Take It All Off

by Weston Parker

  His face brightened as he nodded. “I’d love that. I can’t believe you were alone for your first ultrasound. You should’ve told them to come get me.”

  The tips of my ears heated. “Marco and I caused a bit of a scene. Nancy came in after he left and said it wouldn’t be good for your heart.”

  “That—”

  “No,” I interrupted him. “She was right. It wouldn’t have been good for your heart. It sure as hell wasn’t good for mine.”

  “Maybe, but I would’ve sucked it up to be here with you for that.”

  “I know.” I gave him the biggest smile I could, but it was still lackluster. “But you can see the pictures.”

  Kyle and I pored over the images for a few minutes, trying to figure out what was what. They were pretty grainy, though. “How far along are you?”

  “About eight weeks,” I said. “Technically anyway. It’s more like six, but there’s this weird gap. Anyway, I’m sure you don’t want to hear about that.”

  He blanched. “If it has to do with your cycle and when you, well, you know, then no. I’ll listen if you want me to, but I’d rather not.”

  A giggle escaped me. My big brother was the only person in the world who ever heard me giggle, but now even that thought made me want to cry. “What am I going to do, Kyle?”

  He stared into my eyes for a minute, saying nothing but studying me like I was a precious painting. “This is Marco’s child. If you’ve been with him for these last few months, I have to tell you, kiddo, I think he was good for you. Better than that. You’ve sounded the best you ever have after you told me you got that job. If it was Marco making you that happy, then I think you need to talk to him.”

  “But just yesterday, you said—”

  “Forget what I said.” He focused the full weight of his attention on me, and that guilt clouded his eyes again. “It’s hard to watch my baby sister grow up and live her own life, but I want you to have a good life. I was in shock, pissed off, and maybe even a little jealous that you’re going to have a baby when it’s all I’ve wanted for so long. I wasn’t thinking clearly. It sounds to me like Marco really cares about you, and if that’s true, then you should go for it.”

  I mulled his words over for a long time, but finally, I nodded. “I think you’re right. I need to try to talk to him, but it might be easier said than done. I chased him away and told him not to come back. If he listened, he’ll be back in Florence by now.”

  “Then you’ll stay with me in the meantime. We’ll figure it out, sis. It’s what we do.” He rubbed his hands on his jeans and stood up. “Speaking of which, let me see if I can find a nurse so we can find out what time you’re getting sprung from this joint.”

  I nodded. “Go for it.”

  He smirked at me. “It might take a minute. I think I’m going to take your advice and see if I can get Nancy’s number while I’m at it. Don’t go anywhere, okay, kiddo?”

  “I’ll be right here,” I promised.

  And I meant it, too. No matter what happened, no matter how far away from him I was, I would always be right here when he needed me. I only hoped Marco would let me be there for him, too.

  Chapter 35

  Marco

  My plane sat on the runway. The pilot was ready, awaiting my instruction to take off. We’d already been cleared to go.

  I hadn’t been able to give the instruction yet. At first, because the gaping hole in my heart and the empty seat next to me refused to let me, but then it became because my mother had called.

  Strangely enough, she was both the last and the only person I wanted to talk to right then. Well, the only person who was currently on speaking terms with me.

  I would’ve given a testicle to talk to Addy, but it didn’t look like that would happen. Despite her ordering me to go away, I hadn’t. I got a room at the hotel right next to the hospital instead and had spent the last twenty-five hours staring at my phone.

  I kept willing it to ring, for her to call and ask me to come back. She hadn’t. The damn device hadn’t stopped ringing, but none of the calls had been from her.

  After another virtually sleepless night, I’d finally come to terms with the fact that she wasn’t going to call. At least, not now.

  There was no way I was giving up on her, but I could give her time if she needed it. Both of us had received unexpected news that would change the course of our futures forever. It stood to reason that she’d want to be with her brother, who had always been with her through hard times, and also that she’d lash out at me.

  Over my dead body was my kid going to grow up half a world away from me, though. The problem was that if I needed to spend an extended chunk of time in the States to convince her to come back with me, I also needed time.

  Ricci Logistics had a powerful team that I’d put together over the years. The company would be able to function without me for at least a while but not at the drop of a hat. I needed to go put some things in place before I embarked on the mission to win my family back.

  And speaking of family, my phone was still buzzing in my hand. It had stopped and started four times since her first call, but she wasn’t letting up.

  “Aldo told me to call you,” she said without even greeting me when I finally answered the phone. “That hasn’t happened for a long time. What’s wrong?”

  “Everything,” I confessed. The word made the crack in my heart split wide open, and the next thing I knew, I was telling my mother the whole sordid tale. Well, the condensed version.

  “Kyle, that’s Addy’s brother, the one who raised her? He had a heart attack.”

  “Oh my God, the poor girl. Is he okay?”

  I frowned at her genuine-sounding concern for Addy but shook it off. “He’s fine now, but Addy and I took the jet to Portland to be with him.”

  “You’re in America?”

  “Yes. I’m still here. I can’t bring myself to leave, but we found out she’s pregnant, and I fucked up. I fucked up badly, Mama. She chased me away, but she wants to stay here.”

  My mother’s silence seemed to stretch into infinity. When she finally spoke, pure ice dripped from her tone. “What did you do? Marco Ricci, what on earth did you do to her?”

  “Wait. What?” I raked a hand through my hair and rested my elbow on my knees. “That’s your first question?”

  “Yes.” She’d never spoken to me like this before. “I treated that girl terribly, and she responded with grace and respect. If she’s chased you away, you must have done something awful.”

  Pain speared through me at the fresh, raw memory. It felt like a white-hot lance separating one side of my heart from the other. “I didn’t know what to say, so I ducked out without saying anything. I just needed a few minutes to talk things through with Aldo.”

  “Does your brother have your child growing in his belly?” she barked, and I was so surprised by her question that I laughed. “Don’t you dare laugh about this, you imbecile. Answer my question. Does your brother have a fetus conceived there by your sperm in his womb?”

  “Obviously not.”

  “Then you don’t leave the woman who has your child in her body to go speak to your brother,” she yelled. My mother never got loud with me. Spirited, yes, but not loud. She was loud now, though. All-caps loud. “What is wrong with you? Have I taught you nothing at all?”

  “Aldo is my support system just as much as her brother is hers. Why is it okay that she needed to talk to him, but I couldn't do the same?”

  “Because she had just found out she was pregnant.” Her volume went up, as did her pitch. “Where the hell has that big brain of yours gone?”

  I held up my hand and braced it on the seat in front of me. “You’re going to have to spell this one out for me, Mama.”

  She muttered a string of Italian curses before releasing an exaggerated puff of air. “Men. I swear you all have your emotional growth stunted at conception and it never catches up.”

  “Let’s go with that. Will you please jus
t tell me what to do?”

  “Now he wants me to tell him what to do,” she spat. “The woman you’re in love with, the same one who had just found out she was carrying your baby, told you to leave, and you left?”

  “Well, yeah.” I frowned. “I was respecting her wishes.”

  “Respecting her wishes?” she parroted, and I could practically hear her rolling her eyes at me. “Her wishes were to have you with her, not to go running off to your brother. She wanted to know she could count on you. You do realize she has no idea where you two stand now? Have you even talked about having children? No. I’m sure you haven’t. Does she have a ring on her finger promising that you’ll stand by her? No.”

  “Rings don’t make everything magically better, Mama. Go check on the divorce rate if you don’t believe me.”

  “Don’t you take that tone with your mother, Marco,” she warned. “I know very well that rings don’t make everything better, but at least it would have given her a sense of security.”

  “But—”

  “I wasn’t done yet. She was scared and alone, and you left her. What was your first thought when you found out the news?”

  “That I was going to be a father?” That had to be the right answer.

  My mother’s answering shout told me it wasn’t. “Have you spared a minute to think about the fact that she’s going to be a mother? She already is a mother. You already are a father, but you know how you feel about her. Have you even told her?”

  “No,” I replied quietly, starting to see where she was going with this. “I was selfish.”

  “You were,” she said decisively. “As for her telling you to leave, I'm sure that was what she wanted at that moment. But hormones are powerful things, son. So are emotions. She was surfing the biggest wave created by the perfect storm of those two things.”

  My body went still. “What are you saying?”

  “I’m saying that she’s carrying your baby. Your child. My grandchild. I won’t let you turn your back on them, and I didn’t raise you to be an absent father.”

  “But she wants to stay in America.” My gaze drifted to the landscape outside. Dry heat rose from the tarmac. But other than that, Oregon really wasn’t all that bad. “My life is in Florence. I can’t stay here.”

  “Your life is where your heart is, and that girl has your heart. The baby will share it with her soon.”

  “What about you?”

  “What about me?” she snapped. “Don’t you dare use me as an excuse. I know how a plane works. My son even owns one. I’m sure we can figure it out.”

  “You want me to stay here?” I couldn't believe what I was hearing. When I’d told her I was opening offices in Rome, she’d gone on a hunger strike because she said she’d never see me again. Call me crazy, but Portland was a hell of a lot farther than Rome.

  “I don’t want you to,” she said, gentler now. “But if that’s where your heart is, that’s where you have to be. I don’t want you here only to be miserable without them. I also don’t want my grandchild growing up without a father.”

  “I want you to be a father,” she added. “Not just an absent memory.”

  The pilot stuck his head out of the cockpit. “We need to take off, or we’re going to forfeit our slot, Mr. Ricci.”

  “Forfeit it,” I ordered. “I’m not going anywhere.”

  Chapter 36

  Addy

  It felt strange to know that this was my brother’s house when I’d never been here before. I recognized some of the furniture, and I’d slept in my old bed last night after being discharged, but nothing else was familiar.

  The house was a narrow, triple-story townhouse in an urban neighborhood. Each house on the street was painted a different color. Kyle’s was sunshine yellow. I loved it but the place didn’t feel like home to me.

  I drifted from room to room in his open living space, aimlessly wandering around trying to formulate a plan. My brother was acting as my sounding board. He sat on his couch with a cup of coffee, a blue pillow in his lap.

  His hair stood up at all ends, but he had just rolled out of bed. He had on a pair of pajama pants which happened to match the ones I’d borrowed. Apparently, he’d bought them on a buy one get one free special. Same with our black tees.

  Since my hair was also still a mess, we looked more alike than ever. Most of all, both of us had a haunted look in our eyes.

  I tossed his phone down next to him with a scowl. “Marco has to be back in Italy by now, but I still can’t get through.”

  Kyle bowed his head in acknowledgment. “Then we have to get you to Italy.”

  “How?” I threw my arms out to my sides. “I don’t even have my own pajamas. I had to use your phone because I don’t have a charger for mine. My wallet with all my cards in it was in my bag. It’s useless.”

  “It’s not,” he insisted, straightening up. “You can reach out to him over the internet.”

  “He doesn’t believe in social media.”

  He arched a brow at me. “Like, at all?”

  I shook my head. “I sent an email to his office account, but he’s got an automatic out-of-office reply on. The only thing I can do is wait until he reaches out to me. I’ll send another email, but that’s the best I can do.”

  “It’s not the best I can do.” He raked his hands over his head a few times. “I’ll take out a loan. We’ll buy you a plane ticket and you’ll go back to him.”

  “I can’t let you do that.” I dropped into the seat beside his, resting my head on his shoulder and folding a hand over my belly. “We can’t let you do that.”

  “Why the hell not? I had a part to play in what happened, sis. You can’t deny it.” Aggravation trembled through him. “It was a big part, too. Let me help you fix it.”

  “There’s no guarantee that he’ll take me back even if I go there. What do we do then? I’d be stranded there with no one to help me, and let’s face it, probably without a job.”

  “If you want to stay, you have a job with me.” His tone brooked no argument. “But I feel like both you and I owe it to you to see if you can make it right. We owe it to the baby.”

  “Wasn’t it you that pointed out he wasn’t exactly excited for this baby?” I couldn’t keep the bitterness from creeping in. “You were right when you said it, so what’s the point?”

  “The point is that you were also right when you said the baby would be missing out on knowing the other half of its family and heritage.” He referenced the discussion we’d had into the early hours of this morning. “Vowing to show it pictures and taking virtual tours of Florence isn’t the same thing as knowing it for yourself.”

  “If he wants the baby to know it for itself, that’s up to him,” I said sadly. “And I think he’s made his decision known.”

  Kyle’s fist tightened in his pillow. “Not this again. It’s been two days, sis. Give the man a fucking minute to get his head straight.”

  “He had his minute,” I reminded him. “In fact, he had many minutes. Right after we found out. Don’t those count?”

  “Not for something this big.” He let out a giant sigh and sagged back into the couch. “I’m not defending what he did, but—”

  A knock sounded at his door, interrupting whatever he had been about to say. I frowned at it, but Kyle pursed his lips. “Damn. I forgot Drew was going to come around today to check up on me. I’ll ask him to come back later. Give me a second.”

  He disappeared down the flight of stairs connecting his living area to the street level. I tipped my head back against his couch and closed my eyes, not sure I really wanted to hear what Kyle wanted to say.

  I heard his voice, but then another filtered up from below. Marco?

  It couldn’t be, but it sure sounded like him. My eyes opened, and when they did, I saw a familiar head of thick brown hair coming up the stairs. The next thing I knew, Marco was there.

  I blinked at him, certain he was about to disappear. When he dropped to his haunches in front
of me, his soulful brown eyes filled with emotion catching on mine, I knew I wasn’t hallucinating.

  Kyle cleared his throat. “I’m just going to step out for a minute. Give you two some space.”

  My head snapped in his direction. “You’re wearing your pajamas.”

  He barked out a laugh and smirked at me. “My area is filled with millennials. They won’t even notice. I probably won’t even be the only one out there going for a stroll before getting ready for the day. See ya.”

  “I like your brother,” Marco said, his soft smooth baritone hitting me like a punch to the heart. My eyes filled with tears and a pained expression ghosted across his face. “I’m sorry. God. I’m really fucking bad at this.”

  “No, it’s not that.” I stared at him in wonder. “I just didn’t expect I’d ever hear your voice again. What are you doing here? How did you know where Kyle lives?”

  “Would you believe it if I said magic?” He lifted his hands and wiggled his fingers but dropped them when I shook my head. “Fine. Nurse Nancy told me.”

  “How did she know?” I asked. Kyle had gotten her number, I knew, but he hadn’t told me he’d handed over his whole damn contact card.

  “She, uh,” he flashed me a sheepish smile, “she checked his chart for me.”

  “Isn’t that illegal?” I doubted my brother would mind, but still.

  Rare color flecked along the tops of Marco’s cheeks. “I might have made it worth her while.”

  “What did you do?” I groaned. “Please tell me it’s not criminal.”

  “Maybe this is a case where the less you know the better.” He lowered himself to sit on the rug at my feet. “But if Nancy and a group of her friends show up in Florence next summer, please don’t ask me any questions.”

  “You promised her a trip?”