Oh, work stuff. She had to reseat her intention to form complete sentences, then let herself be drawn into the conversation as much as she could.
They all seemed so energized by being together, while she must look like a timid recluse.
The only ones not speaking much were her and Dante. He counted cans, marked info on a ledger attached to a clipboard, and watched everything and everyone else—but most especially her. And it wasn’t the dark, sexy kind of watching that made her tingle in interesting places. It was the kind of watching that made her nervous, made her say stupid things.
The women tried to draw her into their conversations here and there, but usually all she managed were the sort of answers that did nothing to keep the conversation going. This was a meeting where she wanted to measure them up—and also to see how they interacted with Dante, thinking maybe it could put her at ease about the decision she’d already made and now spent time trying to talk herself out of.
“How long have you all known one another?” she asked them, trying to get her bearings, trying to figure out how long it had taken them to bond to the point that they practically chirped with enthusiasm and amusement at one another while talking.
They gave a series of months that shocked her. Not at all long, and already so attached and friendly. It was like watching sisters...
“It’s a lot to meet the whole family at once.” Saoirse extended an olive branch, which was jumped on by each woman in turn, all agreeing.
“I did this a few weeks ago. Trust me, I remember the tension all too well, and there were only four for me to meet. You have two more since there are six of us now. Plus Dante, but you already know him.” Cassie had reached out to her again. Kind women. All of them.
“Dante,” a male voice called, getting Lise’s attention—getting everyone’s attention.
“You look like you’re about to lower the boom on someone.” Rafe. The twin! Lise identified him, felt fleeting pride, moved past it...
She would never have looked at them and thought of them as twins. Aside from them all being handsome men with similar coloring, they each had a look all their own. But somehow, in all that, the most handsome one of all was the one she might have landed if she decided to land and he was still amenable to the landing...after all this.
“He’s afraid we’re going to embarrass him in front of la rubia bonita,” teased Alejandro.
The pretty blonde. That could be any one of three. Or two, really.
“Alejandro!” Saoirse yelled at him, and it took Lise a second to realize she wasn’t his wife.
Ugh, she might never get this.
They all thought Dante was tense, expecting them saying the wrong thing? Poor people, worried for nothing. He was worried about her messing everything up. And she hadn’t really done anything to calm that fear so far, what with one stupid thing after another shooting like popcorn from her reckless mouth.
The ribbing seemed to relax him. Dante shrugged, “I’m trying to convince her I’m the last decent unmarried man left in Miami.”
“She works with you—she knows better.”
So they weren’t asking How did you meet? questions because they already knew. Had he prepped them too? Were there any forbidden topics from their end?
“And now she knows you’re the ugly one. Should’ve married her before you brought her around your handsome brothers.”
He bent, snatched something small and shiny from the floor, and chucked it at Alejandro. “Laugh it up, flaca loco. You’re all taken. She’ll just have to settle for the ugly one.”
The good-natured banter and laughing did more for her than all the attempts to include her or put her at ease.
Something else was said—in Spanish, so she didn’t get it—but it resulted in a roar of laughter from around the room.
In her arms, Gervaso startled and then began to cry. For the briefest second, panic rose in her, but before she could even think about asking what other ways were safe to hold him, Alejandro put his clipboard down and headed toward them.
“Is he getting fussy?” he asked while showing her his hands, indicating his desire to hold and comfort his son, and she wasn’t about to argue.
Lifting the red-faced, squirming bundle, she eased him into his father’s arms and laughed a little. “I swear I didn’t pinch him.”
Her silly explanation earned her an odd look, then the man smiled and lifted the frightened baby to his shoulder to walk and bounce—something she’d tried and failed to comfort Eli with, but which worked for Alejandro.
On his next pass, when he could keep his voice lower, Alejandro explained. “He’s basically healed now, but if something causes him to move sharply or suddenly, I think his chest aches. A change in position helps.”
“I’m sure that having his daddy hold him helps too,” she said, but then rose and slipped around him, heading for the flat of cans the new daddy had abandoned. A quick scan to make sure she understood the system, and she followed to where he’d left off and resumed inventory.
“Hey, she counts!” Santiago wasn’t quiet, but he did keep himself a few decibels further down from frightening-the-baby level, and pointed at the other women, turning his teasing onto them. “I hope you three see what a good example looks like.” And finished with, “Lise, you’re hired. Marry him tomorrow.”
The teasing words caused her to blush, but she laughed too—half in appreciation of the inclusive ribbing, half in nervousness.
The ribbing, the counting, the welcoming feeling they all gave—whatever Dante had felt compelled to do to provide for them must’ve weighed on him if it had turned him into the sourpuss of this lot.
It wasn’t fair that he’d carried all that on his own. And now that she’d met his family, she couldn’t even picture a scenario where they wouldn’t share the load.
Could people change? If he had her helping him lead a transparent life, could he let go of all that? Or was it buried too deep to be dug out now?
She was probably grasping at straws to comfort herself. This was probably how people made themselves blind to the flaws of their loved ones and partners.
The only thing she knew with absolute certainty was that people who adopted and fell in love with a seriously ill baby were good people. She could trust her still hypothetical children to these people. And they didn’t walk on eggshells around him—he’d even responded in the same manner.
The visit lasted about two hours, and by the end not only had Gervaso been passed around to get gentle affection from everyone in attendance—including Dante—but the rest had passed her cell phone around, taking selfies for identification purposes and putting their data into her contacts. Six new people in her Miami acquaintances.
* * *
Dante waited until Lise had closed her car door then turned toward her, searching her profile in the glow of the streetlights.
Why wasn’t she looking at him?
From his disadvantaged position, he could make out pinched brows and a set jaw.
Worried, or thoughtful?
“Did they pass?” he asked finally, reaching over to gently turn her face toward him. “You got everyone’s number.”
“They’re lovely people,” she said, reaching up to take the hand on her chin. She squeezed it then, gently but firmly, lowered it to the console separating them.
Despite her complimentary words, she didn’t look excited or even resolved.
“But...?”
“But nothing. They’re really great. It was a little overwhelming at first, I was nervous and everything I said sounded like some kind of ridiculous, hammy line from a badly written B-movie.” Then she drew in a deep breath, exhaled slowly, and added, “I don’t think I’ve ever been in one room with that many people who were all related. At least, not for any length of time. It’s a lot.”
If she
were retreating again, he’d have to make it harder to do. Despite the fact that she’d disengaged his hand from her face, he caught one of her small hands and held it. True to the agreement of one night, no promises, she’d distanced herself after leaving his home last Saturday. But he’d expected this meeting to turn that distance around—or at least he’d hoped it would. He’d hoped it would lead to an easy yes, and even now, looking back, he couldn’t see any reason that the word wasn’t already rushing from her lips.
He concentrated on the connection with her hand, and listening. And squeezing to show support. “So?”
“No.”
“You’re saying no?” he asked as she firmly reclaimed her hand.
“No. I’m not saying no to that. I’m saying I still need some time to sort all this out. I need to be smart about this decision. I can’t just fall in love with a sweet little baby in my arms and the truly humbling amount of love circulating in that room. I have to be as rational and smart as I can be in this.”
“More pros and cons lists?” he asked, trying not to be irritated at having to abide by another’s schedule again. When he made decisions, he immediately began pursuing them. That’s how he operated. He’d chosen Lise, and now he wanted to make some measurable headway, but it seemed like a perpetual holding pattern.
“Maybe. Though the past week has added a number of pros to your list. That’s not the problem. It’s not even the number of cons, it’s just the type. Just the one, really.”
As they both knew what she was referring to, Dante said nothing else, just started the car and backed out. Soon they were back on the road, and both seemed to have run out of words to say for the evening.
If she couldn’t move past the way he handled The Inferno, he would have to cut his losses, no matter how fantastic the sex, no matter how much he liked her.
CHAPTER NINE
DANTE WANTED AN ANSWER. After meeting them, she’d needed more time. So he’d waited. Waited and become very aware that he no longer had enough patience for a long con.
Waiting usually felt strong—it made people look at the things he’d told them differently. They had time for ideas to percolate, their opinions to change, their enthusiasm to build...until they finally came to him.
Then they’d had their usual three-day weekend in preparation for the unholy, long-hours of their four-day workweek. So he’d expected that by Monday, or Tuesday at the latest, she’d have come to him with her answer.
Another inventory day had come and gone in the meantime, and she’d avoided him like a leper in all ways outside work during that time, but he craved time with her. His body had already signed on the dotted line—his wife, the woman he was supposed to be naked with as much as possible. But it wasn’t just physical, he missed her.
In the last fifteen minutes of the second Thursday since the bodega, Dante finally worked it out. He wasn’t the one in power here. She was, and his patience officially ran out.
He summoned her.
Five days working together in that time, and standing shoulder to shoulder with her in surgery every morning. He’d seen her five days out of eight, and was available to her every day.
There was a knock at his private office door and Dante barked, “Come!”
Scowling, Lise stepped in and closed the door, her arms folded under her breasts in a way that, yes, made her look cross with him, but also distracted him with an extraordinary amount of cleavage.
“How can you possibly still be thinking about this?” he asked, one arm flying toward the ceiling in a rush of frustration. “You’re smart enough to have sorted this out by now!”
“Is that really how you want to start this conversation?”
Dante ran both his hands over his face, blew out a sharp breath and forced himself around the desk to sit on the sofa. It was the first time he’d ever been angry with her, but she was right. This wasn’t the time to lose his cool.
She watched him until he made himself relax, and only then did she cross the office to sit beside him. Her soft, warm thigh pressed against his, distracting him.
Don’t touch her yet. Hands under control.
“I needed time apart from you for the idea to settle without all...this.” She gestured to their thighs, touching and tingling even though separated by at least two layers of cloth. “Attraction clouds my thinking.”
He opened his mouth to speak, but she cupped her hand over his mouth, the soft hollow of her palm shutting him up.
“And then I had my cycle too...sort of. And I really wanted to make sure I wasn’t being emotional because of that either, since we went without protection. I needed space so I could trust that my decision wasn’t influenced by a massive amount of desire to go to bed with you again, or fear of a protracted legal battle if I got pregnant and was too afraid to get married.”
Dante urged her hand to his lap and kept hold of it, but since she still had words rushing from her mouth, he held his tongue.
“I wasn’t slighting you, I was just trying to trust my own decision. And you’re kind of like a bull. If I had given you an opening you could in any way interpret to mean please convince me, you’d have resumed convincing me, and you’re very convincing. I just needed me in my head to make the decision. So don’t yell at me about this in the office!”
Her voice rose at the end and she scowled, then fell silent.
Before she’d even gotten to the end of her own wordy tirade Dante had felt the tension draining from the back of his neck. “All right. So we’re agreed. Engaged.”
A flash of guilt on her face, and she pulled her gaze away, a negative noise rumbling in her throat.
The tension returned as she pulled her hand away.
“Your family is wonderful. A huge comfort. But I do have just one little other condition.”
“Lise...”
“I can see you’re testy, and I know you’re not used to being made to wait for anything, so I’m going to overlook it right now and not kick you in the junk because you’re not the only one who’s stressing out over this. My condition is for your benefit too.”
“What is it?”
He wouldn’t yell. He wouldn’t yell. He wouldn’t yell.
“I want to be pregnant before we announce anything about us. I’ve seen enough to know that fertility issues can affect marriage, and women who are otherwise perfectly healthy can find it impossible to conceive. The truth is, we don’t know that I can conceive a child. If I couldn’t hold up my end, it wouldn’t be fair to you. This marriage will be unconventional already—there’s no room for us not to get what we want. And I’d rather not have a divorce to deal with on top of my dream of children breaking—should it come to that. So it’s for both our benefits.”
Every now and then Lise could catch a glimpse of what Dante was thinking or feeling before he outright told her. Yelling and big emotional displays—like when she’d stepped into his office after he’d demanded her presence—were easy. She picked up on the anger before she’d got into the room. But now that the moment had passed he’d reverted to the cool, implacable man who frustrated her.
She couldn’t tell if he approved of her condition or was about to unleash an objection on her. Maybe if she said something else, he’d speak. “When I get pregnant, I will accept your ring.”
“No. Engagement now,” he said. “If you want to avoid a divorce if you can’t get pregnant, then we’ll marry after you’re pregnant, but I want this settled.”
“Why?”
“Because it fits your needs and mine. I’m tired of waiting. I’ve been patient.”
“This was you being patient?”
“Believe it or not. We’ll move you in on Saturday.”
“What about my cottage? I don’t want it to sit empty. There are vandals and arsonists... All that and loss of homeowner’s insu
rance if it’s unoccupied for a whole month.”
“Fine. We’ll spend some nights there and work on getting it sold.”
Dante reached for her closest hand and she turned her palm toward his so she could link fingers with him. It was a small gesture, but once the digits entwined he lifted his eyes to hers. “That also settles your arguments.”
Lise nodded, but it was in her to make sure he understood the leap she was making. “I’m still not at ease with everything.”
“The best way to get used to the idea is to jump into it.”
“I guess.” She was adaptable, but the fear still lingered that this would all go wrong. “I don’t want there to be any guns in the house. Not even locked up in a safe, not there at all. Taser if you feel the need to be armed.”
Maybe she needed to prove something to herself.
“I can live with that,” Dante said easily enough. “I can compromise, see? And with three of our four parents dying from gunshot wounds, I have no problem with that.”
He stood and gestured for her to stand up, and it was all too easy to step in and lean against him. She’d missed him, and working at his side all week had been one temptation after another. If the week to think was anything to go by, this was the only sensible decision to make. In one swoop she got a father for her children, an extended family to love and protect them, a lover, and an occasional friend when he wasn’t infuriating her.
Rising up abruptly, she pressed her mouth to his. Dante needed no persuading. His arms tightened around her and mashed her to him as he took control and deepened the kiss, turning it into a promise for the weeks to come.
The day was over, they could stay, get naked on the second version of that same uncomfortable leather sofa she’d seen in his possession.
Despite her attempts to get distance enough to make good decisions, echoes of the pleasure from their one night had rolled around in her thoughts all week, haunting her, teasing her, probably corrupting her judgment despite her best efforts.
She just couldn’t keep going like she had been for the past three years. She had to take a chance on people, and even if it all went badly with Dante, their children would be tied to his family. The wives would probably still be her friends.
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