by Mary Campisi
“Oh?” Her dark gaze landed on the pink satin of the box. “What is it?”
“Just a joke from someone trying to get my attention.” Heat snaked from his neck to his cheeks, burst into full flame.
“I see.” She snatched the box from him, lifted the lid. Stared. Read the card. Pinched her lips. Met his gaze. “Do not go near that Servetti woman, do you hear me?”
“Mom, I’m not a kid or an idiot. I know all about Natalie, knew about her back in high school.”
She sniffed, handed him the box. “She’s nothing but trouble, and age has only made her more dangerous and more desperate. Do you know she almost ruined poor Nate Desantro’s marriage?” His mother tsk-tsked like she used to when she scolded him and his sister. “I’m talking destruction so cruel, you couldn’t imagine it. Pop told Sal about it. Seems Nate’s wife’s mother didn’t like her daughter being married to a small-town boy, not with them being from Chicago and all. And you know what she did?” Of course, she didn’t expect him to answer, but plowed right on. “She hired Natalie to drug him and pretend to seduce him, and they got pictures of it. That’s what your father said Pop told him. Can you imagine?”
“No, actually, I can’t.” This was worse than a bad soap opera, and it definitely sounded worse than his split from Jess. At least that was based on good old greed and financials, no photos necessary.
“Pop says Natalie’s like a bad penny and until she shines herself up and changes, she’s going to end up in one bad situation after another and maybe one day, it’s going to be too late to change.” She nodded, made the sign of the cross, and clasped his forearm. “But you, Roman Salvatore Ventori, will not be her male intrigue, do you understand?”
Male intrigue? Roman smiled, pulled her into his arms for a quick hug. “Of course, I do. Don’t you worry, Mom. I won’t let big, bad Natalie Servetti get to me.”
“Humph. You aren’t the first man who said that.” She eased away, looked into his eyes, and said in a firm voice, “But when a man stops thinking with his brain and starts thinking with another part of his body,” she sighed, shrugged, “that’s when you know you’re in trouble.”
Roman hid a smile. “Got it.”
She stroked his cheek, murmured. “You need to find a nice girl, settle down, and raise a family. Then you won’t have strange women leaving food and underwear at your doorstep.” He cocked a brow, waited for her to go on. With his mother, there was always a part two to every lesson. “Your father and I have a few suggestions if you’re interested.”
“Which I’m not.” His parents wanted to play matchmaker? That was rich—and not at all funny.
“I think you might like our choices, though actually we only have one real contender.” She paused, studied him. “Would you like to hear about her?”
“No.” Absolutely not. “Mom. You know I’m not moving back to Magdalena, right?”
She looked away seconds before she fixed her gaze on him. “Of course I know that, silly.” The smile slipped out but he didn’t miss the tremble in her voice, a sure sign that said she did not know that.
Damn, but she really did think he’d stay. “I have a home in Chicago, a job.” He gentled his voice and added, “Season tickets to the Bears.”
Those dark eyes filled with tears. “You have things, Roman. Things that mean nothing next to a family.” A tear slipped down her cheek, followed by another. “You don’t even have a wife anymore.” She shook her head and sniffed her disgust. “Not that I ever thought you belonged together, but she’s gone, too.” Another sniff. “No children, not even a dog.”
“I’m fine, Mom. Really. And I’m happy.” Why did they have to push him so much? Didn’t they think he wanted a family, a place to come home to at night where he belonged, where someone might actually be waiting for him? Of course he did, and he’d thought he’d have that with Jess, but it didn’t work out and now he wasn’t sure he wanted to go through the heartache of risking that kind of pain again for a maybe. Hell, he was pretty sure he didn’t want to risk it, and his parents needed to understand there were worse things in life than not having a wife or a kid.
“You promised you’d stay until your father’s feeling better. I think he’s perked up because he’s convinced you’re going to give him a grandbaby before he meets his Maker.”
Roman blew out a quiet breath. “Who put that idea in his head?” He already knew the answer. When Sal Ventori and Pop Benito got together, it was a real rollercoaster ride of ideas and schemes. Roman would bet the grandbaby idea had hatched in Pop’s living room. “Isn’t it convenient that Pop Benito has a new granddaughter and now Dad’s talking about a grandchild?”
She shrugged, looked away. “I wouldn’t know. Is it?”
“I’d say so. In fact, I’d say the idea to have a grandbaby emerged ten minutes after Dad visited Pop. What do you think?” More looking away, a slight lift of the shoulder. Oh, she knew something, like the truth, and she wasn’t about to spill either. “Are you in on this with them, Mom?”
“No!” She swung her gaze to his. “No,” she said in a quieter voice. “Though I did help with the names. They concocted a few and trust me, you would not have liked the choices.”
“I see.” He glanced at the box from Natalie Servetti and thought of the pie and cookies in the kitchen. “How did these women just so happen to send me food and underwear on the same day? Did Dad and Pop place an ad in the paper advertising for a wife?” The laugh caught in his throat when he spotted his mother’s pale face. “Mom? They didn’t.” Pause, a gulp of breath. “Did they?”
“Not an ad actually, just a small note in the window of Lina’s Café.” He stared at her, trying to comprehend her words. “And Victor’s Pharmacy,” she added. “Pop thought the traffic would be good.” Pause. “He hung a note at Barbara’s Boutique and Bakery, too, but that’s all,” she finished in a rush. “I swear.”
He ran both hands through his hair, blew out a breath. “Wow. Now that’s what I call humiliating.”
“No, don’t feel that way.” She clutched his arm, worked up a smile. “Those two men just want to see you happy, and I haven’t seen your father this excited in months. I didn’t have the heart to tell him to mind his own business.”
“So you figured it’s only Roman, he’ll do whatever we tell him to, even ruin his life by marrying somebody he doesn’t love. What do we care as long as we get our baby?”
His mother stepped back, shook her head. “No, it wasn’t that way at all. Not with me, anyway. And I didn’t have the heart to tell those two that their matchmaking attempts were not going to work.” The tone of her voice shifted, turned desperate. “Your father needs something to look forward to right now.”
“Is there something you’re not telling me?” When she didn’t answer but swiped at her eyes, he said, “Is he sicker than what you told me?”
“No, but he isn’t as well as he lets on. I’ve seen him when he thinks he’s alone. He gets this far-off look on his face, and there’s a sadness there that makes me ache. I don’t know if he’s in pain, and I doubt he’d admit it if he were. Who knows? There could be other symptoms he’s feeling and chooses to ignore. You know how your father is, stubborn to the very end.” She gasped, bit her lower lip, and let out a ragged breath. “But I do not want this to be the end for him. The only bright spot is talk of a baby, and helping you find a mate. I know this puts a horrible burden on you, and I know it isn’t fair, but I don’t see any way around it until he gains his strength back.”
Was she saying what he thought she was? “You mean you want me to pretend to fall in love and then pretend we’re going to have a baby?” How could his own mother make such a suggestion? It was just plain wrong, and plain crazy.
She gave him the same look he used to get in high school when he’d figured out an answer but she didn’t want to come right out and admit it. Like the time he asked if the story about Mr. Jacobson’s wife being a former trapeze artist were true, or if Samuel Durham lived
for three months in the hills of West Virginia before becoming one of the county’s most respected lawyers. Lorraine Ventori never gave a flat-out yes or no, but her breathing pattern changed, grew short and choppy like she was trying to hold in the truth. The eyes were a key, too. Glazed, distant, darting right, left, everywhere but on the person asking the question. Like now. Roman rubbed his jaw, crossed his arms over his chest and waited. Yup. The senior citizen matchmaking crew of Pop and Sal had designs on him that included a wife and a kid.
Not happening. So not happening.
“I’m sorry, Roman. I don’t know what else to do right now. The grocery store is your father’s life, has been since he was a boy sweeping out the back room and stocking shelves. Now he’s told to stay away, that he can’t lift a crate of lettuce, and the worst part is he has to depend on others, and you know how he hates that.” She touched his cheek, smiled through her tears. “I know it’s a horrible burden to ask you to consider this, but this baby business gets him up in the morning, and yesterday he got dressed before lunch. Without a reminder. Would it be so bad to give him something to hold onto until he’s back to his ornery self?”
“It’s a lie, Mom. You think he’d want that?” If there was one thing they all knew about Salvatore Ventori, it was that he couldn’t stand a lie or the person who told it.
She fixed her gaze on his chin. “Actually, Pop thinks it might not be a lie. He says if you give it a chance, there might end up being more truth to the story than we think.”
“Right.” He liked Pop, thought he was clever and wise, and the spirit of Magdalena. But the damn man was a busybody and fourteen years away from the old guy hadn’t changed that. “He’s nosing around again, isn’t he? Trying to make life work the way he thinks it should.” He sighed. “It didn’t work fourteen years ago and it’s not going to work now.” Pop had tried to convince the town they were making a big mistake, that Roman was not the father of Paula Morrisen’s baby, but most weren’t interested, especially Sal Ventori.
His mother was not about to let that last comment go. “The town’s softened,” she said, her voice a blend of sadness and hope. “So has your father.”
“Right.” Roman glanced at the black gift box from Natalie Servetti, thought of the pie and cookies in the kitchen. Would there be other enticements? More goodies, edible and inedible? “So, who’s the dream girl I’m supposed to fall for?” This would be good. “Cantor in the choir? One of Pop’s friends’ grandchildren?”
Lorraine Ventori stretched a smile across her thin lips and said, “Angie Sorrento.”
***
His mother’s big reveal burrowed deep in Roman’s brain for the next three days, set up home in his subconscious, and meandered around at night, stealing sleep, logic, and his good mood. How could his mother actually buy into this ridiculous scheme? Get enough exposure to a potential mate and eventually feelings would sprout, like potato “eyes” left in a dark cupboard? He flipped through the week’s inventory. Crazy. Insane. Angie Sorrento? Good God, no. More page flipping, checking line items…thinking about potatoes, Brussel sprouts, and schemers.
If he stepped back and thought about the people making up the plan, he’d guess this strategy wasn’t unique or foreign to them. Hadn’t he heard tales of his great-grandparents, Pasquale and Maria Ventori, spotting each other at the fruit market while Pasquale stacked oranges? They smiled, exchanged a hello, maybe two weekends in a row, and the next thing you know, the parents were arranging the nuptials and the wedding Mass. Interesting times. Nobody asked if you were happy or thought you could be with an almost stranger. Didn’t matter, they didn’t care. So what if you weren’t fulfilled, in love, complete? You had a duty and damn it, you were not going to cry about it. He sighed, entered the codes for the cantaloupe and watermelon. Maybe that was the problem with so many relationships today. Too damn many choices, too many easy outs. Jess had sure had an easy out, but he’d given it to her because he hadn’t wanted her to stay unless she was all in. And refusing to consider a child was definitely not “all in.”
Supposedly there were still marriages that worked, relationships that complemented one another, and couples who actually liked being together. Not that he’d seen a lot of that in Chicago, but he’d heard they existed. His mother had hinted that Nate Desantro was a reformed man, married with a baby and another on the way. Unless he saw that one for himself, he wasn’t buying it. Same with Cash Casherdon, supposedly in love and enjoying wedded bliss with Tess Carrick. Doubtful. There were a few other men his mother insisted had found true love, like the guy who lived in the mansion across town and the cop with the pregnant wife who was going to have the kid any second.
Maybe the stories were true, or maybe there was a hint of truth to them. Or maybe Lorraine Ventori had conjured them up to try and convince Roman to take a chance on a relationship again. At eighteen, he’d believed he and Charlotte would share that kind of relationship and it would span a lifetime, a marriage, children, old age. But a lie had destroyed it. Roman ran a hand over his face, squinted at the numbers in front of him. He’d heard that Charlotte was married to a lawyer, had a boy and a girl and lived in a big house on the south side of town.
He wished his kid sister were here to sidetrack them with her mercurial personality and ever-growing list of suitors. But she wasn’t, so the spotlight was on him and his future offspring, and that started and ended with a woman. Angie Sorrento? No, and not just no—Hell No! There might be a person walking this earth who would be a match for him, but it wasn’t that over-opinionated, fast-talking, wild woman.
“Roman?”
A guy didn’t forget the voice or anything else about the woman who’d crushed his heart, not the smell, the smile, the touch… Roman looked up and there she was, as beautiful and perfect as she’d been at eighteen. He pushed back the memories, stood, and forced a smile. “Hello, Charlotte.”
“I heard you were back.” Her pale skin turned pink. “I’m sorry about your father.” A gentle dip of her voice, soft as the silkiness of that skin he remembered so well. “How’s he doing?”
The old man had always liked Charlotte, said she and Roman would make beautiful babies one day, the girls, blond-haired, blue-eyed like their mother and the boys dark, brown-eyed, like the Ventori side. How the man thought he could separate eye and hair color by gender was an interesting concept, but no one questioned Sal Ventori because they knew what he meant. He was after the dream of a legacy by continuing the family name. It had all sounded so perfect, with hopes, dreams, and a road map of how it would happen.
Until Paula Morrisen accused him of fathering her child.
Roman cleared his throat, met her blue gaze. “He’s coming along. Slow, but nothing keeps him down for long.” That’s what he kept telling himself, but he didn’t miss the faulty steps, the glimmer of confusion flitting across his father’s face some days, the nervous hesitation. And the fear. Sal Ventori wasn’t a man who’d ever claimed fear of anything or anyone, until now.
Charlotte licked her lower lip, a nervous habit that meant she was about to deal with a tough issue she’d rather avoid. “I used to look for you around the holidays, hoped you’d come home, even for a day or two, just so I could see you.” Those eyes glittered like stars against a black night. “Oh, not at first, but later, when I realized you might have been telling me the truth.”
“Charlotte—”
“No.” She shook her head, swiped at her eyes, and continued on in a rush, as though there was only so much oxygen to get the words out. “Let me say my piece. Please.” The woman he’d called “his angel” placed a hand on his forearm, her skin warm against his. “It took two years to work up the courage to consider you were set up. By then it was too late; I was engaged, had a house and a life that made sense. I could see down the road, past the wedding and the first child, to the second, maybe even the third. Magdalena was my home, this was my community, and this was where Steven had his business. You weren’t going to settle here, eve
n if there’d never been a scandal.” She paused, worked up a sad smile. “And maybe deep down I always knew that.”
“We used to dream of leaving this place and making it on our own.” He stared at her. “Didn’t we?”
“You dreamed, Roman, and those dreams were big enough for both of us.” She paused, and her voice slipped to a whisper. “Until they weren’t. Oh, I wanted to believe, wanted to be with you no matter what, but I was scared, and when Paula made her accusations, well, it was easier to turn my back on all of it, pretend it never mattered.” Another smile, this one splitting apart with a sigh. “But it did matter, and I never realized it until it was too late.”
Roman glanced at her left hand, spotted the shiny diamond glittering on her finger. “You shouldn’t be telling me this.” No, she should be telling her husband, the man who shared her bed, her dreams, her children. Not Roman.
Charlotte stepped back, buried her left hand in her pocket, and said, “Steven and I are having…issues.”
Issues. That could mean anything or nothing. “I see.” He didn’t see, though, didn’t want to see. When a guy started poking around in a former girlfriend’s marriage, that was never good, especially if she had the look on her face that said unhappy and regretful.
“I’m trying, but some days are really hard.” She sniffed, swiped at her cheeks. “Remember when we said we’d get in a car and travel around the country, eat sushi and swim in the Pacific Ocean? That scared me as much as it excited me. So did you.” She lifted a shoulder, her brows pulling into a frown. “Steven was safe. I knew my way around the community, knew what was expected, and what my role would be: the Sunday dinners with Steven’s family, the PTA meetings, the annual trip to the shore. But somewhere along the way, I started wondering what it would have been like if I’d believed in you and taken the risk.”