Priceless (An Amato Brothers/Rixton Falls crossover)

by Winter Renshaw

  “Just coming out to get my phone charger,” he says with a smug smirk. “Going to be here a while. Turns out broken noses aren’t life-threatening, so we’re not being prioritized.”

  He’s beside me now, his pace matching mine. I catch a whiff of his spicy, soapy cologne. It makes my stomach do a somersault, but I refuse to let it show.

  “You know I’m still waiting to hear the rest of your story.” I stop in front of my car. He follows suit.

  His body angles toward mine, shoulders squaring up, and he smirks. “Yeah, well, I’ve been giving it some thought. That’s why it’s taken me so long to get back to you. And I think you should finish the story.”

  “Me?!” I press my pointer finger against my pounding chest and pray he’s kidding.

  “Yeah,” he says. “With your penchant for storytelling and all.”

  I lift a single brow, not following.

  “You made up that ridiculous story about me having a fiancée in Kansas City and all of that,” he says. “You’re creative. You tell me what happens next.”

  My cheeks burn. I’m horrible at flirting, and he’s clearly very practiced. I haven’t had to do it in a long time, and it seems so natural with him, like a second nature. And that’s probably the very reason why I should be climbing in my car and high-tailing it home instead of standing around on the verge of making a very reckless decision.

  “You tell me how it’s going to go,” he says. “I think we left off at the part where . . .”

  “It’s your story,” I say, cheeks burning. I’ve never so much as written a dirty word in my life. The mere thought makes my head dizzy and my stomach flip, like a teenage girl who’s diary has just been read by her high school crush. I’m thankful for the dark of night and the sliver of moon in the sky. I can stand tall all I want, but there’s no hiding a good blush. “I couldn’t possibly take it from you.”

  “Maren.” He cocks his head to the side, studying me. He’s quiet for a moment and then he pulls his shoulders back. “You’re afraid, aren’t you? You’re afraid of what comes next.”

  “What? No.” I take a step back, cleats dragging on the blacktop, and I bump into the hood of my car. “Trust me, it takes a whole hell of a lot more than some dashing stranger to scare me.”

  I think about telling him I’ve been through two C-sections and a divorce and one case of appendicitis, and his dimpled, chiseled face and corded-steel arms don’t terrify me in the least, but then I decide to shelve that thought because he doesn’t need any more unflattering visuals of me than he already has.

  He laughs through his nose. “No one’s ever called me dashing before.”

  Suddenly I feel out of touch. I don’t know what twenty-somethings call each other these days. I’ve spent the last twelve years with my nose buried in children’s books and my arms elbows deep in puke, poop, and piss. I’ve had more important things to concern myself with than pop culture slang.

  “Has anyone ever called you a sexpot before?”

  I wrinkle my nose. “No. Never.”

  Sounds dirty.

  And kind of hot.

  “It just means you’re sexy,” he says with a casual shrug, slightly licking his lips. “It’s a compliment. Not an insult.”

  Standing here in this getup, looking like last night’s garbage, I find it hard to believe that this Greek Adonis of a man still finds it appropriate to refer to me as a “sexpot.”

  “Has anyone ever told you you’re crazy?” I ask, stepping around the hood of my car and reaching for the door handle.

  He smirks, his attention trained on me with an intensity that makes my mouth dry and my face numb and my ears ring.

  “No. Never,” he says.

  “Well you are. You’re crazy.” I fight a smile and climb in, pretending not to notice when he shoves his hands in his pockets and watches me drive away.

  Chapter 8

  Dante

  Cristiano’s situated in the corner of the ER waiting room, an ice pack over his nose as we wait for his name to be called. He’s half-asleep, half-drunk, and half-snoring, and I’ve just plugged my phone into a nearby outlet.

  It’s been a half hour since Maren left, and I’m not sure how far away she lives, but I’m willing to bet she’s still up.

  Sliding my thumb across the screen of my phone, I pull up her number and begin composing a text, stopping after a few words because I’m really not sure what I want to say. I just know I want to talk to her.

  She’s funny. And charismatic. And unapologetic. And genuine. And more than all that, she’s sexy as hell. Even in that crazy outfit she had on and her hair all messy and no makeup on. The best part is, I don’t think she even realizes how ridiculously hot she is.

  Tapping out a message, I decide to say: YOU REALLY WANT TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?

  A minute passes. I watch the screen like a hawk, waiting with bated breath.

  MAREN: I’D LOVE A BEDTIME STORY. PLEASE. YOU’VE GOT MY FULL ATTENTION.

  Smiling, I think about responding with some kind of joke about bedtimes and bedtime stories, but then I remember our age difference. It isn’t a big deal to me. At all. But I know women can be sensitive of that sort of thing, and the last thing I want is for her to think I have some kind of MILF fetish.

  MAREN: I’M WAITING …

  Cristiano snorts and snores, waking himself up and then wincing when the pain hits him square in the nose all over again.

  “Keep it iced, buddy,” I say, pressing the ice pack firm into his hand and lifting it higher. Returning to my phone, my heart races in my chest. This woman makes me work like a beast for her attention, and now that I have it, I’m not sure what to do next.

  This isn’t me.

  I’m cool and collected, self-assured and always ready with a comeback, and here I am, tongue-tied and second-guessing all the things I want to say to her.

  I don’t want to screw this up.

  I want to screw her.

  All in due time, of course.

  Glancing up, I see a little old lady, curly white hair and knitted sweater, staring at me with the biggest dentured grin I’ve ever seen.

  “You remind me of my great-grandson, Benjamin,” she says proudly.

  “Th-thank you,” I say.

  She continues staring and smiling, and suddenly it feels obscenely inappropriate to tap out some filthy story to the woman I’m desperately trying to fuck. It’ll be even more inappropriate if I were to accidentally get a semi.

  Great-Grandma here is seriously killing my mojo.

  “He was in the army, you know,” the woman adds, her voice just as crinkled and papery as the skin on her shaking hands.

  “Well, that’s wonderful,” I say. “I’m very appreciative of his service to our country.”

  She grins bigger. “He used to come see me all the time, and then he got married. They moved out east. Connecticut. You ever been there?”

  Oh, sweet Jesus. I’m trapped in a conversation I don’t want to be in, and I see zero exits ahead.

  My phone buzzes in my pocket. Maren has sent me a string of question marks.

  “He has four children,” she adds. “Jaylin . . . Janaya . . . Jenson . . . and what’s the last one’s name? Oh, goodness. I always forget. Oh, right. Jacoby. No. Wait. That’s not it . . . these kids and their names these days. Back in my day, we gave our kids real names.”

  “Cristiano Amato?” A raven-haired nurse calls from the doorway ahead.

  I reach across and tap Cristiano’s arm and he sputters awake, appearing disoriented for a few seconds.

  “That’s us,” I say to the lady. “It was lovely chatting with you.”

  Her face falls, and I feel sorry for her for a moment, but within seconds I’m following Cris back, and the nurse is asking a million questions that he can’t keep up with. When did this happen? How did this happen? Who did this?

  I answer them for him. We were at a bar. Some guy was talking shit about our oldest brother, Alessio, saying he to
ok the easy way out by retiring early and that he was a disgrace to Baltimore Firebirds fans everywhere.

  Cristiano overheard and wasted no time socking him across the jaw.

  The guy stumbled to the floor.

  There was blood.

  The guy’s pals circled around my brother.

  And then some other guy popped out of his bar stool like some drunk ninja and jabbed Cris square in the nose.

  By the time I helped him off the floor, the guys were long gone and the bartender was telling us to get the hell out of his place before he called the cops.

  “Noble,” the nurse says, smiling and turning her full attention to my brother. “Your brother’s Ace Amato? I love baseball. Huge Bluewings fan. Please don’t hate me.”

  The two of them laugh, and she examines him with gentle hands, standing unnecessarily close. Her perfume fills the small room, some fruity, coco-nutty combination, and I’m thinking she probably just came on shift.

  She’s younger, like him, and I can tell she sees clear past the fucked-up nose. She can tell he’s a looker. I roll my eyes and stifle a chuckle. I’m used to this. People act like Cristiano’s some kind of god everywhere we go. I’m convinced half the couches he crashed on over these last couple years belonged to girls hoping they were going to get lucky with that lady-killing bastard.

  With Cristiano busy scoring points with his nurse, I retrieve my phone and fire off a text to Maren.

  YOU STILL UP? SORRY. THEY CALLED US BACK.

  Within seconds she replies, YES. BUT NOT FOR MUCH LONGER.

  I write, CAN I TEXT YOU WHEN I LEAVE? HOPEFULLY IT’LL BE SOON. THEY JUST HAVE TO SET HIS NOSE.

  She takes a little longer to respond this time, and knowing my luck, she’s already fallen asleep, but lo and behold, my phone buzzes a minute later, only it’s not a text coming through, it’s a phone call.

  “Hey,” I answer, keeping my voice low and chin tucked. I turn my back toward Cristiano and his nurse.

  “I had to call you,” she says, a sliver of a smile in her tone, “because every time I type the word ‘you,’ it autocorrects to ‘you are a stinky butthead.’ My boys have clearly been messing with my phone.”

  I chortle. That’s definitely something my youngest brother, Fabrizio, would’ve done back in the day.

  “So I didn’t want to send the wrong message,” she says, “you know, literally.”

  “Appreciate it. You may have given me a complex. Thought I left my stinky butthead days back in elementary school.”

  “Anyway, I’m still up,” she says, sighing. “Something about rushing to the emergency room to be with your son gives a woman a bit of an adrenaline rush. Not sure when I’ll be wound down for the night.”

  “Can I call you when we leave?” I ask, checking on Cris from the corner of my eye.

  Maren pauses and then exhales. “Yeah. You can call me.”

  Victory is mine.

  “Don’t fall asleep,” I say. “We need to hash out this story of ours.”

  “Story of ours?” she scoffs. “This story isn’t mine to tell. Thought I made that clear earlier.”

  “Yeah, it is. I gave it to you. I passed the torch. We’re co-writers now. This is a joint venture. Think of it as a group project.”

  “I hate group projects.” She groans, but I can almost hear her smile. “There’s always one person trying to pawn their stuff onto the other person, and then the other person ends up doing most of the work.”

  “I don’t operate like that,” I say. “I’m a fifty-fifty kind of guy. That’s why I started the story and I want you to finish it. Fifty-fifty.”

  “Is your brother an author?” I overhear the nurse ask Cristiano.

  Cris coughs. “Oh, god, no. No, no, no.”

  I excuse myself and take my call to the hall.

  “Think about it,” I say, keeping my voice low. “Think about what you want to happen next.”

  I hear her release a long, held breath, and I hope she’s sighing and not yawning.

  “I’m going to call you as soon as I get home,” I say.

  “This feels like a lot of work,” she replies after contemplative silence.

  “Excuse me?”

  “Having to be all sexually creative,” she says. “Sometimes I just want to be taken, you know? Like slam-my-back-against-the-wall, crush my mouth with a kiss, shove your hand up my skirt and make me yours. Like that kind of taken. Like romance novel taken.”

  My cock throbs, and I try to respond but nothing comes out.

  “I’ve spent well over a decade having missionary sex in the dark with the first man who ever kissed me,” she says. “And the sex wasn’t even that good! I never came. Not once.”

  “I’m sorry. That’s . . . that’s unacceptable.”

  I could make her come. I could make her come so hard.

  “Jesus. Listen to me. I don’t know why I’m telling you this.” She sounds flustered now, embarrassed, and her voice is shaky. “I’m not even sure where I was going with all of this. I’m sorry. I’m tired. I should go to bed.”

  “No.” I interject. “Do not go to bed, Maren.”

  I hear her yawn in the background. There’s no mistaking it this time. So much for her adrenaline rush.

  “I’ll finish the damn story myself,” I make a promise out of desperation. “All you have to do is wait up for me. Answer the phone when I call. I’ll tell you what happens next.”

  “Fine,” she says, her tone satisfied. “You’ve got yourself a deal.”

  “Where the hell is the doctor?” I’m pacing the exam room. We’ve been waiting well over ninety minutes now. “Of course you just had to tell them you wanted your nose re-set by a plastic fucking surgeon.”

  “Gesù Cristo, Dante, settle down.” Cristiano leans against a wall, eyes fluttering shut. “This is my face we’re talking about. This is how I get laid. I’ve got to keep it looking tight.”

  “Do me a favor.” I huff, glancing at the ticking clock above his head. “Next time someone’s talking shit about Alessio, stay the fuck out of it. Fans are allowed to have their opinions, and a lot of people were upset about his retirement. It’s not your job to police them.”

  “All right, all right,” he says.

  “Not like I didn’t want to beat the shit out of that loser too,” I add. “He wasn’t the first to talk shit about our brother, and he certainly won’t be the last. Got to rise above it. Be better than those trash-talking shitheads.”

  “I forgot. You’re a classy millionaire now.” Cristiano rolls his eyes.

  I purse my lips and blow a hard breath through my nostrils. “Do not. Do not start with me.”

  “The hell is your problem? You’re on edge tonight.”

  My problem is that I was supposed to call a woman almost two hours ago and because of Fight Club over here, she’s probably passed out by now.

  It’s almost midnight.

  I’m not going to call her.

  If she was yawning two hours ago, she’s definitely asleep by now.

  Fuck.

  Chapter 9

  Maren

  He never called last night.

  I even waited up until two a.m.

  That’s what I get for expecting a twenty-something ladies’ man to actually follow through with a promise. All he wanted was to get laid. I’m willing to bet a million bucks that he found some other woman to keep his bed warm and decided that pseudo-phone sex with me was no longer going to serve his needs.

  Fucking horny prick.

  Fucking hot-as-sin horny prick.

  That’s what I get for playing along, letting his intense stare cloud my judgement, and for entertaining, for a millisecond, that he might be worth my time.

  He tried to call me the next day, but I ignored his call.

  Any man who can’t keep his word isn’t worth my energy.

  Marching into work Monday morning feeling unrefreshed and wishing I’d done something more productive all weekend than sit around and s
tew about Friday night, I toss my purse into my bottom desk drawer and feel the weight of Keegan’s stare on my back.

  “Good morning,” I say, back still toward hers. “Did you have a nice weekend?”

  The click of her heels on the concrete floors grows close, and her outline fills my periphery. Her silence concerns me, and when she sighs and takes a seat on the edge of my desk, I’m scanning my brain at warp-speed, trying to figure out why I’d possibly be in trouble.

  Glancing up, I see her checking her reflection in a compact. Her brows meet in the middle and she seems displeased.

  “Do my lips look uneven?” She pouts and purses her lips, examining them from all angles. “I just had them done, and I feel like this side is bigger than that side.”

  “Oh. Um.” I squint, trying to scrutinize her puffy, swollen, mauve lipstick-covered lips. “They look fine to me.”

  “That’s what I get for going to a plastic surgeon’s office that accepts coupons.” She makes a rattling sound in the back of her throat and clicks the compact shut. “But to answer your question, Mary, no. I did not have a nice weekend.”

  “It’s Maren,” I correct her. “And I’m sorry to hear that.”

  No, I’m not.

  “God, why can’t I ever get your name right?” Keegan laughs, resting her hands on her lap and turning to me. “So I went on this date Saturday night. The guy was a total weirdo. I mean, what did I expect? I found him on that Swiper app. I should’ve known better. But he looked so normal in pics, and we texted back and forth a little bit and he seemed funny.”

  “Where’d you go?” I have no interest in engaging in this conversation, but every minute spent listening to Keegan rattle on about her bad date is one less minute I’ll have to spend standing in front of the scanner/copier.

  Keegan sticks out her tongue. “He took me to this Japanese steakhouse, you know the kind with the hibachi grills where you sit by people you don’t even know? Who does that? It’s the least romantic restaurant you could possibly choose for an intimate, getting-to-know-you date.”

  “Agree.”

  She has a point.