by Bethany-Kris
She gave him a look. “I guess, huh?”
Renzo chuckled, and dropped a kiss to her sweet mouth. “I know a place.”
Their second surprise, that was.
Something to make this day even better than it already was.
• • •
Diego practically climbed over the table to get the last quarter of the mini pizza he’d ordered for dinner. He couldn’t just ask for it, no. He had to climb over the damn table, and drag it back across the top when he fell back into his chair. All Renzo could do was laugh at his little brother because shit, even correcting him probably wouldn’t help.
“This place is busy,” Lucia noted.
Renzo nodded, and finished the bite of spaghetti in his mouth. “It is. Seems like everybody likes it.”
That was putting it mildly. From the time they had entered Richie’s Place, the restaurant was filled to the brim. Even now, an hour after ordering and having their food brought out, the place was still packed. And loud. Music pumped out from an old jukebox in the corner, adding to the black and white checkered appeal of the decorations and floor tiles. The patent red leather booths that served as tables for the patrons kept everyone in close quarters. Noise from the kitchen usually came out like laughter, or a chef barking at someone to get it right, Kenny.
The servers smiled. The floor was clean. The people were nice.
What more could someone ask for, really?
Having finished his plate, Renzo pushed it aside and grabbed the waiting napkin. Wiping his mouth before tossing it to the plate, he polished off the glass of water and watched Diego tear into the last piece of his mini pizza. Lucia had already finished her plate, and was still enjoying the atmosphere of the restaurant.
“Time for some truth,” he told her.
That brought Lucia’s attention back to him in an instant. Her hazel eyes glittered with amusement as she looked him over like she knew he had some kind of secret he was hiding from her. “And what’s that truth, Ren?”
“I’ve been here before.”
Lucia arched a brow. “You said you’ve never been in San Fran—”
“No, I meant I came here—to this restaurant—this morning. Micheal came home from work early, and he had some news for me. You all were still sleeping, and I didn’t want to wake you up. It took me a little over an hour to come over here, talk to the owner, and then get back to the house. You were in the shower when I got home.”
“Why were you running all over the place this morning?”
Renzo chuckled. “Because we need a place to stay, and I need to make money.”
Maybe it was that statement that finally clued Lucia in to what Renzo had been hinting at because a smile lit up her features. “Here?”
“Yeah, I guess. The owner—Todd—knows Micheal. I guess he plays the drums some nights for the band if the regular drummer is sick, or whatever. Anyway, Micheal said Todd wouldn’t ask questions, he just needed a guy to do some work for him on the side.”
Lucia nodded. “Under the table, you mean?”
“Basically. Nothing …” Illegal, he wanted to say. Renzo settled on saying, “Just extra work that nobody else has time for, you know. Pay is good, and it gave me an opportunity for something else, too.”
The money was good enough for them—more than enough to pay rent, get food, and get them by. Which was really all they needed at the end of the day. Sure, it wasn’t going to be enough to continue paying for Rose’s schooling and everything else his sister needed. That was something Renzo would have to figure out as he went ahead. They still had a few thousand dollars stuffed away in one of their black duffle bags that he could use to carry Rose once the year was finished, and she ran out of money. But he didn’t have to worry about that right now, so he put it aside in his mind.
“Like what else?” Lucia asked.
“Have to wait for Diego to finish his food to find out about that, now.”
Lucia gave him a look, but Renzo only laughed in response. He liked teasing her probably more than he should, really. Lucia was always a little sweeter when he got her worked up, after all. Not that he was going to tell her that.
“All done!”
Diego’s punctuated his proclamation with a messy smile. Cheese, grease, and pizza sauce stuck to the side of his cheek, and painted his lips red. Laughing, Renzo got him cleaned up with the napkins left on the table with a bit of help from Lucia. It was only after they had paid their tab and were heading out of the restaurant that the owner—the same guy Renzo had seen earlier—noticed them as he loitered at the exit with an employee who seemed to be going out on break.
Todd, the owner, had apparently taken over the business when his father was too sick to continue on with it. Richie, hence the name, didn’t mind handing the reins over to his son.
“Ren, are you heading up there, then?” Todd asked, leaving his employee’s side to come and shake hands with Renzo.
“We are, yeah. Thought I would surprise them.”
Todd grinned at Lucia, and then little Diego, too. Or maybe his gaze just lingered a little too long on Lucia for Renzo’s liking. Then again, he hated when any fucking man looked at Lucia, even if this particular man was old enough to be her father and she had her arm wrapped around Renzo’s waist.
It didn’t matter.
Jealousy was a monster.
“And who is this?” Todd asked. “The woman you told me about?”
“Yeah, Lucia. Babe, this is Todd.”
Todd grinned. “That’s me.”
“Nice to meet you,” Lucia replied kindly.
“I’m Diego,” Renzo’s little brother said suddenly, shoving himself between the three to stare up at Todd with a smile. “Hi.”
The man laughed. “Hey, there.”
Renzo tugged Lucia a little closer to his side, adding, “We’re good for everything, right?”
Todd’s gaze came back to him.
Thankfully.
“Yeah, Ren. We’re great. Start tomorrow morning, huh? Don’t worry about the noise—no one will hear you over the restaurant anyway. And hey, say hello to your uncle for me.”
“You got it.”
“Hey, Todd, you’re needed back—”
“Gotta go,” Todd said out of the corner of his mouth before dropping Lucia a smile, too. “And it was nice to meet you. I hope to see your face around here more often.”
“Probably not,” Renzo muttered at the man’s back as he headed toward the kitchen.
Lucia smacked Renzo gently on his back. “Stop it, he was being nice.”
“Looked at you too long.”
“Oh, my God.” She smacked him again, a little harder the same time, making Renzo chuckle. “He’s old enough to be my dad, quit it.”
“Whatever, we have better things to see.”
He grabbed Diego’s hand, and kept his hold around Lucia as he directed them out of the restaurant. Lucia moved to head down the block again where they had come from, but he was quick to redirect her toward the alley at the side of the restaurant. She gave him a look, but he only winked. In the alleyway, toward the back, a spiral, metal staircase led them up to a painted-tan door.
Renzo finally let her go then to pull a single key out of his pocket. He held it out to her, and Lucia took it, eyeing him at the same time.
“What’s this?” she asked.
“Killing two birds with one stone,” he replied.
Understanding lit up her eyes. God, yeah. That’s what he wanted to see from her.
“An apartment?”
“Maybe. Unlock the door.”
Lucia laughed. “That was quick.”
It paid to have people who knew people, he supposed. Shit, maybe they should have just come to San Francisco from the jump. Hindsight was always twenty-twenty, as the saying went.
Diego was jumping up and down, excitement radiating from him all the while. He tried to grab the key out of Lucia’s hand, but she was too quick for him. She stuck the key in the lock eve
n as he shouted, “Open it up, Lucia!”
Their laughter colored up the alleyway. Lucia finally got the door to the apartment opened, and pushed it wide to give them all the chance to go inside. It wasn’t much, a small two-bedroom with one bathroom. All the walls were a dull white. Being it was a small loft overtop of the restaurant that Todd had apparently converted into an apartment over the last year, the windows weren’t all that big, either. It was furnished to a point of being comfortable. A couch and chair in the living room. A table set in the kitchen. A double bed in one bedroom, and a twin in another.
There wasn’t any artwork on the walls. They would need to go out and grab anything extra they might need like dishes, sheets, and curtains. But that didn’t take much work.
It wasn’t much to look at, sure.
But it was something.
And it was theirs.
For now.
Diego instantly took off to explore, but Lucia turned to face Renzo with that smile playing at the edges of her lips again. He didn’t give her the chance to say anything before he kissed her.
Hard, and fast, and long.
Home was where the heart was, right?
That’s how the saying went.
As long as he was with Lucia, Renzo figured he was always home.
THIRTEEN
A lot could change in five days.
Lucia wasn’t really surprised that she felt that way, but sometimes, a reminder was always good. Peace, calm, and the mundane rituals of life day after day could lull someone into a sense of happiness that little else could provide. Or maybe it was the fact that Renzo seemed slightly calmer after a few days of being settled in San Francisco that allowed Lucia to feel like she too could stop looking over her shoulder every second of the day.
God knew Diego liked it here.
Lucia’s gaze drifted between the burner phone in her hands, and then to the sight twenty feet away from her in the park. A couple days after moving into their new apartment, Renzo came back from work saying someone had mentioned a park for Diego to play. It wasn’t far from their place—maybe a block of walking, nothing much. But the place was full of different kinds of playground equipment that any kid would love. Slides, swings, jungle gyms, and more. Everything that would get the kid running, and climbing. Burning off all that energy he constantly seemed to have.
Renzo made it his first priority to take Diego to the park every day after work, now. Lucia tried to take him during the day, too, if the weather was good and she didn’t have other things to take care of first. Which, frankly, she didn’t have very much to do except keep the apartment clean and stay busy while she waited for Renzo to come up from downstairs. Keeping busy was a hell of a lot easier than doing nothing for hours at a time, so she often made things for herself to do to pass the time.
The good thing about his job, too, was the fact sometimes, he wasn’t needed all the time. He didn’t have a set number of hours, really. It was whenever Todd called on him to go downstairs and help with something, or run across the city to grab whatever was needed. In a way, Lucia figured that helped Diego a lot, too. He constantly asked about his brother—he stayed by the small window far too often, looking out and searching for Renzo, wondering when, or if, he was coming back.
That broke Lucia’s heart.
For more reasons than she cared to admit.
Sometimes, getting the boy out to the park was literally the only thing that would drag him away from the window, and get his mind focused on something else other than looking for Renzo. So yeah, even if the skies did look a little dreary in the mornings when Renzo headed out for work, she still got Diego away from the window, made him get dressed, and took him down the block to the park.
Today, Renzo had joined them for that morning run to the park. He didn’t have to go into work until later in the afternoon, for whatever reason. She didn’t ask what he was going to be doing for Todd later. Why should she when she was simply happy that he was there with them while he could be?
God knew Diego was happy about that, too.
Diego’s squeals of joy carried over the park as Renzo chased his brother from one side of the park to the other. Renzo darted up a metal slide on one side of the playground equipment, while Diego took the winding metal stairs in an attempt to escape his brother. Not that it worked. Renzo still caught Diego in the middle of the equipment, picked him up with both arms, and swung him around. Diego’s laughter picked up even more as Renzo carried him over to the tube slide, and both of them came down to the ground, smiling the whole way.
It made Lucia grin, too.
She was happy on the bench looking after their stuff. Usually, she would be the one joining Diego on the equipment, especially if there were no other children for him to play with and all. She really didn’t want to interrupt his time with Renzo, though. She knew how much he looked forward to those times with his brother.
Lucia was content to sit right where she was, and watch them enjoy themselves for now. Besides, she had other things on her mind that felt like it was weighing heavily on her shoulders.
Glancing down at the burner phone in her hands, she twisted it around and around. The black screen almost taunted her, in a way. How easy it would be for her to just … turn it on. Turn the phone on, dial a familiar number that was never far from her mind as she had memorized it when she was a child, and just … tell the truth.
Or rather, tell her father the things she hadn’t really taken the time to explain. Because if she could just gain the courage to turn the phone on and dial her father, he might listen to her if he picked up the phone. He loved her, didn’t he? Next to Renzo, she didn’t think there was another man in her life who loved her as much as her father did.
And maybe over the last little while, since they had settled in San Francisco, her father had been on her mind more than she wanted to admit. When things were quiet, and the apartment was peaceful … when she didn’t have anything else to do but think, Lucia often went back to her father.
She was still mad at him.
Just not as much.
She was still bitter.
Just not as deep.
But, above all else, she loved him. That was most present, and mostly because she knew he loved her, too. Maybe that was why her mind drifted back to her father whenever she found herself quiet, and happy. Because she was happy, and if only he understood that—if only he knew this was where she wanted to be, and that she hadn’t run off with Renzo because she was forced to, then maybe her father would leave her be.
Let her live.
That’s all she wanted, really. Just to live.
She entertained that thought far too often, maybe. That if she could just call him, her wish would come true. He would understand, and let her do the thing she wanted to do the most. He would step back. They wouldn’t have to run again when he got too close.
That was why, even as Renzo and Diego’s laughter drifted over the park again like an invitation for her to join in on their fun, she was stuck staring at the phone in her hands. She pushed the button on the side again and again. Turning the home screen on, and then off. Over and over until all she could see when she closed her eyes was the home screen and the phone icon taunting her.
How easy it would be …
And yet, she knew it wouldn’t be easy at all.
The wishful part of herself that hoped her father would hear her words and listen was delusional. The smart part of Lucia knew her father was never going to stop—he would never back down. The only thing that rivaled his love for his children was the love he had for his wife, her mother. If, for any reason, he thought Lucia was in danger … no matter what she tried to tell him … then that’s what he was going to think.
No amount of truth and words would change his mind.
Ever.
For the last time, Lucia looked down at the home screen of the phone, and pressed the button on the side to turn it off again. Calling would be pointless, even if she wished for something
entirely different.
This all could have been different, really. But right now, it was what it was. And even if she wanted something different between her and Lucian, that was never going to change the fact that Lucia was happy right where she was. That, no matter what, she was where she wanted to be with the people she wanted to be with, and her father didn’t have to agree or understand.
Not now, anyway.
“Hey!”
Lucia glanced up from her hands to find Diego and Renzo leaning over the railing at the highest point on the playground equipment. If she didn’t know any better, she might say Renzo looked a good five years younger in that moment. Like he was closer to his twenty years—yeah, she felt like shit for missing his birthday even if he said he didn’t care—than how he normally seemed decades older.
Right then, life was giving him a moment to relax.
And he looked like he wanted her to join.
So did Diego.
“What are you doing over there?” Renzo called out, grinning. “You’re missing out, babe.”
“Come play, Lucia,” Diego shouted.
She couldn’t exactly say no, could she?
Not when love was waiting …
• • •
“So, here’s how it works,” Renzo explained, rolling over to his stomach to get a better look at the board in front of him. “If you land on a ladder, Diego, then you climb up. But if you land on a snake, you—”
“Slide down,” Lucia said, coming to sit on the floor with them.
She plucked up the small pink game piece, and put it on the starting point for the board. Diego picked his own color, too—a green piece. Renzo’s little blue piece was already sitting on the starting point.
“Do you get it now?” Renzo asked his brother.
Diego nodded. “Yeah, throw the dice—”
“Roll the dice,” Renzo muttered, trying to hide his smile.
“Fine, we roll the dice, then I move the same number of squares that’s on the dice, right?” Diego looked up from the game board, and when they nodded at him, he said, “If I land on a ladder, I get to climb up, but if I land on a snake, I have to go down.”
