‘He likes everyone this week. He’s in love.’
‘So am I. Are you fighting me on this?’
‘No. I…I…’ she floundered. Isn’t this exactly what Mom meant when she said, ‘at your age a woman should be interested in security, stability, a man who respects her?’ Dominic respects you. Dominic loves you.
Oh my God. He loves you!
It’s him. He’s why you bought the house. He is the reason you’re here.
Lesley shook her head, trying to separate exhilaration and the facts, trying to be practical. ‘There’s no way this will work. You mother will always detest me. My mom’s not all that thrilled by you or your family. Besides the constant interference, the nasty looks, the...the…’
‘The what? I love you. You love me. That fixes everything.’
‘Where, in Sunshine-Happy-Dominic World? What do I do about my business? How do I fix that?’
‘I decided you could become a partner with me and Fabian. There’s lots of work here in Los Alamos.’
She frowned again, hands on hips. ‘You sound like my dad. He thinks I could fix up quads and duplexes. He says there’s plenty of ‘em over on…’ Her mouth fell open as her eyebrows rose. ‘Wait a second! Have you been talking to my father? Has he roped you into some kind of conspiracy? Is that what’s going on? Is that what this is? I bet GP came to you and…and…oh, fabulous! Just fabulous!’
Dominic burst out laughing and gripped her by the shoulders. ‘Hold on there, Little Miss Paranoid!’ He smiled down into her face, ‘take a breath and think about it. No one is involved in this but you and me.’ He pulled her into his arms, welcoming the contours of her body as she fit so perfectly into his. ‘I admit maybe we’re going at breakneck speed and this whole loving a woman thing is new to me, but I’m trying really hard to have your happiness and welfare foremost in my mind. I’m going to make some mistakes and get a few things wrong, but I made room for your things in my medicine cabinet.’ He smoothed back her hair. ‘When do you want to bring your shampoo and tampons over?’
Lesley gazed up into blue eyes she loved. ‘Do you think your son’s ready for feminine hygiene products and a woman in your house?’
Wait a second. Am I actually thinking about living with Dominic like Stefanie did?
He kissed her deeply and Lesley’s heart seized in her chest. Yes, Dominic loved her, but there was no way, no way, she was going to put herself in the Stefanie position. Time-limited she could handle, it was a quick demise that would leave her with bittersweet memories, but live-in lover would drag out into an agonisingly slow death that had the potential to turn her into the kind of woman who walked out on an infant son.
Or Dominic would dump her just like every other man she’d ever loved.
Martino never guessed that someone so different to his quiet, gentle Angelina would find his heart. Oh, he had loved that woman and when she had died a hole in the earth had opened up and swallowed him up to the neck. For years he’d been like a man buried in sand at the seashore. He’d dug himself out, but never realised his heart was still stuck beneath the ground until a glimpse of red distracted him from the church hymnal one Sunday morning. Eilish had taken off the scarf she’d wrapped around that glorious red hair and he’d been…intrigued. Intrigue gave way to curiosity. And curiosity became infatuation, which one morning amid toppled books at the library, turned into love.
And suddenly Martino was free.
For a moment, he was angry it had taken so long. ‘Porca Madonna,’ he swore under his breath and ground the heels of his Docs into the carpeted floor. After thirty goddamn empty years he was in love again and he was ninety-fuckin-two. The unfairness over being short-changed pissed him off. Blasphemous words, all in Sicilian sprang to the tip of his tongue.
Then he caught sight of that chic red bobbling head standing next to Chicken Neck Phelps in the buffet line and simply decided to live until he was at least one hundred and two.
‘Well, big boy, you were pretty fast on your feet.’ Barney had joined the lunch line. He gave Martino a few hearty slaps on the back. ‘Sneaking off to Vegas was a bit of surprise. I had ten bucks riding on you going for the big church do.’
Martino shook his friend’s gnarled hand. ‘We’re going to have a private ceremony with Father Kearney next week and a reception afterwards. It’d be a real honour if you’d be there.’
‘Mind if I bring a date?’
‘A date?’ Marino grinned, ‘Anyone I know?’
‘Been seeing a bit of Maxine – uh-oh. Here comes trouble.’ Barney tipped his head towards the entrance to the dining room. ‘He’s been bad-mouthing you. Telling everyone you stole his girl.’
‘Is that so?’ Martino felt the eyes of that clog-stomping, Edam-eater boring into his back. He’s been looking forward to this moment. Sure, it was petty, but the Poffertjes-lover deserved it. When he turned to face Witteveen, he made sure to smile brilliantly. ‘Well if it isn’t the old son of Orange,’ he began, but the gleeful vengeance died after a single flare.
His former friend looked haggard. Mike’s face was drawn. Dark circles stood out under his eyes, one of which was red and swollen with a sty. Right then Martino felt sorry for the old bastard. It seemed downright inhumane to be so happy when this big bird was so miserable.
‘Son of Orange? You think you’re so clever. You always think you’re so superior, like your…shit,’ Mike said, clearly uncomfortable using the word, ‘doesn’t stink or something.’
‘Oh, no. It does. Us garlic-eaters have some foul-smelling…’ Martino shook his head. ‘You know what, Mike?’ He held out his hand, ‘Let’s call this quits. Let’s put it behind us.’
Witteveen’s gaze travelled from Eilish back to Martino’s outstretched hand. ‘You expect me to shake your hand…you…you expect me congratulate you?’
‘No, I want to call us square. What you did to me was low down when you knew I was dizzy for the dame, but we’ve been pals a long time and we can crab a way out of this.’
‘Yeah,’ Barney piped up, ‘shake hands and get over it. We need you back. I’m tired of being the one losing all the money when we play Lamebrain Pete and Cincinnati.’
Mike smiled like a movie star. He took Martino’s hand. And squeezed. ‘This isn’t over just because you want it to be.’
As the pressure on his knuckles increased, Martino raised his eyebrows, and squeezed back. Harder. ‘I guess not.’
‘Son of Orange? I’ll show you son of Orange.’ Mike’s grip tightened.
So did Martino’s.
The crowd that had been lined up at the buffet now formed a circle around the two men and their little contest. His bride stepped forward and smiled at him again. ‘I’ll be gettin’ your lunch for ya, Marty,’ she said, sounding just like Maureen O’ Hara, ‘Come to the table when you’re done.’
It was utterly ridiculous that two old men should be trying to show the other whose pecker was bigger, but what was even funnier was how Sicilian Martino Rotolone suddenly felt just like Irish John Wayne in The Quiet Man.
Dominic knew he’d done the wrong thing, but it took a while to filter down through all the supercharged sexual energy. The thought struck him at dinner last night, right after Lesley had gone home. When he woke up alone this morning he realised how it was meant to be.
So he faced the facts about himself, about what he wanted, before he rolled out of bed.
For nearly thirty years it sat at the bottom of his top dresser drawer, untouched—except for when he shifted it around to put away freshly laundered underwear. His father had given it to him. Dominic had looked at it a few times when he first got it. He’d always figured it was something he’d give to Kyle one day.
Well that day was never going to come now.
He yanked open the top drawer and rifled around boxer shorts and unworn tighty-whities his mother gave him every Christmas. He pulled the box out and opened the creaking cedar lid. The smell reminded him of his grandmother’s other wooden chest,
the one that had been at the bottom of her huge four-poster bed. She used to keep hand-made quilts in that thing. It was Christian’s now and had been since Granny Brennan died in 1981.
Dominic wondered if his brother still stashed Playboys in that old cedar trunk.
Grinning at the memory, Dominic started down the hallway, box under his arm. ‘Kyle,’ he tapped against his son’s half-closed door and pushed inside, ‘have you got a minute?’
‘Uh-huh,’ the boy grunted. Sitting on the edge of his bed, barely awake, his son pulled the armhole of his t-shirt over his cast before yanking the rest down his chest. As a little kid, he’d had a chubby body and a satiny mop of fat curls that made him look cherubic. These days his physique was lean, muscles were defined, and his wavy blonde hair was bunched behind an ear on one side and matted against his head on the other.
Watching Kyle yawn, seeing his face still pink with recent sleep, made Dominic realise how freakishly fast the years had shot by. Sixteen. Kyle was sixteen. This was the year of college applications, of SATs and campus visits, of potential scholarships and program choices. In another two years he’d be off at some university, far away.
Dominic almost sighed. The only thing he ever wanted to belong to him was this young man. Nothing or no one else had mattered. Ever. Right then, he suddenly felt a little choked up. His throat was a tight, his eyes stung too.
Wasn’t love a pisser?
Kyle yawned again and scratched his jaw. ‘Dad, you’re hovering.’
Dominic swallowed and looked around the bedroom. BMX magazines and comic books were all over the floor. Computer cables, used drinking glasses and CDs littered the desk top. A tangled pile of dirty clothes sat right in front of the hamper. Clementine was curled up in the middle of the bedclothes. ‘What’s the dog doing on the bed?’
‘I dunno, sleeping? Don’t give me a hard time. I know you let her on your bed.’
‘OK, so I’m a hypocrite.’
‘I was wondering how to broach that subject.’
‘Were you now? I was wondering when you last ran the vacuum through here. This place is a mess.’
‘Why, thank you. I try. We got eggs. Will you make pancakes this morning?’
‘I guess so.’
‘Did Lesley go home?’
‘She stayed at her parent’s place last night.’
‘Oh. So why are you wearing bottoms?’
Dominic shifted the cedar box from under his arm and took a seat next to his son. ‘Because, Flash, there’s something you need to know.’
‘If it involves you wearing pants in the morning I’m all for it.’
Reaching over, Dominic ran his hand over Clementine’s soft puppy fur. ‘Things have changed with me and Lesley. I don’t want her to be my girlfriend anymore,’ he said.
Fifteen minutes later, while Kyle ate his pancakes, nose in an Invincible comic, Dominic called his mother and told her exactly the same thing.
Chapter 22
Dominic waited for a few cars and a fire truck to pass before he made the left off Diamond Drive. He continued along 35th Street until he hit Arizona Ave. When the road forked, he veered right and had to stop for kids on bikes to clear out of the way. A little further along, the avenue became congested with parked vehicles and he moved over to let a police car roll by. Finally, rounding the bend of Isleta Court, he pulled behind Fabian’s mud-spattered pick up and Lesley’s equally filthy Bronco.
He should have done this when they’d been together yesterday. An odd feeling crept into him, one that he hadn’t experienced in quite some time. Butterflies bumped and fluttered in his gut. He sat there for a while, Jeep running. Even though the Cherokee’s air-conditioning was dry and cool on his skin, Dominic felt sweaty and hot. His eyes blurred as he gazed at the red dirt caked on his friend’s silver truck.
Fabian was here to set up the scaffolding for sanding and painting the exterior. His being on site wasn’t exactly private, but that was no excuse. While Dominic had made the decision, he hadn’t actually given any thought to how to execute things. He only knew he had to. What had he been thinking by asking her to move in with him anyway? How stupid was that idea? He couldn’t string her along. It wasn’t fair. Not to Kyle, not to him, not to Lesley.
It had to end. It had to be done. It was necessary. It was plain.
This had to end today.
For two more minutes, he sat there, head back against the seat, eyes fixed on dried volcanic soil coating metal, and tried to figure out how to explain things to her. He came up with zilch, nada, bupkis...
When he cut the engine a bead of sweat rolled down his spine. He slid out of the Cherokee, slammed the door and shoved his hands into his pockets. Oh yeah, he was a paragon of self-assurance and determination. Sweat was the essence of confidence.
Blue ribbon-winning chicken.
Chastising himself, his own idiocy and lack of courage he started up the steep driveway. The scaffolding Fabian had brought over sat in a big pile at the top of the incline. Dominic didn’t think anything of it as dry pine needles crunched beneath his feet. Then he looked at the house and blinked.
Black? Orange? What the hell? I thought Lesley said she was going with a camel colour and sandy accents.
The confusion over Lesley’s paint plans lasted less than a second. He realised the crunchy bits under his boots didn’t come from conifer trees at all.
It was glass.
Broken glass.
He blinked again. The screen he’d fixed was twisted off the frame, the front door open wide. Charcoal smudges spread out over what had once been white paint. The tall windows Lesley had recently replaced were shattered. Billowed across the garage door and face of the house, in a spray of fluorescent orange, was LIAR LIAR HOUSE ON FIRE.
Worse, he could see through the empty windowpanes that the same writing arced along the open-plan living area, neon-bright through the smoke-stained walls.
Stunned, Dominic gaped at the sight.
Movement caught his eye and Fabian bled into focus. His friend stood beside a dented black thing that barely resembled the galvanised steel garbage can it had been. CDs had been snapped in half and swept into a pile with what remained of Lesley’s portable stereo, which sat beside a red canister that lay near Fabian’s feet. He wiped his face with a towel, long streaks of soot smeared up his arms.
Dominic’s tongue wasn’t working, but he must have made a sound because Fabian glanced up at him and shook his head. ‘I got here just in time,’ he said, tossing aside the filthy cloth to pick up the red fire extinguisher he usually carried in his truck. ‘The fire department came and went. So did the cops. You might want to go to the station for Lesley. The spray paint came from your store.’
Dominic’s shock vanished. His stomach liquefied into his boots. The house that withstood the Cero Grande fire had just survived another. ‘Jesus, Mom, what did you do?’
As the adrenalin flow finally gave out, so did Lesley’s legs. John grabbed her elbow and she plopped into a chair in the stark white lobby. ‘I don’t know how much more of this I can take,’ she said.
John crouched in front of her and hummed a few bars of the circus song Entrance of the Gladiators. ‘You weren’t kidding, were you?’
She shuddered and closed her eyes for a moment. ‘I’m definitely the star attraction of this circus.’
‘And you do it all without a net!’
Her eyes opened and she cracked a smile. ‘I think it’s a big clue that I should pull down the tent and clear out of town – before anything else escapes from the menagerie.’ She sighed and touched a finger to his badge. ‘I’ve got to find you a nice girl. I’ve got to find you a nice girl and you need to take me back in there,’ she pointed over his shoulder to the window to what he called the Control Room, ‘so I can talk to whomever it is I need to, to arrange bond.’
‘Bond? How can you be so forgiving?’
‘Because it’s just going to go on and on if I don’t.’ She looked at the photos of mis
sing children and a display case mounted on the wall. It was full of police department patches from all over New Mexico. ‘It has to stop, John.’
He put his hand on her knee and shook it. ‘That’s really noble of you, but don’t take this lightly. It’s Criminal Trespass and Arson. Somebody could have been hurt. You could have been hurt.’
‘I don’t care. Someone has to make it stop. I’m tired of being in the middle.’
There was a rush of air as the glass doors rolled open and closed with a slight hiss. They both turned to look as Dominic stalked into the lobby and pulled off his sunglasses.
Jaw already tensed, he bit down harder for a second. Lesley looked like she was about cry and Dominic found he couldn’t move. He had no idea what to say or do other than squeeze his sunglasses in his fist. ‘Lesley,’ he said finally. ‘Officer Tilbrook.’
The cop took his hand from her knee and stood. ‘It’s John, Dominic,’ he nodded with a tight half-smirk. ‘I was wondering when you’d get here.’
‘This is insane,’ Dominic said with a dose of gravel in his throat. ‘Could it be dementia? I know it’s usually memory loss, depression, disorientation, but could dementia make a person act completely bat shit?’ He prayed his mother’s actions were dementia because that was easier to accept than the fact she did this on purpose, and with such malice.
‘Possibly. I don’t know.’ John shrugged. ‘Look, you can’t stay in the house like that, Lesley.’
Dominic’s heart beat with a slow dreadful rhythm as he moved towards her. Even if it were still an option, like she’d want to move in with him now. ‘No. You can’t. I’ve sent Edgar over with some plywood for the windows. Jesus, I’m sorry. There’s no way I can apologise. There’s nothing I can do to change this and I’m sorry about that too.’
Lesley watched him cross the space between them. She licked her bottom lip and tried to smile. The expression warbled the same way her voice did. ‘It’s not your fault.’
‘Yes it is. It’s all my fault. I waited too long to do something. Now my mother’s done it again. She’s done something despicable and I’m ashamed.’
A Basic Renovation Page 32
