by Piper Rayne
“I do, Zia. Thanks.” I kiss her cheek and again entwine my hand in Val’s.
The basement stairs creak on our way down to the finished basement that Mauro moved into when he was a teen. All three of my cousins are on the couch in front of the Xbox, playing Madden.
Mauro has on his tux pants but no shirt. Luca’s in track shorts and a T-shirt while Cristian’s wearing jeans and a V-neck T-shirt. If I didn’t have a better body than Mauro, I’d demand he get dressed in front of Val. But let’s be real, he’s put on a few happy pounds.
“Boys,” I say.
Mauro and Luca glance up from the television, their fingers moving across the controllers as they shout at one another.
“What’s up, Dom? Thanks for bailing Luca out, Val. You’ll come to find out he’s the baby of the Bianco family and acts just like one.” Cristian ruffles his younger brother’s hair and Luca slides out from under his touch.
“He’s jealous because I’m the better-looking one.” Luca’s eyes are still on the TV screen.
“I thought we were here to teach you how to dance?” I motion for Val to sit on the plaid chair, and I stand by Cristian.
She crosses her legs and watches the game. Silent but observant.
“The girls at the hotel?” I ask.
“Nah, they’re at Luca and Lauren’s, getting ready before they head to the church,” Cristian says, since the boys are too busy playing their video game.
“Nice. So when will you be visiting the altar?” I slap Cristian on the shoulder.
He smiles. “Van’s not ready yet. I let her dictate how fast we go. She just got another new store to take on her designs, so I’m waiting until next year maybe. But I won’t be making a big deal of it like these two. We’ll be eloping.”
I chuckle. “Zia gonna like that?”
“After these two, Ma won’t mind. Maybe we’ll have a small reception, but I don’t want all the fuss. I want the wife with no wedding. Plus, her ma died when she was young, and I think it’d be painful for her to have a big to-do.”
I half smile at Cristian because out of all the Biancos and Mancinis, he’s the one who always puts others’ needs before his own. Not that we’re assholes, but Cristian’s like hero territory. Which probably explains why he’s a police officer.
“I gotta say, I was surprised to hear about your nuptials.” Cristian keeps his voice low, but Val turns ever so slightly, so I know she heard.
“Yeah. Val and I have known each other a long time, so…”
“But marriage?” He shakes his head. “I always envisioned you as the forever bachelor, Uncle Dom who brought home girls half his age.”
I chuckle and Val stifles a giggle, still trying to act as though she’s not eavesdropping. “Gee, thanks.”
“No offense.” Cristian shrugs. “But I’m happy for you. You guys sneaking off last night must mean things are good.”
Val turns toward the television. “How much longer?”
The boys are arguing about a touchdown.
“Give me two minutes to kick his ass,” Mauro says, standing from the couch. His body moves side to side as his fingers press on the remote.
“We’re good,” I say in answer to Cristian’s question.
Luca stands up next to Mauro, his fingers just as fast. A second later, he drops the remote on the table with an ‘I’m the best’ attitude. “Winner!” He raises his hand toward Val and she high-fives him.
“It’s his wedding. Can’t let him walk down the aisle thinking he sucks.” Mauro laughs and Luca tries to put him in a headlock.
Mauro wraps his arms around Luca’s torso, and the two wrestle on the couch.
Val laughs and looks at me.
“Yeah, we wrestle sometimes too,” I answer the question she didn’t ask.
“I figured,” she says.
“Come on. We don’t have all day. Luca, get your ass up,” I say.
His red face peers up through Mauro’s arm, then he slips out of Mauro’s grasp and straightens his T-shirt. “Sorry.” He shoots a warning glare at Mauro, who’s too busy laughing to care. “I just need to know enough to not make a fool of myself.”
She stands and comes over to where I am, since there’s more space. “Play some music, Dom.”
“What kind of music?” I ask, pulling out my phone.
“I’m assuming you have a mother-and-son dance along with the first dance for you and Lauren?”
Luca nods.
“Are they fast or slow?”
Luca glances at Cristian.
“How would I know?”
Luca’s vision shifts to Mauro.
“It’s your wedding.”
Luca throws up his hands. “It was weeks ago that we met with the DJ and Lauren already had a song picked out for me and Ma, so I went with it.”
“Do you know the song you’re dancing to with Lauren?” Val asks in a patient tone that still suggests step it up, you’re the groom.
This is Luca. His attitude toward the wedding has no bearing on how much he loves Lauren. He’s probably arranged for something to be delivered to her already this morning. Their honeymoon will be awesome. But he doesn’t care what they dance to. All he cares about is her.
“I’m not a complete dipshit.” But he pauses to think, and when his eyes light up, we all sigh. “‘Thinking Out Loud’ by Ed Sheeran.”
“Okay.” Val nods to me, and I search for it on my phone. “Now, you’re going to hold your ma much differently than Lauren. Let’s do Lauren first since we have the song.” Val holds out her hands, waiting for Luca to step into her space. “Come.”
“Oh.” Luca steps forward.
“One hand on the small of my back, the other hand clasped with mine.”
Luca does as directed.
“Now she might move her arms like this.” Val links her hands behind Luca’s neck. “This is great, but I feel like you can be just as intimate with your hands linked.” She moves closer, tucking her hand back in his. “Great, now that we’ve got the position, let’s work on the footwork.”
For twenty minutes, we play the song over and over while she shows my cousin how to do the box step. I’m surprised how long it takes Luca to learn such a basic step. Val stops him once he has the step down. Mauro and Cristian are still in the basement with us, looking bored.
“Great job getting the step down, but you need to be the one to lead her. Take control. Here, watch me and Dom,” Val says.
Mauro looks up from his phone. “Dom knows how to dance?”
“Well, I taught him.” Val sheepishly looks at me.
I place the phone on the table and take Luca’s place.
“Can’t wait to see this.” Luca joins his brothers on the couch.
Oh, now everyone can put their phones away.
Val easily steps into my space like that night she taught me almost two decades ago. My hand slides around her hip to her lower back, and she raises her arm to wrap around my neck with our entwined hands tucked between us.
“Ready?” she asks.
“Yeah.”
Thank God I had her last night, because if we did this before we slept together, I’d probably have a raging hard-on and make a fool of myself in front of my cousins. I never realized what a turn-on dancing is. And I’m not talking about grinding my dick against her ass at a club.
“You have to maintain control, Luca,” Val continues teaching as I circle us around the small basement. “Dom is leading me…”
I whirl her and the song ends. “Perfect” by Ed Sheeran starts next. The lyrics sink in as I hold her, and her directions to Luca fade into the background as I soak in the feeling of having her in my arms again. The lyrics hit home—not knowing she was the one because we were kids when we first fell for each other.
When I first met Val, she was all metal braces and long legs. I was boney and hairy. But over the years, we’ve emerged from our adolescent cocoons as beautiful creatures. Valentina especially. Her teeth are straight and white, he
r long legs slender and graceful. I’m not sure if the lyrics are speaking to her too, but she leans her head on my shoulder, her fingers running up the back of my head.
Is this all for show? I don’t even care. I can’t afford to care. It’s hard to admit it, but that summer in the Hamptons when we split, I was a fucking mess, destroyed by mourning the death of something that was never fully realized. I’ll never tell her that though. Because it doesn’t matter. I’ll never allow myself to be in that position again.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Valentina
* * *
I’m not surprised that Dom remembers how to twirl me around a dance floor without making it look as though he’s concentrating on what he’s doing. The universe seems set on tormenting me, what with the Ed Sheeran’s “Perfect” starting up after Luca and Lauren’s song. It’s a song that only makes me think of Dom. It could’ve been written as our very own love song.
Nostalgia sets in. This basement feels familiar—like the one in the Mancini house. They lived in a rare three level semi-detached and were one of the only people I knew who had a basement growing up. A basement we played Monopoly in on rainy days, or hide-and-seek when we were much younger, spin-the-bottle once we got older. My first kiss with Dominic happened in his basement, and three years later, I lost my virginity to him there. There was nothing especially romantic about the scene, but it felt romantic just the same.
My parents had inventory, so Mrs. Mancini had said that I could spend the night with them. They had a bed in the basement for family members or friends who spent the night.
Mrs. Mancini set me up downstairs and made sure I was comfortable. I lay in bed with a movie on the television to help me fall asleep. I hadn’t slept over at the Mancinis’ since I hit puberty, and I was positive there was a reason for that.
Around midnight, I heard the third stair creak, and I didn’t have to look to know who it was. Dom appeared in a pair of track shorts and a T-shirt. His hair was everywhere. I wondered if he’d fallen asleep before he came down to join me.
“Hey,” he said, walking across the basement toward my bed. “You doing okay?”
Back then, and still I suppose, I loved the way he acted like my own personal bodyguard, always making me feel as though I wasn’t alone. “Yeah, I just can’t sleep.”
He glanced at the TV, where My Best Friend’s Wedding was playing, then shrugged and sat on the edge of my bed. “Seriously? You haven’t watched this enough?”
I poked him with my toe. “It’s a cute movie.”
“It’s stupid. Who makes a pact to marry someone by a certain age?” He leaned his back against my headboard, his long legs stretched out in front of him.
It felt intimate, sitting that close to him on a bed. Being teenagers, it wasn’t a luxury we could often enjoy.
“Why do you think they didn’t marry earlier?” I ask.
“They’re friends. They both want careers. I don’t plan on marrying anyone until at least thirty.”
I drew back as though he’d offended me. That was the first I’d ever heard him say anything like that. “Why?”
“What’s the point of getting married if I can’t take care of my wife and kids? I want them to have everything, and for that to happen, I need to have a stable career.”
At that point, I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life. I loved to dance, but I knew there was a slim chance I’d be able to make a career out of it. But Dom was nothing like me. Maybe it because he was the oldest, but he already knew he wanted to work with money and make money early on. He knew what he wanted to do and what school he wanted to get into.
“What if you lose the love of your life in the process?” I held my breath for his response.
“If she’s the love of my life, she’ll still be there at thirty.” He was cool and casual and certain. It scared me to think I’d miss out on the love of my life.
“Maybe there’s more than one love,” I offered.
He stared at me, the glow of the television making him look somehow older. “I think there’s only one true love for everyone.”
“Dom.” I elbowed him, but his eyes never left mine. “What if you never meet them?”
“What if you meet them too young?” he asked.
“Answer my question.”
His eyes dipped to my lips, then his tongue slid out of his mouth and he licked his lips. A tingle shot through my body. We’d kissed before—a few times—but we’d never gone further than some heavy petting. Still, I was cognizant of something stirring deep inside me, a desire and a want I wasn’t accustomed to.
“I don’t know what happens if you never meet them. My problem is that I worry I met mine too young.” Talking in code had always been Dominic Mancini’s MO. The man never laid his cards out, because he could never show vulnerability.
“And who is that?” I was afraid to hear the answer, but I needed to know.
He tilted his head, his eyes never leaving mine. “You know who.”
“Are you talking about Lulu?”
Lulu was another neighborhood girl. We’d been friends for years, but she was the complete opposite of me. She wore bows, and her hair was always perfectly curled. When we were younger, she played in dresses and was always trying to pull me away from the boys to play house or Barbies. At sixteen, I wasn’t climbing trees anymore, but Lulu was still the kind of girl that most boys in our grade gravitated to.
“Stop it, Val, you know we’re meant to be together.”
What had started as a tingle now felt like a full-on blaze about to ignite my entire body. Dom was finally being straight with me and I couldn’t stop hope from sprouting.
“We’re sixteen.”
He tucked one strand of my hair behind my ear. “And you’ll be my wife someday. You just have to let me conquer the world first. Promise.”
Our eyes locked, and all I wanted was for him to seal his promise with a kiss. Just as I hoped, our faces drew closer and our breathing was the only sound I heard.
“How could you ever think I like Lulu?” He smirked right before his lips brushed mine.
His tongue slid along my seam and I opened, allowing him to enter. The kiss became more intense, and soon my back was flat on the bed and Dom was half on top of me, his hand about to slide up my shirt.
“Is this okay?” he asked before touching my breast.
I arched my back and nodded to grant him permission.
My Best Friend’s Wedding played in the background as we explored each other’s bodies. Dom raced upstairs to retrieve a condom from his bedroom and then we took off our bottoms. I didn’t look when he put it on, and I still had my shirt on as he slowly pushed inside me. He kissed me to drown out my pain, and for a moment, the painful sensation was masked by my love for him.
It was awkward and sloppy, but it felt magical all the same. Because anything that involved the two of us was always good.
He stayed with me until sunrise, when we heard his dad getting up for work. His lips landed on mine, and he acted as though it tore him to shreds to leave the bed.
Later, I told his ma that I’d gotten my period in order to explain the sheets and she gushed over me to make sure I was okay. I’m not sure what Dom did with the condom. I never asked.
At breakfast that day, Carm played Duck Duck Goose with Blanca even though none of us got up to chase them. My eyes caught Dom’s, but then we’d look away from each other. I was certain of one thing when I left the Mancinis’ that weekend—I’d wait forever if it meant having Dominic Mancini.
Dom’s feet slowly stop, pulling me back to the present like a bucket of cold water. He releases me as though he didn’t realize himself that I was still in his arms.
“Whoa. You guys are good,” Luca says, pretending to do what we did.
Mauro yawns and stretches. “I’m hungry.” He barrels up the stairs without another word.
Dom turns off the music and stuffs his phone into his pocket. “There you go, Luca.”
I walk over to Luca, happy for the distance from Dom. “Just love her out there and your feet will do the work. If all anyone sees is the love between the two of you, they’re not watching whether your footsteps are right.”
“Thanks.” Luca stares over my shoulder at Dom. “I never would’ve guessed that you’d be one to sink.”
“Sink?” The heaviness in Dom’s voice almost sounds like he wants to say fuck off.
“You’re drowning in love. It’s great to see.” Luca smiles then nods toward the stairs. “Ma made some food. Want to join us? I eat when I’m nervous.”
“Give us a minute,” Dom says, putting up his finger.
“Sure.” Luca barrels up the stairs with Cristian in tow.
I try to keep my eyes focused forward when I hear his footsteps growing closer.
“You okay?” Dom’s hands land on my shoulders.
I desperately want to lean back, assured that his strength will keep me up, but I force myself to stay upright. “I’m fine.”
“You look like you saw a ghost.” He’s quiet and his hands run up and down my biceps.
“Just memories.” I turn around, but his hands stay on my arms as he peers down at me.
“What memories?”
I can’t take us down memory lane. We can’t afford to get lost there. “Nothing. Let’s go.”
I walk toward the stairs, but he grabs my hand, pulling me back to him. “Valentina, what is it?”
I shake my head. “All this pretending brings up a lot of stuff from the past at the same time as it brings reality to the forefront. Come on.”
I tug and he follows, letting us pretend that any feelings we might have for one another are all part of the façade. That’s the thing about Dom—he’ll never let me see his vulnerability. It’s always been the one part of him I can count on.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Dominic