by Hope Ramsay
After polishing off half the cinnamon rolls, Rafe said, “I gotta run.”
“I’ll walk you out,” Sara said, following him out the front door and closing it behind her.
“What’s the deal with you and Colton?” he asked as soon as they were out of earshot. “You were busting his chops.”
“You know what the deal is.”
Rafe’s brows pulled down as he frowned. “He’s a good guy.”
Sara crossed her arms. “Legends? Antics with women? And you pal around with him.”
“You certainly seemed amused about his dating history,” Rafe said. “Maybe you’re a little jealous?”
“Jealous? Of the Revolver? You’re…you’re nuts!”
“Right. Well, you know how I feel about things,” Rafe said. “Tagg got his just deserts, if you pardon the cake pun. All he thought about was himself. Good riddance.”
“God, Rafe, I wish you’d have more conviction about things,” Sara said, smiling. He’d always been a straight shooter, and he’d always been quick to stand up for her, even when they were kids. She had to admit it felt really good to have her grown-up little brother defend her. But that didn’t mean she was going to agree with him about Colton.
“Anyway,” Rafe said, “give Colton a chance. He might surprise you.”
“Um, last time I checked you were my much younger brother, and therefore it goes against natural sibling order for you to offer me advice. You’re forgetting I’ve known Colton longer than I’ve known Tagg. Once a jerk, always a jerk.”
“Geez, give the guy a break, OK? People can change.”
“Dad swears most of his patients still have the same personality they had when they were thirteen.”
“That’s fatalistic,” Rafe said.
“So is dating a different girl every week,” Sara said, tossing him a pointed look.
“I said people can change—if they want to. I, however, have no reason to, seeing as I’m in my sexual prime. See you tonight for Sunday dinner?”
“Yeah.” She kissed her brother on the cheek. “See you.” Sara couldn’t be too critical of her brother’s dating habits. His longtime girlfriend had died in an accident when he was just twenty-one, and for years he’d barely dated at all. She supposed the fact that he was dating now and joking about it was a big improvement. She just wasn’t sure how much of his attitude was bravado.
She watched from the front porch as Rafe got into his shiny black F-150 with custom chrome rims and drove away. Colton came out of the house carrying two rolls in a baggie. No one ever left Nonna’s house without a full doggie bag.
“Thanks for letting me stay for breakfast,” he said.
She shrugged, although she was secretly surprised he’d bothered with a thank-you. “Not my choice. It was Nonna’s.”
Colton was standing very close. So close she couldn’t help noticing the vibrant blue of his eyes, a cross between summer sky and Caribbean ocean. Man, the guy had been kissed by the gods in looks. A real heart-stopper.
Not that he stopped her heart or anything.
“Bye, Mrs. Faranaccio,” he called to her grandmother, who was still in the house. “See ya, Red.” His gaze flicked quickly up and down Sara. “I tend to agree with your shirt. You do get an A in Anatomy. But it’s a shame, because the rest of you is a little salty.” He gave Sara one last sweeping look, put on his hat, and headed out into the rain.
Chapter 3
At four forty-five p.m., Nonna’s kitchen smelled like spaghetti sauce and freshly baked bread. As Sara pulled the homemade rolls out of the oven, she silently declared Nonna’s house ready for Sunday dinner.
“Nonna, where’s Gabby?” she called to her grandmother, who was in the dining room setting the table.
“Oh, I don’t know, dear,” she said as she set two forks by one plate. Before Sara could intervene, Gabby’s voice called from afar.
“I’m up here!”
“I’ll grab Gabby and be right back to help you finish setting the table,” Sara said.
“Take your time,” Nonna said, lining up yet a third fork near the other two.
“Here” turned out to be the attic, up the pull-down ladder at the top of the stairs to a space under the dormers lined by old crossbeams and layers of fluffy pink insulation. A solitary light bulb hung on a chain from the central roof beam.
Sara climbed halfway up the ladder, her head at floor level, debating going the rest of the way up. “Hey, Gabs, dinner’s in fifteen minutes. Can you come down and help? Nonna needs some help setting the table.”
“Oh, sure,” Gabby said, crinkling up her cute nose. Gabby was Sara’s closest sister, in age and in bonding. They were only fifteen months apart, and they told each other nearly everything. Gabby was one of the big reasons being back home was tolerable.
“Come up here, I’m scared,” Gabby said, exuberantly holding out her arms. Did Sara mention she was the dramatic sister as well as the imaginative one? “I need my big sister. Especially since I’ve barely seen you since you’ve been home. Besides, Nonna sent me up here to look for those pretty dessert plates with the white scalloped edges, and I can’t find them. Remember those?”
Sara hauled herself up the remaining rungs and sat down near Gabby on a couple of stacked wooden crates.
“This place always creeped me out,” said Gabby, who was sitting in the middle of the wooden floor surrounded by open boxes. “Rafe used to tell me terrible stories about families forced to live in the attic—like in those novels everyone was reading years ago, remember?—and I believed every word. I never wanted to come up here as a kid.”
“You always had the biggest imagination too,” Sara said.
Despite being a wills and trusts attorney, Gabby was a dreamer, and Sara wouldn’t be surprised at all if she’d gotten caught up in rifling through Nonna’s stuff, completely losing track of time.
Sara took a glance around under the dim light of the solitary bulb. For an attic it was pretty meticulous: Boxes lined up and tidy. Rolls of fabric propped in one corner, covered in plastic. An old wooden rocker and a baby bassinet hanging from hooks, plastic zipper bags containing old curtains, an old aluminum washtub that they used to wash their dog in.
“Maybe while you’re at it you can find my thirteenth-birthday present.”
“You still haven’t given up on that, have you? God, we looked everywhere for that.”
Sara shrugged. Her mom had been very sick on her thirteenth birthday and had died just a week later. “Mom was really good about that. She never forgot a birthday. Maybe she just hid it so well we never found it.”
“Well, I’m happy to keep looking. And while we’re at it, you can help me find Mom’s journals.” Gabby dug into a nearby box and took out something wrapped in yellowed newspaper. “Wow, look at this.” She held up a ceramic flamingo standing on one pink foot. “Fabulous. I might need this for my apartment.”
“Nice,” Sara said. “Mom had journals?”
“She was always writing in spiral notebooks, do you remember that?” Gabby said. “They have to be here somewhere.” She pulled out another box. Also filled with newspaper-wrapped objects.
Sara reached in and unwrapped one. “Oh, Nonna’s Fiestaware!” She dug through the box. “In all colors of the rainbow. I remember this stuff!” A thought suddenly occurred to her. “Does Dad know where Mom’s journals are? Maybe he’d have them instead of Nonna.”
Gabby shook her head. “I’m checking here first. I mean, when Dad married Rachel, he probably gave most of Mom’s stuff to Nonna. That makes sense, doesn’t it? You wouldn’t keep your dead wife’s personal belongings in your attic, would you?”
Sara had no idea. What she did know was that even now, her dad said very little about their mother. He never talked freely, and when questioned gave the briefest answers possible.
Sometimes she longed to sit down with him and have a heart-to-heart. Ask him about their mom, their childhood, happy memories. With Nonna’s memory fading, she wish
ed her dad would share more about her mother.
Actually, she wished her dad would share more, period. With her mother gone, her dad had turned into a man who was very involved in guiding and shaping their life decisions as he saw fit. Without their mother’s more relaxed and intuitive attitude, her father sometimes pushed for things he felt strongly were right but weren’t necessarily so.
“Have you asked Nonna?” Sara asked.
“All she says is, ‘Your mother was always scribbling in those notebooks of hers.’”
“Maybe someone got rid of them. Jane Austen’s sister burned two-thirds of her letters, did you know that? Presented to the world only a certain scrubbed version of events. Some people claim she ruined her sister’s legacy.”
“I’d call that a good sister,” Gabby said.
Sara laughed. “Maybe so. But Gabby, journals are private. Maybe Mom wouldn’t want us reading them.”
“I need them,” Gabby insisted. “Don’t you ever feel you wished you knew her? Not how we knew her as children, but how she was as an adult?”
Sara got up and hugged her sister. It was a relief to know she had as many questions about their mom as Sara did. “I wish that all the time.” She sat down next to her on the floor, pushing aside a box of recipe clippings. “I wish Dad would talk to us more about her.”
“Dad has a different life now. He hates talking about Mom, and I always feel uncomfortable bringing it up in front of Rachel.”
“Well, I think looking for her journals is a great idea, and of course I’ll help.” Sara examined the old box of cut-out recipes, for sure Nonna’s doing. “So, everything going OK with Malcolm?” Gabby had reconnected with her college sweetheart, who was a hedge fund manager they’d all been very relieved she’d stopped dating years ago. At the time he’d spent more time exercising than being with Gabby, and that about said it all.
Gabby flashed a bright smile. A little too bright, but maybe that was just Sara’s imagination. “Things couldn’t be better. Malcolm is awesome. He showers me with gifts and never fails to tell me how much he loves me. In fact, he’s planning to come out to dinner with the whole family sometime soon. Are you free some Friday or Saturday?”
“For you, I’m free anytime.”
“Great. You know, we’ve gotten pretty serious.”
Sara raised a brow and tried hard to put a nonjudgmental expression on her face. “Really?”
Gabby nodded. “I know you didn’t like him that much, but he’s changed. Grown up. I think you’re going to really like him.”
Sara’s recollection of Malcolm was that he was always into things. Bigger, better, more expensive things. One look at Gabby’s face and Sara realized her sister was waiting expectantly for her to say something. Screaming Get out while you can! probably wasn’t what she wanted to hear.
“Gabby, my main objection to Malcolm back then was that he was really into himself. He spent a ton of money on you, but it seemed like that was all part of his image. I hope that’s changed.”
“Malcolm’s very ambitious. Dad would love that. He’s a hard worker but he still finds time for me. He doesn’t beat children or kill cats. Plus I’m twenty-nine. He’s not perfect, but who is? Maybe he’s as close as I’m going to come.”
“Oh, Gabby.” Sara hated the idea that Gabby seemed to be talking herself into believing how great this guy was. “You’re not over the hill yet.”
She shrugged. “Not yet. But it’s getting really hard to meet nice guys who aren’t already taken, going through nasty breakups, or who aren’t just plain weird.” She paused. “Oh, and who also meet Dad’s criteria for a good spouse: educated, makes good money, worthy of his daughters.”
Sara laughed but had to admit Gabby was right about their father. He definitely had certain expectations about the men he wanted them to marry.
“Also, I have one more bit of news: I just got promoted to partner, but that’s less thrilling. Overall, life is great!” Gabby worked for a law firm in downtown Cleveland and had a gorgeous loft apartment there.
“How come you didn’t tell us about the partnership? That’s fantastic! Another reason to celebrate.”
“The money’s good, but it’s dullsville, Sara. I’m working eighty hours a week, and every single minute, I feel like pulling all my hair out one strand at a time.”
“God, Gabby.”
“I know. Please don’t tell Dad, but I’m working on an exit plan. Besides, for now, Malcolm makes up for how crappy I feel about my job.”
Worry riffled through Sara like a good strong wind before a storm. Their father had urged Gabby, wonderful, artistic, creative Gabby, to go to law school. It had probably saved her from becoming a hippie. It also appeared to have made her very unhappy.
Despite the bad vibes, Sara put on a cheery smile. “Well, we can’t wait to see him again.” She pulled something out of a box. “Oh, look what I found!”
“Is it the dessert plates?” Gabby asked.
“No, it’s my beat-up old copy of Pride and Prejudice. Look.” She held up the battered book with curled edges and yellowed pages, which looked as if it had definitely seen better days. The first thing she did was to put it to her nose and sniff it. God, she loved the smell of real books. Especially old and beloved ones, and this one had been—and still was—her favorite.
“Oh, you carried that thing around for years,” Gabby said.
Sara grinned. “I love it. I just never thought Pride and Prejudice would become my life.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Oh, just Tagg. I mean, I thought he was my Darcy.” She sighed.
Gabby sat down beside her and gave her a squeeze. “Tagg would definitely play the role of the perfidious Wickham in your life. But then who would be Darcy?” She tapped a finger against her lips. “Oh, I know. Colton!”
“I was just going to tell you how much I missed you and how happy I am to be home because you’re here. But after that comment I can’t.” Sara paused. “And besides, Colton would have to be Mr. Collins,” she said, pulling a face.
“First of all, he can’t be Mr. Collins because he’s not our cousin.” Gabby laughed. “Plus he’s nowhere near hideous.”
“Not in looks, but in personality he is.” Sara rose and headed to the stairs. “Come down and help me fix Nonna’s creative table setting before everyone gets here.” There were definitely no Mr. Darcys on her horizon. She certainly hoped for Gabby’s sake that Malcolm had transformed during the intervening years from a Wickham to a Darcy, but she seriously doubted it.
Chapter 4
When Sara and Gabby returned from the attic, Sara helped Nonna set the old Duncan Phyfe dining room table with the pretty floral bone china passed down from Nonna’s grandmother, quietly subtracting extra forks as necessary.
Sara took a plate from Nonna. “I’ve always loved these,” she said, smoothing her finger over the intricate pattern of pink roses intertwined with English ivy. They reminded her of being a child, sitting at this very table with her mom and dad. She used to study the flowers and the twists and turns of the ivy as she waited impatiently for all the big Italian dinners they’d eaten every Sunday, every holiday. She always called them the rose plates, not just because they had roses on them but because that was her grandmother’s name too.
“My mother’s mother brought these dishes from Italy,” Nonna said. “They were a gift from her parents for her wedding. Then my mother gave them to me for my wedding.” They were beautiful and old-fashioned and delicate, yet they’d withstood many years of wear.
Although Sara loved them for another reason too. “Remember the bullies?” It had never been easy being the fair redhead among a bevy of dark-eyed, dark-haired siblings: her older sister Evangeline, her younger sister Gabriella, and Raphael, their baby brother. Kids at school loved to tease them for having all been named after angels. The story went that after Evie, their mom couldn’t get pregnant, and prayed and prayed for a child. Four years later, she found herself
pregnant with Sara, then Gabby was born just fifteen months later, and Rafe came along two years after that. “I’m the luckiest mother in the world to have four beautiful angels,” her mom had said. Sara loved the story, and her name, but it was just one of the many things that had made her a target at school.
It didn’t help that their parents had chosen their names despite the fact that Angel Falls had an angel legend of its own. The centerpiece of downtown, beautiful cascading falls that used to power paper mills in the 1800s, were flanked by a quaint bridge guarded by a bronze statue of two angels. Any couple who kissed in front of the angels (and had their picture taken) was supposed to have true love forever. People came from all over to see the falls, shop along the quaint Main Street, and of course get their photo taken in front of the angels.
Despite being the only redhead, Sara was also the only sibling with glasses, which she’d worn from the age of four. Every year it seemed they got thicker and thicker. One afternoon in fourth grade, after she’d been made fun of by some kids on the playground, her mother had sat her down at this very table and told her how special she was, and how loved. “We wouldn’t want any of you kids to be the same as anyone else. You’re all unique, on the inside and out,” her mom had said.
Nonna had pushed a glass of milk and one of these very plates, full of warm chocolate chip cookies, in front of her. Sara hadn’t been hungry until she’d smelled the cookies. Nonna had sat down beside her and put an arm around her. “My little Serafina, the ivy is very different from the roses, yet they’re still wrapped around each other tight. They still belong together. That’s how families are.”
That’s exactly how her family was, thank God. In some ways she and her siblings couldn’t be more different, but they were all bound by an unalterable I’ve-got-your-back mentality.
