Deep (The Pagano Family Book 4)

by Fanetti, Susan

  She’d never thought about him in that way, and she’d had no idea he’d thought about her like that. How completely stupid and naïve was she, really?

  But she missed him. There was no chance they’d be friends like they had been, but in the past couple of weeks, her anger had ebbed enough that she’d missed him, what they’d had—what she’d thought they had.

  “I just wondered if he’s okay.”

  Sky huffed. “Okay. This isn’t high school, and I am not going to be running notes back and forth between you. But I will tell you that I see him around a little. It’s not like we were all that close. You were the thing that connected us. So we’re not hanging out or anything. But we’ve run into each other. He’s…okay. It looks like he’s okay. Doing his thing.”

  “Okay.”

  “Are you thinking about talking to him?”

  “I don’t know. Probably not. I’m just sad to lose what we had.”

  “What you thought you had.” Sky’s expression suggested that she was pissed at Chris, too.

  Bev pushed the cookie away. “Yeah.”

  “I swear, that ‘friend zone’ bullshit is fucking infuriating. Like all we are is somebody to fuck.”

  “Sky, you’re not helping.”

  “Sorry. It’s just…I had a big fight with Rome about this not so long before all that shit went down. He said Chris had it bad for you, and I tore him ten different new assholes about how misogynistic it was to assume that a guy couldn’t be friends with a woman. And then that bastard goes and proves him right. And trust me, my Romeo has not let me forget it.”

  Nick had apparently seen it, too. Bev replayed the exchange she’d overheard between him and Chris that day at Ben’s. Nick had known. At least Sky hadn’t known—it made Bev feel fractionally better that another woman had missed the signs the men had apparently seen.

  “You’re not going to finish your lunch, are you?” Sky turned a disappointed eye on Bev’s basket.

  Bev shrugged.

  “Fine, then. I’d sacrifice small children for your curves, but waste away if you want. Come on. Let’s shop.”

  ~oOo~

  Nick pulled his Tahoe into the small gravel lot at the Quiet Cove lighthouse and parked. Bev was surprised—he’d said he wanted to take her somewhere special. She wasn’t sure what she’d expected, but it hadn’t been this.

  “We’re here?”

  He turned and smiled his beautiful smile. “We are. Have you ever been here?”

  “It’s not open to the public, is it?”

  “Not for the last few years, no. It’s still a working lighthouse, but the path down to the shore isn’t for the faint of heart—it’s steep, and the shore is all rocks, no beach. Some dumb kids were being assholes, and one of them fell and died. Since then, until the town gets a proper walkway built, which is turning into a hassle, it’s closed to everyone but the people keeping the lighthouse working.”

  “And us.” Bev smiled. Rules didn’t often apply to Nick. Not the same rules normal people followed, anyway.

  His smile became a grin. “And us.” He opened his door. “Come on.”

  Knowing that he wanted her to wait until he opened her door for her, and liking that he had this little old-fashioned quirk, Bev sat until he did so. When she stepped out, he led her around the lighthouse to a deck facing the water.

  The Quiet Cove lighthouse was, as far as Bev knew, a typical New England lighthouse: a tall, white, tapering column topped with a glass-paned beacon, painted bright red. There was a tiny house-shaped building attached on one side, where, before the days of automation, the lighthouse keeper lived, she supposed.

  Situated at the edge of a rocky bluff and ringed with a railed, wooden deck, the structure had guided ships into the harbor for probably three hundred years.

  Nick led her onto the deck and around to the front—or was it the rear?—of the lighthouse, overlooking the ocean. There was a wooden bench, painted bright red, against the building on this side. He led her there, and they sat. He put his arm around her, and she settled against him.

  And then he said nothing. He just stared out at the water.

  She let him be quiet for a few minutes, but eventually, she had to know. “Nick, why are we here?”

  Without turning from the ocean, he said, “I come here a lot—usually around this time, in the evening, when the light gets gold. I sit and smoke and think. I don’t care much for the beach, but I love the ocean. I’d like it just fine if they never get the walkway built.”

  She looked over the railing at the steep, rocky incline. There was a kind of a path, but not one she’d have been brave enough to attempt. And the shore below was all rocks, big and craggy. “Why haven’t they built it?”

  “To get one that’s safe, and meets ADA requirements, and is consistent with the regulations on changes to historical sites, it’s expensive—and it’s the Cove. Once people start talking about historical sites, it’s years before they stop fighting and make a decision. It’ll happen. Like I said, I’m in no rush.”

  She wondered if he was hampering the process at all. Maybe, for a Pagano, not being in favor of it was hamper enough. “Why are we here?”

  He turned and met her eyes. “I love you, bella.”

  She smiled and started to return the sentiment, but he put his fingers on her lips. “I think of this place as my place. I come here to be alone with the ocean and to work out difficult problems.”

  He paused, his green eyes searching her face. Bev felt like there was something she should be understanding, but whatever it was, it eluded her. “I don’t understand, Nick.”

  Something went through his eyes like a shadow, and Bev got the sense somehow that he’d changed his mind. From what to what, she had no idea; she wasn’t even sure why she was so sure that he had. But when he spoke, she didn’t think it was the thing he’d meant to tell her when he’d brought her here.

  “I got some news about my family today—family you haven’t met. My cousin Carmen is getting married. Here in the Cove, in a month or so. She’s going to be in town this weekend. I want you to come to Mass with me and meet the rest of my family. I want you to start coming to Mass with me.”

  They’d not yet talked much about religion. He went to Mass every week, but he’d never even raised the idea of her going with him before. “I’m not Catholic.”

  “So you won’t take communion. You believe, right?”

  “Sure, but—”

  “It’s settled, then. You’ll sit with me at Mass, and this Sunday we’ll go to my cousin Carlo’s house after. They’re throwing Carmen an engagement party.”

  All he’d said about his cousins was that there were a lot of them. In her earlier life, she would have been excited at the thought of meeting new people, but now she felt overwhelmed by the idea. She wondered if she’d ever get her old life back. “It’s important to you?”

  “It is. I want you to meet the rest of my family. I want them to know you.”

  “You hardly talk about them at all.”

  His expression clouded over a little. “They’re good people, all of them. They’re not in the business I’m in. They know me for who I am, and that holds me apart. But they’ll love you. And you them.”

  Still confused, and now feeling a strange sense of defensiveness on Nick’s behalf, she nodded. “Okay.”

  With the kind of smile he gave only her, he leaned in and kissed her. “Thank you, bella.”

  Meeting his family—all of it. That felt like a step. Part of her, most of her, was exhilarated to think that he was folding her into his family. A much smaller but adamant part of her was afraid. She was half of herself. She didn’t know how to find the rest, and she didn’t want Nick to be with her out of pity or a sense of responsibility. With every step he took that deepened what they had, she fought the urge to shrink back.

  What they had now was different from what they’d just started building before. She was different. And he was different. He was different with h
er. He was always Good Nick now, kind and patient, gentle and careful. He was the half of himself that her half-self needed. But she didn’t want to be her half-self, and she didn’t want half of him.

  She just didn’t know how to put their pieces back.

  ~oOo~

  Bev had never been to a Catholic service before. In some ways it was familiar, harkening back to the United Church of Christ services her mother would sometimes drag her to, when she’d get a rare itch to be a better person. But in most ways, Catholic worship was different. There was a lot more ceremony and ritual. And, strangely, people were, as a whole, dressed more casually.

  Except the Paganos. They were all dressed in Sunday best—but for one guy, one of Nick’s cousins, she guessed, across the aisle. He wore jeans and a button-down shirt. The rest of the men were in suits.

  After the service, there was more ritual, as everyone milled around outside and waited, apparently, for their chance to speak with the priest. Ben and Angie didn’t have to wait. And Nick, Betty, and Bev, too, were next.

  And then it was time to meet the rest of his family. There were so many of them! Feeling shy and nervous, she shook hands and accepted hugs from a nearly endless line of men and women. There were children, too, a young boy and two babies, a boy and a girl. She tried to remember all of their names—she was good with names—but after a while she was sure they were running together.

  She tried to keep it straight in her head: The big guy in the jeans and shirt, that was Luca. He stood out.

  Nick’s uncle was Carlo. His wife was Adele. The tallest cousin was Carlo Jr. His wife was Sabina. The two boys were theirs—the blond older boy was Trey. The dark-haired baby boy was Little Ben. Oh! Cute!

  The tiny baby girl was Teresa, with an exotic pronunciation. Her mother was Carmen—the one getting married. She was marrying the older tall, blond guy—blond was a helpful marker in this crowd—he was Theo. Another, younger blond guy who actually looked a lot like Theo was Eli. Eli’s Pagano was Rosa. And then there were two unattached cousins. They were John and Joey.

  Phew. She thought she had them. Fourteen Paganos. Plus Ben, Angie, Betty, and Nick. And her. And there were other cousins off somewhere, too, Ben and Angie’s kids and their families. And Luca had a wife at home.

  This family was a party in and of itself. Somehow, Nick had managed to be an only child in the middle of all this familial bounty.

  This party scared her. Since that night at the diner, she hadn’t been around so many people. Two months had passed—more—and though she felt better, she felt different. Once happy in a crowd, mixing and mingling, meeting people, making friends, now she had no idea whether she’d be able to smile and be pleasant with strangers for a whole afternoon.

  Nick took her home to change into more casual clothes before the party. He dropped her off at her door and went back to his place to do the same. Once in her room, she stripped out of her church clothes and her underwear and stood naked in front of the standing mirror in her bedroom. Even her body was different. Smaller. Looser. She’d lost muscle tone in the weeks she’d been recovering. She was scarred, inside and out.

  She turned and lifted her breast, smoothing her fingers over the shiny new skin of her scar. Why she did this, she didn’t know. It didn’t feel good; the skin there was numb—a lot of the breast was numb now, in fact. It wasn’t pretty. But again and again, she felt compelled to see this mark. To study it, make sure it was etched deeply into her memory.

  As if she could have forgotten.

  “Bella.”

  Bev’s heart nearly leapt clear of her body. She turned with a squeal and found Nick standing in the doorway to her room. “What are you doing here? You knock! You’re supposed to knock!”

  He stepped in, and she stepped back, snatching her robe from the arm of the chair she kept in the room. He stopped.

  “I did knock. You didn’t answer. I was worried.” He took a few more steps toward her.

  She was wedged now between the chair and the wall, and her heart was drumming at triple time. She shouldn’t have been afraid, not of Nick, and she didn’t think that was what had her so freaked.

  Shame. It was shame.

  Clutching the robe to her chest, she tried to make her voice steady. “You need to go.”

  He took the remaining steps to close the distance between them. “No.”

  “What?”

  “When have I ever let you push me away?” He grabbed hold of the robe and pulled. For a moment, they were at an impasse, Bev clutching the terrycloth close, Nick pulling it away, gently but with determination. “Let me see, Beverly. Let me see.”

  “Nick, please. I can’t.”

  “I don’t mean to take you, not until you’re ready. But I want to see what has you so fascinated. I know what they did. I made them suffer for it. But I don’t want you to suffer for it.”

  He didn’t understand. “Not even you can control that.” She let go of the robe, and he pulled it away.

  He dropped it to the floor, and then he stood before her and stared at her, his hands at his sides. Bev shook with shame, but she kept her hands at her sides, too, resisting the need she felt to cover herself.

  After interminable seconds ticked away, Nick lifted his hand. Bev flinched, and his eyes lifted from her body to her face. “Easy, bella.”

  His fingers grazed the long line of the scar at the side of her breast, and she began to cry. “Please don’t.”

  “Does it hurt?”

  Unable to answer through her tears, she shook her head. And then she forced words out. “It’s numb. I’m numb. I’m numb everywhere. I’m just numb.” Suddenly overcome by the weight pressing down on her shoulders, the weight of everything that was wrong, everything she’d lost, Bev’s body gave out, and she folded over, sobbing.

  Nick caught her, and then she was enfolded in his arms, her naked, numb, weak body surrounded by his clothed, passionate, strong one. He swept her up and carried her to the bed, then sat down, settling her on his lap. He held her and rocked her while she cried, combing his fingers through her hair and murmuring soft Italian nothings in her ear. The words meant nothing to her. And they meant everything.

  She cried longer and harder than she had since the diner—since long before that. When she was finally cried out, she stayed where she was, limp in his arms, taking strength and calm from his love of her.

  “We’ll stay home today.” He spoke in the same soft tone as before.

  “It’s okay. I’m okay. I’ll wash my face and get ready.” She pushed herself back from his chest, but he kept his arms tight around her.

  “We’ll stay home. There’ll be other parties—there’s a wedding next month.”

  She didn’t fight him; she was exhausted and didn’t want to go to a party full of strangers and happiness. “I want to get dressed, at least.”

  For an answer, he moved his hand and brushed his fingers again over her scar. Bev closed her eyes and tried not to cower from his touch.

  “I’m not trying to be sexual, bella. But I don’t want you to hide from me anymore. I think hiding is keeping you numb.”

  “I can’t. I’m not strong enough.”

  He caught her chin and made her look at him. “You are. When I came into that kitchen and found you, the first thing you did was ask for help for Donnie and Bruce. Everything that happened to you, and you were worried about the others. Irv—Chief Lumley—said it looked like you crawled back to Donnie after they left. You did that to check on him, didn’t you? After everything, you didn’t give up. You got yourself back to Donnie.”

  Her chin felt odd, and she realized that his hand was shaking.

  “I want you back, Beverly. I want you to remember how strong you are. I want you to have back your hope and your faith in the world. Your light. They didn’t take that from you. That scar is a battle scar. And you won.”

  If she had had more tears to cry, she would have. But she was dry. Tired and dry. So she tucked her head against his neck and
let him hold her. It no longer mattered that she was bare to him.

  ~ 19 ~

  Nick sat with Ben, Fred, and the capos at their table at Dominic’s, eating a lunch of steak and lobster. Once a month, the administration sat down like this with the capos and discussed business. Dominic’s was one of their safe zones, swept routinely and well guarded.