by Quinn Ward
Challenge
Kinky in the City #2
Quinn Ward
Copyright © 2018 by Quinn Ward
Cover Design by Cover Me, Darling
Edited by William Cooper
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Contents
1. Freddie
2. Peter
3. Freddie
4. Peter
5. Freddie
6. Peter
7. Freddie
8. Peter
9. Freddie
10. Peter
11. Freddie
12. Peter
13. Freddie
14. Peter
15. Freddie
16. Peter
17. Freddie
Epilogue
Also by Quinn Ward
A Note From Quinn
Acknowledgments
About Quinn
1
Freddie
“Daddy, I’m bored!” I barely heard Sophia’s whine over the clatter of pans hitting the floor. I let out a heavy sigh because this was the hundredth time my little girl had wandered into the kitchen since we got here this morning. Most days, she stayed with Mama, but I’d stupidly thought I could juggle keeping an eye on her with trying to get everything ready. Today, we were hosting our most important gathering since Papa turned the restaurant over to us boys and I was distracted thinking about about who would be walking through the doors later today.
I yanked the apron over my head and steered her back to Frankie’s office. The room had been transformed into a makeshift daycare, complete with toys, coloring books, the iPad, and even a DVD player with Sophia’s entire collection. There was no shortage of things to do, which meant she was having one of her needy days today.
My heart broke and I felt like the world’s worst father for getting irritated with her. The past few months had been rough and no amount of reassurance convinced her everyone she loved wouldn’t disappear if we weren’t right there with her. That shit tended to happen when the woman who gave birth to a kid took off, claiming she needed to “find herself.”
“Sweetie, if you can sit back here through one movie, I’ll come and get you when I’m ready to put out the cookies,” I bargained with her. By now, Mama, Enzo, and Matteo should be on their way to the church, Tony and Frankie should have the dining room set up, and I was the one woefully behind thanks to the constant interruptions. “If you want, I’ll ask Uncle Tony to come back and watch the movie with you.”
“But I wanna watch Peter Pan and he says I watch it too much,” she complained. Tony was right; there was no reason all of us should have every line of that movie memorized, but we did because it was the movie Sophia watched it almost daily and none of us were man enough to tell her no. I avoided it whenever possible, even if that meant resorting to bribery, because just hearing the title of the movie felt like the captain’s hook was twisting around in my chest, directly through my heart.
“I bet he’ll be okay with it today,” I promised her, already trying to figure out how to bribe him into taking kid duty for an hour while I tried to get back on track.
“Okay Daddy.” She followed me to the DVD player and watched as I loaded the disc. After I hit play, she wrapped her arms around my leg and held me tightly. “I don’t want you to go back to work.”
I scooped her into my arms and held her close. God, I hated this for her. I swallowed down the lump in my throat. “I know sweetie, but after today you’ll go back to Nonna’s house when I’m working. That way you don’t have to sit back here all alone.”
“But I like being by you,” she whined. “When I’m at Nonna’s, she won’t let me see you.”
“That’s because she knows I’m trying to get my work done as fast as possible so I can race back to pick you up,” I reminded her. “Now, you watch your movie and I’m going to tell Uncle Tony you’re waiting for him.”
“And you’ll give him cookies for us to share?” She bounced on the balls of her feet, rapidly blinking her big brown eyes. The girl had perfected the art of emotional manipulation.
“I’ll see if I have enough,” I conceded.
“There are always enough cookies to share.” I shouldn’t have mentioned the damn cookies. Now, she was fixated.
“But these are cookies for the Agnelli family. They’re not our cookies,” I explained. Just saying their last name caused a heaviness in my chest. Our families had always been close. Peter, being the only boy out of four children, had been easily accepted into the fold of the Marino boys.
But something changed nearly a decade ago, and I was the only person who could pinpoint the exact moment Peter started pulling away from everyone. It’d been eight years since he’d packed up his car and turned his back on the family that needed him.
“Daddy, did you hear me?” Sophia asked, tugging at the leg of my chef pants. I shook my head, regretting that I’d allowed my mind to wander down memory lane.
“I’m sorry sweetie, I was thinking about everything I still have to get done in the kitchen,”
I lied. Even if she was a decade or two older, I wouldn’t have told her what I’d actually been thinking about.
“You should let me help. Nonna says I’m a good helper in the kitchen and then I wouldn’t be soooooooo bored.” I picked Sophia up and deposited her on the couch with her blankie and the stuffed sheep she’d gotten for her fifth birthday from her favorite cousin. It didn’t matter that Ryan was her only cousin, she always made sure everyone knew he was her favorite.
“When I have something I need help with, I promise you’ll be the first person I ask,” I told her, quickly adding, “As long as it doesn’t involve knives or the oven.”
“Because I’m too little to use sharp things,” she said, satisfied for at least a minute that I would let her help at some point.
“That’s right, Squirt. Now, are you going to be okay back here until Uncle Tony can come and sit with you?”
“Yep. I’m good. You should go back to work now,” she directed me, as if I hadn’t spent the entire morning trying to do exactly that. “And I hate Squirt. Uncle Tony and Uncle Enzo call me Tinkerbell. I wanna be your Tinkerbell, too.”
Another twist of the hook. Fuck, it was going to be a long day. I wanted to tell her Tinkerbell was the one name I’d never call her, but she seemed so genuine in her request I couldn’t refuse her outright. “I’ll do my best.”
A little over two hours later, Matteo walked into the kitchen still dressed in the suit and tie he’d worn to the funeral. His eyes darted around, trying to take in everything that needed to be done. This was going to be a disaster. As much as I loved Matteo, he tended to be spastic when he was stressed out and escorting Mama to her best friend’s funeral couldn’t have been easy.
“Teo, I need you to go out and light the Sternos under all the chafing dishes,” I instructed him, handing a lighter across the pass-through. I didn’t have the time or the energy to keep him on task, but today was not the day for him to lose his shit. As soon as I saw Frankie, I’d give him a list and he could be our baby brother’s keeper.
“Freddie, Mama wants you to come out and pay your respects to Silvio and the kids.” The kids, not the girls. That meant Peter had graced the family with his presence at his Mama’s funeral. The lost boy comes home...
“No matter what happened between you and Peter, you need to remember he’s mourning the loss of his mother,” Tony lectured me as I followed him through to the bar, where the family was neatly lined up accepting condolences from everyone who’d come.
At one end of the line was Silvio, the stocky man I’d always been uneasy around because of his backward thinking and misogynistic beliefs.
He and Papa had a falling out after Silvio insisted it’d be better to allow their family bakery to close rather than put it in the hands of one of their daughters, even though one was a talented pastry chef. All because Peter abandoned them and didn’t give a damn about their family’s legacy.
“Nothing happened between us,” I lied. I’d be doing a lot of that today. There were things I’d learned about Peter I wished I could forget, but I would never betray him by telling anyone what I’d walked in on one afternoon when I showed up early to pick him up for a church youth group camping trip.
“Tell that to someone who didn’t see how he paled every time Mama mentioned your name. The poor guy looked ready to burst into tears.”
“As you pointed out, his Mama just died and he was too caught up in his own bullshit to make it home in time to say goodbye,” I reminded him. No way in hell was Peter on the verge of tears because of me.
And holy fuck—my mouth felt like I’d been chewing on cotton balls when I caught sight of the man standing at the opposite end of the receiving line. The hair that used to be short and cropped into a respectable, masculine style was now shockingly blond with highlights and slicked back into a low ponytail that brushed the collar of his suit jacket. The lights were dim so I couldn’t be certain, but I swore I saw traces of eyeliner framing his eyes. My gaze traveled down the length of his body, and I wondered what he wore beneath his perfectly tailored trousers. If I was disappointed to see plain black dress shoes on his feet, I’d never admit it. Peter was nothing like the picture I’d painted in my mind.
Get a grip, Marino. Of course he’s not dressed the way you expected. No way Silvio would have allowed that.
“Man, you should see your face right now.” Tony chuckled as I elbowed him in the ribs. “Anything you want to share, Freddie?”
“Fuck off. Don’t you have work to do or something?” I whipped out the crudely scribbled to-do list I’d planned on giving to Frankie and handed it to Tony instead. “Here, this is shit Matteo can do without causing any damage. Think you can help him stay focused? And since you have so much time on your hands, once he’s settled you can go entertain your favorite niece.”
“Don’t think I’m so stupid I don’t realize what you’re doing,” Tony warned me. “We will talk more about this later. But I have to say, you have good taste if he’s what can pull you out of the funk you’ve been in.”
“Go,” I demanded, pointing to where Matteo was apologizing for bumping into someone. Tony might think we’d finish the conversation later, but as far as I was concerned, there was nothing more to say. Peter was even more beautiful now than I remembered him, and I wasn’t comfortable with the way my stomach tightened, knowing the attraction was as alive as ever.
I cut into the receiving line when another of our former neighbors greeted me. If anyone hadn’t known I was working and not here to mingle, the chef’s white jacket with the Marino’s logo embroidered on the chest would’ve given it away.
Silvio greeted me with cool regard. “Freddie, thank you for everything you’ve done. My Teresa would’ve loved this.” He made the sign of the cross at the mention of Mrs. Agnelli. Lucia, the eldest of the Agnelli sisters reached out to console her father.
“I’m sorry for your loss,” I said, the words feeling inadequate as they always did. I shook hands with Silvio and offered Lucia a hug.
The Agnelli girls had been a constant reminder of what it would be like to have pain in the ass little sisters around, and I hurt for their loss. Maria, in particular, was nearly inconsolable by the time I reached her. I held her tight, glaring over my shoulder at Peter, who was rubbing her back. Tony’s voice echoed in my head, reminding me this wasn’t the time to crucify Peter for his absence. He was here now, and from the looks of it, at least Maria accepted him exactly as he was. And yes, his upper lids were definitely lined with black and there was the slight shimmer of eyeshadow. Not appropriate for a man at his mother’s funeral in my opinion, and given the disapproving looks from other well-wishers, I wasn’t alone.
“Peter, it’s good to see you.” There I went with the lies again. My heart ached, and I tensed when Peter draped an arm over my shoulder. I wanted to shrug off his embrace. Wanted to wrap my arms around him and tell him how much I missed him. How much it hurt to admit the role I’d played in making him think he couldn’t live as he wanted here.
“Thank you for doing this for us,” he said, shuffling from one foot to the other as he ran a hand over his slicked-back hair. He started to speak, stopping abruptly and shaking his head. All the things he didn’t say spoke volumes. This wasn’t the time or the place to rehash the past.
“Lucia asked Frankie so she could focus on your father and your sisters,” I responded, subtly making it very clear I hadn’t done this for him. Hell, until he showed up at the restaurant, I’d convinced myself even the death of his mother wouldn’t bring him home.
I pulled away, making excuses about being needed in the kitchen, but Peter reached out for me. “After the dust settles, I’d like to sit down and talk.”
“We’ll have to see,” I said, more as a brush off than anything else. Nothing either of us said could change the past, and I needed to stay focused on Sophia’s needs. Whether I liked it or not, Peter would be a distraction.
2
Peter
By the time the receiving line at Mama’s funeral ended, I was exhausted. Today was the one day I’d toned down my personality out of respect for the woman who’d given me life. No matter how her silence hurt when Papa used to tell me to act like a man or stop acting like a sissy, I struggled to accept that I would never see her again.
“Hey, if you go down the hall, the last door on the right is an office. No one will look for you in there,” Maria whispered. She’d been glued to my side all day, and I worried about leaving her alone out here. She tugged at the skirt of the simple black dress Lucia had insisted she wear today, despite Maria’s obvious discomfort.
Seeing how Maria blanched when Lucia unzipped the garment bag and set a pair of simple black heels on the bed last night ignited my protective mode. I’d missed so much of Maria’s childhood and seeing her now, I wondered if I could’ve helped her more had I stayed. “I’m fine. You need to take care of you, too.”
If not for Maria, coming home would’ve been a total waste. Every time Papa looked at me and sneered, I knew there was no way he’d ever accept the man I’d become, no matter how many awards or accolades I’d received. He didn’t care that I’d followed my dreams, because my dreams were an embarrassment to the family. Lucia would never forgive me for being so self-centered that I didn’t run home when Papa sent for me, forcing him to close the family’s bakery. It didn’t matter to her that being chained to the ovens day in and day out would’ve slowly killed my soul. And Gianna was so disgusted by who I’d become that she hadn’t been able to hold back her condemnation.
The only reason I hadn’t gotten back in my rental car and headed straight back to New York was sweet Maria, the quirky, eccentric teen who no one noticed was falling apart. I saw so much of myself at her age, and I couldn’t leave until I knew she was okay. She’d snuck into my room late last night and begged me to tone it down for the funeral. It was an unnecessary request; I knew damn well I couldn’t walk around in artfully shredded jeans and glitter eyeshadow during Mama’s funeral. I turned up the shock factor for my homecoming because I needed to make a statement. The boy who’d run away from home eight years ago was dead and gone. I was through bending to fit the expectations of anyone else.
“A few minutes of quiet time might be a good idea.” I kissed Maria’s cheek and snuck away before either of my other sisters noticed and interrogated me. Or worse, told me again what a piece of shit I was for needing a break from the parade of people who thought they knew me.
“Peter!” I heard
a little girl shriek as I shuffled down the hall. Without a second thought, I broke into a sprint, my feet protesting the friction against blistered heels with every step. I threw open the door where the cry had come from, shocked to find a little girl staring at me like I was an intruder. She clutched a blanket close to her chest as she backed away from me, tears filling her dark eyes.
As I surveyed the scene, I noticed what was playing on the television mounted to the wall. Peter fucking Pan. Seriously, could my day get any more jacked up? It felt like a sick joke that this little girl, who couldn’t be more than four or five, was watching the original version of Peter Pan instead of one of the myriad newer, fancier animated movies most kids fell under the spell of.
“Who’re you?” she asked, her little voice ragged and scared. I crouched down so I wasn’t towering over her. She took another step back, plastering herself against the desk.
“My name’s Peter,” I told her, glancing at the screen where Peter Pan dodged Captain Hook with Wendy cowering in the distance.
“Like Peter Pan?” Her eyes grew wide with amazement. For the first time in twenty-six years, the comparison didn’t annoy me. I nodded. “And I’m Tinkerbell. We should be friends.”
I had no response for that. And I wasn’t sure why this little girl was back here unattended. A smart man would’ve backed out of the room and found the nearest Marino to figure out who she was, but that’d require dealing with people, which I wasn’t prepared to do now that I’d escaped the cacophony of condolences in the dining room. Hell, the kitchen would be preferable with all its clatter, but that would mean facing Freddie, and it was obvious I still disgusted him.
