36
These Foolish Things
One week. I’ve got one week left with Luca. One week to pretend like we’re all glued up and back together again. Like I haven’t used Luca’s act of faith and affection as the key to getting out of his luxury prison. One week to listen to “Somethin’ Stupid” on repeat inside my guilty and confused head.
“Amber…. Earth to Amber.”
I snap out of my daze later that night to hear Naima say, “I think your stew’s burning, girl.”
I do a smell and an aural check. Strong odor, too angry sizzle. Crap, she’s right.
Cooking blind on a stove top is an all remaining sensory hands on deck sort of activity. But I’d completely spaced out for the second time today.
I curse under my breath as I turn down the burner, and hate that I have to ask Naima, “How is it?” because I hadn’t tracked the dish as closely as I should have.
Soft footsteps come around to my side of the island and stop beside me. “It’s fine,” she answers, after a few moments. “Maybe just add like a half cup of water, then turn it all the way down to simmer, and you’ll be good to go.”
“Thanks,” I say. “You’re a dinner saver for sure.”
“You seem really distracted. Are you all right?” she asks, her hand coming up to my shoulder. “If you want, I can stay here instead of going out with Rock tonight.”
“Uh, no you can’t,” Rock tells her from the other side of the island, where he’s sitting at his usual counter stool. “Not unless you clear it with Luca first.”
Naima’s hand tightens on my shoulder, obviously irritated. It can’t be easy for her, having her every decision monitored by my ruthless ex-husband. But Rock’s right, it’s entirely up to Luca whether she can stay behind tonight. Reason 2 million and 9 why I shouldn’t feel guilty about the deal I’ve made with Peter.
“Seriously, I’m fine.” I pat Naima’s hand before moving to the drawer to the left of the stove to grab a measuring cup. “It’s just pregnancy brain.”
“Maybe you should start letting me make dinner,” Naima says. “Not because you’re disabled, just because it feels crazy to watch somebody as pregnant as you doing all the cooking when I’m right here.”
“Yeah,” Rock says, getting right back on Naima’s helpful page now that she’s not trying to violate one of his boss’s rules. “And I know Luca wouldn’t care if you wanted to start ordering out. Just tell me what you want.”
“No, I like cooking, and unlike tying my own shoes, it’s something I can still do,” I answer, easily locating the stainless-steel cup with “1 cup 250mL” etched into its handle. “Let me have this, okay?”
The incoming buzz of the elevator sounds before either of them can answer.
“Luca, you’re home early,” Rock calls out when the doors slide open.
And I brace myself for the acting job of a lifetime.
But then a voice says, “Sorry, not Luca. Joey let me come up alone.”
The confident voice sounds familiar, but I don’t recognize it, until Rock says, “Heya, Matti. How’s it going?”
And Naima says, “Matti, is that really you? I didn’t recognize you with the grey beard.”
I hear the quick tap of her sneakers, and I can imagine her rushing over to hug the lawyer who saved her parents from being evicted from the house she still lives in to this day. Well at least until her forced two-month relocation to Appartamento Mafioso.
“Hello, Matti,” I call out as I fill the measuring cup with water. “What are you doing here?”
“I’ve come to speak to you on Luca’s behalf, actually,” Matti answers.
An awkward silence descends, during which some kind of physical language exchange must happen between all the sighted people. Because in the next moment, Rock says, “Hey, Nai, I never been to this place we’re eating dinner at. Maybe we should head out a little early?”
“Oh…okay,” Naima says, her voice just as deliberately casual.
Honestly, it feels like I’m the main character in a sitcom, with the side characters making obvious excuses to get out of there. And I can’t blame them.
There’s seriously no such thing as a fun conversation with a lawyer.
I finish putting the extra water in the stew and stir it while Rock and Naima make their retreat. And as soon as the elevator doors swoosh closed, Matti says, “I can see you’re busy with dinner, so I’ll try not to take up too much of your time.”
I give him a small smile. “It’s a stew, so it’s really no problem.”
Then I instinctively go quiet, just as I would if opposing counsel had walked into the room. Even though we’re on either side of a long floating counter, not a conference table. Guess my lawyer sense hasn’t gone completely dormant after all, even after two months of disuse.
Matti clears his throat, switching into business mode as well. “Today, Luca asked me to draw up two contracts for you and then bring them here and I guess…play them for you. I think I’ve gotten the speech to text figured out on my computer. Option plus escape, right?”
“You’re on a Mac?”
No answer, and I half smirk. “Are you nodding?”
“Yes…to both questions.” Matti sounds super sheepish. “Oy vey! Sorry. You’d think I’d be better at that after subbing in for you the last two months.”
“What do you mean you’ve been subbing in for me?” I ask, tilting my head.
More silence, and I can almost hear the messy attorney-client privilege calculation buffering in his head and stalling out his answer. So just to help it along, I ask, “Off the official record, have you been handling my cases for me while I’ve been out on…ah…maternity leave?”
“I have?” His answer is so careful, it ends up sounding like a question.
I stand there for a second. Completely shocked. “Oh my God, Matti! Thank you! I’ve been so worried about all the clients I left hanging without a word.”
Matti lets out an audible breath. Apparently even more relieved than me. “I’m glad you said that because I have quite a few questions I’ve been dying to ask you, especially about some of your ongoing accessible website cases.”
“Shoot,” I answer. “Like I said, that stew’s good to go. I’m all yours.”
“This small vocational college we’re suing on behalf of Natalia Rosenthal came back with a generous settlement offer—six figures, free tuition, and a personal aide to help her navigate through the school’s education portal, but no promises to make the website accessible.”
“So, they’re trying to pay her to go away and shut up already about their non-accessible website, since she’s the only blind student at their school,” I translate, taking a seat on the stool I keep on the kitchen side of the counter.
“Exactly. And I’ve got to say I’m torn here. She and her family aren’t well off…”
“But what about the next blind student who wants to attend this school?” I finish for him. “Taking that settlement might make the application process even more biased against disabled students in the future. Since the college knows accepting another impaired prospective could potentially open them up to a lawsuit.”
“Yes, that’s what I’ve been wrestling with…I’m sorry to say, I’m not used to thinking of the bigger social justice aspect of most of the court cases I take on.”
“Yeah, I bet,” I answer with an understanding smile. “It’s a difficult balance.”
We end up talking about my various disability cases for quite a while, along with prepping for an IEP meeting in the South Bronx. Then we get into the high-profile divorce cases. However, Matti’s work on those cases has been more funny than problematic. Apparently, walking into a negotiation with Luca Ferraro’s lawyer has produced all sorts of dividends for my custody and divorce settlement clients, including an unasked for accounting of formerly withheld assets. One husband even assumed his wife was dating Luca Ferraro now and begged her to take him back, even though he’d been the one trying to trade her out for a you
nger trophy wife.
“Please tell me she didn’t accept his offer,” I say, shaking my head after Matti tells me that.
“No, but she did insinuate her ‘boyfriend’ would be really upset if she didn’t get everything she was asking for,” Matti answers with a laugh.
By the time we’re done consulting over my client roster, I’m almost ready to give him Diamond’s contact information, just in case he runs into a husband who can’t be intimidated by Luca’s long shadow.
But I settle for saying, “Seriously, thank you, Matti, for working so hard on my caseload. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it.”
“Thank Luca,” Matti answers, apparently not as concerned about attorney-client privilege as he’d been when we’d first sat down at the counter. “He told me he didn’t want you stressed during the last trimester of your pregnancy but knew your clients were important to you. And by the way, Mr. Silva is all taken care of, too. I paid his hospital bills anonymously and put him on the Ferraro Disaster Management health insurance. So hopefully that’s another load off your mind.”
I tilt my head again, wondering if I misheard. Because Pascoal’s last name is Silva. “Are you saying Luca paid my ex-boyfriend’s hospital bill and put him on his company’s health insurance?”
“Ahh…” Matti answers, the attorney-client privilege question obviously dropping back down like an anvil inside his head. “Speaking of Luca, it’s getting late. We should probably move on to this contract he wants us to go over.”
As segues go, graceful it is not. But Matti pushes that option-esc key combo before I can ask any more questions. And since, I can’t exactly read along, my mind automatically switches into extreme concentration mode as soon as the electronic voice starts pouring out of his laptop.
But then, only a few minutes into the reading, I have to risk missing something to ask, “Is this a custody agreement?”
Maybe Matti’s not quite as hard to train as he insinuated. I hear a couple of key pecks, and the contract pauses, before he answers, “Yes, it is.”
My heart soars with surprise. Luca is offering me a custody agreement. Just like I asked. That means, he’s letting me go.
But then my heart plummets, an unexpected sorrow crashing down. “He’s letting me go? Just like that?”
A hesitation, and I sense Matti choosing his words carefully before he answers, “Luca was very clear that he wanted me to offer you a custody agreement before I played the other contract he asked me to draw up for you this morning.”
“What’s the other contract?” I ask, my heart frozen inside my chest.
37
That’s All
Luca
“What did she say???????”
I receive the message from Amber’s hidden assistant while waiting in the lobby of my building for the come on up text Matti promised to send after he was done reviewing the contracts with Amber.
Good question. And I wish I had a better answer for the still unrevealed person I’ve been exchanging weekly messages with for the last two months. “Nothing yet. She’s still with my lawyer.”
“Seriously?????? Why is it taking so long?”
Another good question, and not for the first time, I find myself weirdly grateful for these exchanges with Amber’s clandestine assistant.
It had started as a sort of “so back the hell off, hater” convo when I texted her about Amber offering me an olive branch a few weeks ago. But then she’d asked me for more details and if I thought the peace request was a tactic on Amber’s part. Quite frankly, I wasn’t sure. And it had felt like I was finally getting the relationship sounding board I’d needed when I answered. “Guess we’ll see.”
The assistant had somehow gone from a threat to “okay, now I’m totally shipping you and my boss” after the truce. S/he’d even texted me about how good Amber looked on my arm after the pictures from Zahir’s and Prin’s engagement party popped up on social media.
Strange, but true, s/he’d had way more questions about me not making moves on Amber than Amber herself. “Cmon, son, you know you bitches too fine not to be smashing. PRIORITIZE THAT SHIT!” s/he’d advised.
I’d actually sent her a “finally prioritized” message the morning after Amber and I rekindled the sexual side of our relationship. And she’d sent back a clip of a brightly robed African choir singing the “Hallelujah” chorus, complete with a troupe of dancers.
I’m really, really hoping the assistant isn’t a 12-year-old boy in Singapore. Nonetheless, s/he’d been my first text when I decided to make my big move a few days ago. And we’d gone over every detail before I sent Matti up to talk to Amber.
“I don’t know why it’s taking so long,” I answer her now.
“You worried?”
“Yeah,” I start to admit since I’m still having a hard time believing all of this. That Amber’s pregnant with my son and back in my bed. It feels like a dream bubble that could be popped at any time.
But before I can hit send, my burner vibrates in my inside pocket. I pull it out to see a message from Matti: “Played both contracts for her. She’s asking to speak with you before making her final decision.”
Can’t say I’m shocked by Matti’s message. Amber’s not dumb, and unlike me, she’s been using her law degree for something other than keeping herself out of legal trouble during the years we were apart. No surprise she wants to put me on the stand before she signs anything. And as Amber’s assistant says when I tell her or him about the delay, “hey it’s not a no.”
This time I don’t bother to type back what I’m thinking. At least not yet.
“Time to roll?”
I look up from my phone. Joey’s standing at his usual post, next to the smallest of the building’s four golden elevators. Dressed in a nondescript black suit, he reads a lot less formal than the doormen posted outside the building and behind the lobby’s ivory front desk. But anyone who gets too close to my private elevator would find out he’s way more lethal than either of those guys.
I repocket both the burner and my official phone. “Yeah, time for me to go up.”
As Joey thumbs the call button for me, I glance over at the man sitting in the lobby’s seating area under an ultra-modern kinetic chandelier composed of crystal bulbs suspended on lines of nickel. Even with a passing glance, you can tell he doesn’t quite belong in this Tribeca high rise. He’s wearing one of those dark wool trench coats that have refused to go out of style since the 50s, no matter what kind of Stay Puff marshmallow and bright colors trends the city throws at it. He also has gray hair and the permanently dour look of someone too established in his career to care what a trendy passerby might think.
“Tell our guest to hang tight,” I say to Joey before stepping into the elevator he’s called down for me.
“Will do, boss.”
Matti’s waiting for me when I get off the elevator. “Amber’s in the kitchen. If you need privacy, I can wait downstairs with Brunson,” he offers, his shrewd brown eyes giving nothing away.
“Yeah, do that,” I mumble without stopping on my way to the kitchen.
I can hear the robotic voice reading over the second contract I had Matti draw up as I approach, and I wonder if Amber’s still listening to it, or if this is her second pass.
Either way, her face is already turned in the direction of my incoming feet by the time I reach the kitchen.
“This is a marriage contract,” she says instead of hello, and her voice is filled with all sorts of da fuck…?
“Yeah, it’s a marriage contract,” I answer, watching her closely because it’s also a test. My last test after revealing this morning in plain language just how hardcore a criminal I actually am. She knows who I really am now without anything held back. Will she fully commit to making this second chance we’ve gotten work? That’s the final question on the exam.
As unreadable as Amber likes to keep her expressions, I can tell I’ve taken her by surprise. Her mouth drops open. Then her brow furr
ows, and I brace for all my unspoken fears to come true. That this second chance with her is too good to be true. That of course, she won’t marry me again. What kind of idiot do I think she is? Of course, she’ll take the custody agreement and freedom over saying yes to a second marriage with the guy who had to kidnap her to get her to this contract crossroads in the first place.
“Seriously, you want to marry a divorce lawyer without a prenup? No offense to Matti, but if I were your attorney, I’d seriously advise you against that move.”
As tense as I am, a smile breaks through, curving up my lips. “I’ve taken your counsel under advisement and have decided to move forward nonetheless. Thanks.”
“Alright, I’m just saying,” she answers, sucking her teeth like I’m the biggest idiot she’s ever met. This is why I love her. Why I never stopped loving her. She always calls me on my shit, and she’s not afraid to tell me when I’m being stupid. She’ll make a good mob wife, I realize then. A partner I can trust to help me with major decisions, and the only woman I’ll never get sick of fucking.
But then, her face turns serious. “No wedding ceremony?” she asks. And this time it feels like she’s testing me.
“No wedding ceremony,” I answer grave as a priest. “I don’t need the pomp and circumstance like the first time. I don’t care. I just want us to be official, Ambs. Before the baby is born.”
“Official,” she repeats, and her face softens. But only for a microsecond before it recomposes into the blank expression of a lawyer with a contract to negotiate.
“And how about Naima?” she asks.
“What about her?”
“I can’t do happily ever after if you’re still holding my dearest friend in the world hostage. You’ll need to let her go—like, tomorrow. Deliver her back to her apartment. And I don’t know how you’ll explain to her job why she’s been gone this long, but you have to fix whatever damage you’ve done. Plus, guarantee me you will never use her to threaten me again. Which means you’ll have to tell your cousin playtime’s over.”
Ruthless Tycoons: The Complete Series (Ruthless Billionaires Book 3) Page 70