“Hey, Pop.” He let Elsa out into the back yard and went to pour himself a cup of coffee.
“Junior. Surprised you’re alone this morning.”
“We’re going slower than that. I have to figure out what to tell Trey, and she’s just figuring out her life. She’ll be at Mass, though, and I’ll bring her over for Sunday dinner.”
Carlo Sr. studied him over his reading glasses but didn’t answer.
Surprised by his father’s reserve, Carlo set his mug down and stepped back. “I thought you liked her, Pop.”
“I do. She’s a sweet girl. Broken, though. I’m worried you haven’t learned your lesson about broken girls.”
“She’s not broken, Pop. You need to look closer. That’s something I really love about her. She should be broken. She has every right to be. But she’s not. Not at all. She’s strong. Tough.”
With a resigned smile, Carlo Sr. finally nodded. “You’re far gone, son. What’s your plan, then?”
He’d lain awake thinking that very thing through. “With Bina, I’ll follow her lead for now. She just got her feet under her. I need to get mine under me, too. I want to move back here, bring Trey home. I want to live here, in the house, if that’s okay.”
Again, his father studied him quietly. This time, Carlo waited him out.
“And your work?”
“Pete and I have to figure some things out, but I can design from home. Maybe build a studio out back. Or redo the attic, if Luca will give it up. I can commute for meetings and presentations. The way things are between Pete and me, maybe it’s best for us not to be in the same place all day.”
“That’s no better?”
“No. He blames me for it all, and it’s my fault, so he’s right. But we both hurt if he bails. Maybe this would give us some time to fix things between us while we fix the company.”
“If you come, you stay, Junior. I hate this house so empty, but don’t move back if you’re thinking it’s temporary. Fill this house with family again.”
“Is that what’s been going on, Pop? You’ve been moody as hell for months. Is it that?”
Carlo Sr. took off his glasses and folded up the paper. He finished his coffee. Finally, he met his son’s eyes. “Your mother’s ghost walks these rooms, you know.”
“What?”
“Relax, I’m not crazy. Not yet, anyway. I don’t mean I see her. I feel her. Everywhere. I know I wasn’t always a good husband, but I loved the hell out of that woman. When I’m alone in here, I can almost hear her. In my heart, I mean. Her laugh. Playing the piano. Singing over her chores. She gets louder with every passing year. When our family is here, she quiets. But alone, the loneliness gets in my head. I’ve been thinking of selling the place, maybe retiring. Maybe even moving down to Florida or something stupid like that.”
“Sell the house? Pop! And retire? You want to retire?” Even though he’d wondered about his father’s loneliness, Carlo was still stunned.
“No. I don’t want to. I can’t see myself in one of those retirement subdivisions, where everyone drives around in a golf cart. Like your Aunt Donna and Uncle Mike. I’m meant to work. But I’m feeling off lately. Getting distracted.” He paused and cleared his throat. “What I’m getting at is I think it’d be good for you and Trey to be here. I think your Mom would have liked it. I know I do. Build a studio, fight Luca over the attic, whatever you want. Fill the place back up. Hopefully with grandbabies.”
Carlo felt a pang at that but kept it to himself. “Okay, Pop. We’ll move back. In fact, we won’t leave at all. If Rosa will watch Trey, I’ll go tomorrow and talk to Peter, then check out of the hotel. I’ll put the loft on the market after the repairs are done.” It meant Natalie would need a new job, and with that realization, Carlo felt real loss. Trey would, too. But he knew moving back home was the right thing.
His father came around the corner of the island and held out his arms, and the two men embraced. “I’m glad, Junior. I fucking hate golf.”
~oOo~
Stuck in the snarl of Monday morning traffic into Providence, Carlo occupied himself by practicing the conversations he’d planned to have today. He’d already handled the contractors for the repairs to the loft and made the arrangements he’d needed with the listing agent. The building association had a lot to do with how it was marketed and shown, anyway, so he simply okayed—after pausing to swallow hard and remind himself that moving home had financial benefits as well—the cost to stage it. Then he arranged a hotel checkout for the following day, which would give him time to collect their things from that sterile suite after he finished his hard work of the day: Peter and Natalie.
Peter first. The office repairs were beginning today, too, so Carlo drove straight there, as he’d planned last week, before his life had changed again. Peter’s Acura was in his space in the lot. Good.
When he got into the office, Peter was talking to Ken Jeremy, the contractor, while a couple of workmen carried in supplies. This wasn’t the kind of project Pagano & Sons took on—too small—but Ken had subcontracted for them on a couple of emergency jobs, and Carlo knew he did good work.
“Hey, Ken.” Carlo held out his hand, and Ken shook it.
“Carlo. Just telling Pete here that this is a five-six day job, outside. We’ll try to get you done faster if we can.” Though time and cost estimates were notoriously malleable, when industry insiders talked to each other, the estimates were more fixed. If Ken was telling Carlo and Pete six days outside, maybe less, he meant it.
“Good. Thanks, man.” Ken nodded and turned to talk to one of his workers.
Pete made a move away without saying anything at all to Carlo. Okay, this was getting ridiculous. He was acting like a pouting teenage girl. “Pete, hold up. We need to talk.”
“Did you get the Connelly design done?”
“Yeah. It’s ready to submit. You and me, though, we need to get ourselves straight. I need you to talk. Not blame. Talk.”
Peter looked over Carlo’s shoulder at the workers, then indicated with a nod of his head that they go back to the privacy of the modeling room. He closed the door behind them. “Of course you don’t want blame. But it’s your fucking fault. I’m two payments behind on my mortgage, and that shit’s all on you.”
“I’ve taken the blame. Every time we fucking talk, I take the blame, Pete. You’re right. It’s all on me. And I’m sorry. But we need to look ahead now. What do you want?”
“I can’t just wash all that away—shit, Carlo! How far away were we from it being even worse—from people going after us and not just our stuff? What they wrote on Trey’s wall? You bring that heat—you and your family. And what the hell happened to Auberon? That’s part of all this, isn’t it?”
Carlo wasn’t about to answer that last question. What he said, rather, was, “You knew who my family was since we’ve known each other. You thought it was cool.”
“Well I was fucking wrong. I don’t know if I can work like that. The damn mob hanging over my head.”
Suddenly, Carlo was pissed. Furious. He’d apologized again and again. Fuck, he’d practically begged. And Peter was no goodie two-shoes, no innocent in the ways of the world. He’d tried repeatedly to get Carlo to exploit his connections before. And Carlo was the fucking talent. Peter was a barely adequate architect. What he brought to their partnership—the business savvy—wasn’t so unique. “You think you’re good enough to work any other way?”
Peter actually took a step back, as if Carlo had struck him—which was, frankly, next on the agenda. “Yeah, fuck you. We’re through. You can buy out my stake.”
“And if I won’t?” Couldn’t, more likely. Until the loft sold, there was no way he could afford it. And it wasn’t what he wanted. He wanted the partnership they’d had. It had worked. For them both. There were years of friendship tangled up in this, and it sucked, but Carlo couldn’t back down.
“Then I’ll sell it to the highest fucking bidder. I don’t give a shit.” They stared at each o
ther for a few incendiary seconds, and then Peter spun on his heel and left—the room, then the office, and apparently their partnership.
~oOo~
“I’m pretty smart. You know that, right? I mean, I don’t have a fancy college education, but I got me some common sense.”
Carlo looked up from his roast beef sandwich and met Natalie’s eyes. She was smiling—it seemed to him she smiled nearly nonstop—but there was tension around her pretty eyes. “What do you mean?”
“You invited me to lunch. Trey is still at the beach. Your expression could best be described as ‘morose.’ You’re firing me. Right? You’re moving back home.”
He blinked. She was definitely smart. “Um…”
“C’mon, Carlo. I know you. I know Trey. I’ve been watching what’s been happening since May. You think I didn’t see this coming? It’s okay. I get it. You’d both be better off in Quiet Cove.”
“Can’t get anything past you. And I’m so sorry. I love you.” Her smile got wider at that. “Don’t worry about money—I can pay you severance, give you time to find something.” He’d figure out how to do that; he wanted Natalie as little hurt by this as possible. “I don’t want to lose you, though. It breaks my heart.”
“Well, you’re not dying, right? Not selling Trey off to the highest bidder? And you’re not moving farther than the beach, right? And we’re still friends, even if you’re not paying me to be anymore?”
He laughed. “Of course.”
“Then I have a friend at the beach. I intend to exploit that friendship outrageously for free weekends of lying in the sand ogling hot men.” She reached across the table and grabbed his hand. “Honestly, Carlo. I was waiting for this. I’m ready. I’m okay. You, too. We’re gonna be great. Smooth seas.”
He hoped she was right. He knew when he got back home, back to Bina and to Trey, he’d find the hope Natalie had that things would work out. Even if on this day, he still felt trapped in the undertow.
~ 18 ~
Carlo looked over her shoulder and rubbed her arms. “We could have ordered a cake, you know. I could still go to the market and pick up a cake. You don’t need to put yourself through this.”
“No! I can do this!” Sabina leaned back a little from the slightly lopsided chocolate layer cake. Everything had gone fine, according to the recipe, until she’d put the top layer on the bottom layer, and now it kept wanting to slide off. Also: frosting rosettes were a lot more difficult than the cookbook suggested. They were a ‘beginner’ skill, apparently. But she should have practiced to achieve the level of ‘beginner.’ Blue blobs rimmed the base of the slippery cake.
She had been an average cook, once. It wasn’t something she’d enjoyed, but her aunt had taught her basic kitchen skills. After years of having a kitchen staff, those skills had atrophied. But the past week, spending time again with Trey, and with Carlo, she was beginning to feel like they were her family, and she wanted to do something special for Trey’s birthday party. Remembering baking birthday cakes for Tia Valeria, she’d decided she’d do the same for Trey.
But Tia Valeria had liked Bundt cakes and pineapple upside down cake. She hadn’t figured on a layer cake being so tricky. Or decorating with frosting.
Carlo and Sabina were alone in the house—Carlo Sr. was at his office, doing some paperwork, and Rosa had taken Trey to Carmen’s to keep him out of the way while they got ready for the party, which had been relocated from the beach when everyone had woken up to grey skies this morning. It still hadn’t rained, but the sky was dark enough that they had the lights on in the house.
He kissed her shoulder, and she felt his tongue tracing a circle over her skin. “What can I do?”
She sighed. “It’s too ugly. I can’t make it good enough for Trey. You should go buy a cake.” As if it were agreeing with her, the top layer finally gave up its fight and slid all the way off its mate, landing on the granite top of the island with a heavy plop. Elsa, sitting nearby and watching intently, cocked her head and shuffled a little closer, her long, pink tongue doing a lap around her jowls.
Carlo laughed hard, letting her go so that he could clutch his belly.
“Don’t laugh! My failure is not funny!”
“Come on, baby. It’s a little funny.”
She had a spatula coated with chocolate frosting in her hand. Feeling both a little hurt and a lot impish, fighting her own smile at Carlo’s obvious enjoyment of her disaster, she raised her arm and cocked it. Before she could fling her ammunition at him, though, he grabbed her wrist and dragged her close.
“Ah-ah-ah. What do you think you’re up to with that?
“You think my cake is funny. I thought I’d give you some more. For more laughing. Which you like so much.”
“You don’t want to start a food fight with me, baby. I have five siblings. You think I haven’t been through these wars? I will take you down.”
She relaxed and, after giving her a long, skeptical look, he let her go. “Good choice. Now, I’ll just—”
She drew the spatula down his nose and over his mouth and beard. “Oops. So clumsy.”
He just stood there, his eyes closed. “Oh. You’re gonna pay. Now, you’re gonna pay.”
“But wait—what if I helped clean up my mess?” Lifting up on her tiptoes, she sucked the frosting from his chin, lapping her tongue through his beard until he shivered. When she rested back on her heels and looked up at him, running her tongue over her lips, his face was wearing an entirely different expression behind his chocolate glaze. His eyes were on fire.
She dropped the spatula in the mess of cake and then grabbed his head in her hands, pulling him down so that she could reach him. She sucked the frosting off his nose, and then moved to his mouth.
And then he grabbed her up and dropped her on the counter, taking her legs in his hands and pulling her all the way to the edge. “I want to fuck you so hard right now. Tell me if you don’t want it, baby. Tell me now.”
Wondering how long the house would stay empty, Sabina caught her legs around his hips and shook her head. “I want it. No more talking. I would like to do something with our mouths else than speak.” To demonstrate, she leaned in and kissed him, sucking his lower lip into her mouth.
He made a rumbling sound deep in his chest, and then his hand was under the short, flouncy skirt she was wearing, and his fingers slid into her panties. “You’re so wet. Does baking bad cakes always make you horny?”
“You should shut up, I think, now.” She grabbed his face and kissed him again, and this time his playfulness was truly mastered. With one hand around her waist, he held her close while the other hand moved between them to open his jeans. The height of the counter was perfect; he pulled her another inch to the edge, pushed her underwear aside, and then he was deep inside her, and she tossed her head back.
With his hand around her neck, he pulled her head forward and claimed her mouth. There was still chocolate in his beard, and she was overwhelmed by the wildness of this hot, rough, consuming kiss that tasted like candy.
This was the first time that they’d coupled like this, fast and hard and out of the blue, and Sabina found it marvelous. So different from what she’d known before, so much animal chaos and need. Carlo’s fingers dug into her hips and thighs hard—hard enough to bruise, but it was a good pain, nothing like the kind of pain sex had meant before.
She didn’t want to be thinking about what had been before, so she grabbed Carlo’s hair and pulled his head backward, then leaned in and latched onto his neck.
“Fuck! Bina!”
“Don’t mind me. I’ll just put the good stuff in the fridge and be on my way.”
Footsteps Page 25
