underneath and locate the drain plug.” And a third. “Unscrew. Watch for the oil as it comes out. At no time did you say, ‘watch out for the damn geyser that will spew from the pan and oh, by the way, it’s gonna soak your head and face and hands, Maggie’—it’s not funny!”

  The asshole rolled onto his back, laughing so loud his face had gone red and he wiped at his eyes. “Shit, bella, it is funny.”

  He turned on his side, still grinning like an idiot when I replaced the brush gasket, the laughter subsiding only slightly as I refastened the bolt with the wrench.

  “I…honestly didn’t think you were serious about all this,” he admitted, looking up at me from the ground as I turned, frowning down at him.

  “Why wouldn’t I be serious about this?”

  “A story my folks told me…about when they met.” Smoke softened his features, his expression easy, traces of his laughter still in the lightness of his eyes and the small grin on his face.

  “How did they meet?”

  He hesitated, just watching me, like he wasn’t sure he wanted to bring up something so personal. It wasn’t exactly common knowledge, and though the Carelli’s were friendly, kind people, they were private. But Smoke only hesitated a second longer before he scooted closer, ignoring the small protest I made before he took the wrench from me and finished fastening the bolt as though he needed something to do to distract himself.

  “Pop worked at this garage back on Staten Island. He’d been there since high school, trying like hell not to be like his—” he stopped, not looking at me before he corrected himself— “trying to make his way different from his family’s.” Mr. Carelli hadn’t been part of his father and brother’s business, the illegal business, and I’d heard rumors it had been a struggle for Smoke’s parents because of it. They’d worked hard for every dime they had.

  “So, he worked long hours and did all the jobs nobody wanted. Dealt with the housewives who didn’t want their men knowing they’d busted up their cars or the families that couldn’t afford to pay up front. He got a reputation for doing good work and for being a good man.”

  “I’m not surprised,” I told him, smiling at the slow shake of Smoke’s head.

  “So that kind of reputation, that kind of man, being the good-looking sort like most Carelli men are…” Smoke turned to me, shooting me a wink that pulled a laugh from me, before he continued, “you can imagine there were a lot of women coming by trying to get his attention.”

  “Or cheap labor.”

  “Yeah, that too.” Smoke nodded to the oil pan, then slid out from underneath the car, leaning down to help me up. He handed over a few more paper towels and we both continued to clean away the oil residue before he lowered the hydraulic and brought my Subaru back to the ground. Then, he lifted the hood and pointed to the bright blue oil filter marked with the word “Engine” along the center.

  I reached for it, unfastening the cylinder filter like he’d instructed me before we started and grabbed a can of fresh motor oil to lubricate the new filter, rubbing the oil around the opening as Smoke watched me, nodding when I replaced it.

  “So, you’re dad…”

  “So, Pop kept getting this one girl coming in, cute little thing he said, big mouth, pretty face, bossy as hell. Every week for over a month. One week it was the tires. One was flat. He fixed the flat tire. Next week, another one was balled. He replaced that one.”

  “She had excuses?” I asked, grabbing the yellow oil cap and removing it.

  Smoke leaned against the car, nodding, handing over a well-used funnel to slip it inside. “She was relentless but full of attitude, telling him every week his work was ‘okay’ and that she thought his prices could be better and when the tires were all new and perfect, she started having problems with her transmission, then something funky with the engine.”

  I poured the motor oil into the funnel, grinning at the smirk on Smoke’s face, already guessing who the woman had been. From the sound of her, Mrs. Carelli hadn’t changed much. “He didn’t figure it out?”

  “Took him a while and even then, she had to help him with it. Wasn’t until she had her car towed to his shop and comes in yelling at him about what an awful mechanic he was because he’d supposedly fixed her car and it left her stranded on the side of the road. He gets under the hood and discovers the distributor cap had popped off.”

  I blinked up at Smoke, not getting why he shook his head. “That was a problem?”

  “Yeah, bella. Distributor caps don’t just pop off by themselves. They’re clipped on. Pretty much impossible to pop off on their own.”

  “She did it?” Smoke nodded, a slow, sweet smile stretching his lips as I tapped the empty oil can against the funnel. “And he finally got it?”

  He shook his head, arms crossed. “Not at first. Not until he was done fussing at her, asking her if she was trying to ruin his good name by sabotaging his work. Thought maybe she had a brother or uncle working for another garage and was trying to help them out and by the time he got done accusing her of all the bullshit that should have sent her packing, that pretty twenty-year-old woman puts her hand on her hips, calls him a dumb mook and asks him how stupid he has to be to not know she wants him to take her out.”

  “And then…”

  “And then,” Smoke said, laughing with me. “They dated four months. Got married on a Sunday, and she never had to worry about flat tires or funky car problems again.”

  After waiting a good ten minutes, as Smoke had instructed, I pulled the oil gauge out of the bin and checked the level, nodding when I spotted the correct amount.

  “And you thought I was trying to pull the same shit your mom did? Because…”

  “Not really. I mean…maybe…”

  I shut the hood, stepping around the car, while Smoke squeezed degreaser in my hand and we washed up at the small sink next to the door. “The difference between your parents and us…is…”

  “Well,” he said, drying his hands, then he brought the towel over and patted dry my fingers and knuckles. “Not sure I wanna know if they were doing what we do, but I’m guessing they weren’t.”

  “Because…”

  Smoke grabbed my waist, pushing me onto the hood of my car. “Maybe they were better Catholics than we are, bella.”

  “Uh huh…maybe,” I said, leaning back on one hand, my foot rubbing against the back of his thigh. “Or maybe, I’m just using you for your body…”

  His laughter echoed through the garage, then lowered into a soft growl when I pulled him close, scooting closer to get my legs around his waist. Smoke’s grin twisted up the right side of his mouth as he took hold of my leg, pushing me close. “Gotta admit…I’m good with that.”

 
5

  Smoke

  On Friday morning, Maggie’s roommate, Vi, stood with Mateo on one hip and two O’Bryant’s bags dangling from her elbow, barely making it down the sidewalk. I wasn’t one to judge shit. It wasn’t my place. But the woman was struggling and, in the heat, with the kid in the mood he seemed in, that struggle looked to be wearing her thin.

  “Hey,” I said, stopping Vi as she tried pushing the crosswalk button with her elbow. “I got it…hold on.”

  “Smoke…” I knew relief when I spotted it and it was clear on the woman’s face. From the way she lowered her shoulders and how she didn’t resist Mateo crawling into my arms when I reached for him, I got that she might need a break. “My hands are full at the moment.”

  “Maggie’s working?” I’d gotten busy with business, dealing with new clients two towns over and hadn’t caught up with her since I helped with the Outback at the beginning of the week. Other than Ma mentioning Maggie being late three days ago for her lunch shift, no one had mentioned her to me.

  “Sick,” Vi said, pulling back her long hair into some knot she managed without an elastic band. “She’s been running a fever all day and chasing that one around. I took him out with me to give her a break.”

  The kid reached for my chain, laughing when I bounced him in my hands, but I kept my attention on Vi, wondering why my chest had gone all tight. “She been to a doctor?”

  The woman tilted her head, giving it a shake. “You serious? Your folks pay well, but she can’t afford the co-pays or the medicines. I got Mr. Aldridge to give me samples of his overstock vitamins because Maggie won’t let me call my doctor, but she’s got this rash I’m worried about. It’s all up her neck and under her arms. I don’t think it’s chicken pox…I mean, surely she’s had her vaccinations and…hey! Where are you going?”

  By the time I’d made it to Maggie’s building, Mateo was fussing, probably crying because of how hard I pounded on his mother’s door. It was probably smarter to wait on Vi for the key. Probably smarter, but not rational, to get Maggie to make me one of my own, but, right now, that wouldn’t let me into her apartment any sooner.