Jasmine dug in her purse, pulling out her car keys, and whispered in Simon’s ear, “Catch, quarterback.” She jingled the keys before lobbing them at Simon, whose hand shot up, following the direction of the jangle of metal. “You drive, superstar,” she said on a giggle.
Simon was one step behind her. “I love a woman who isn’t afraid to take risks.” He cackled, obviously pleased.
Looping her arm through his, Jasmine led him to the edge of the sidewalk. “You break my CRX, and you’ll find out just how far I’m willing to go. I saved for a year to buy it.”
“You have a C-Rex? Jesus, they’re like a thousand years old.”
“So am I,” Jasmine snickered. “We’re a match made in heaven.”
Their voices trailed off, leaving Frankie with Nikos and the boozed-out Marco. “Wait here. I’ll get the car, and if he unloads his misery in my backseat, then I want Tuesday and Wednesday off.”
Nikos grinned. “You just want Wednesday off because Nails by Noreen’s having a twofer special. She told me when she was in for lunch and dropped off flyers.”
Frankie chuckled her way into the parking lot. “Perfect. I can have my upper lip waxed and get my nails done. It’ll be like Christmas and my birthday.” She beeped her car, jumping in and cranking up the heat with a hard shiver.
Pulling up to the curb, she got out to help Nikos get Marco into the backseat. He slumped against the door with a drunken murmur. Getting into the driver’s side, she shook her head at Nikos, wrinkling her nose. “He’s snockered. Tomorrow’s going to totally suck for him.”
“Among other things,” Nikos agreed as she pulled out of the parking lot. “Look, Frankie. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about Marco, but it wasn’t to protect him as much as it was to keep one more stress off your plate.”
She caught a glimpse of his profile in the dashboard lights, angular, sharp, so sexy, and forced her eyes back to the road. “I appreciate your looking out for me, but I don’t need to be treated with kid gloves. Was I surprised Bamby wasn’t Mitch’s first foray out into the land of the infidel?” Frankie shrugged. “I guess not as much as I thought I’d be once I got used to it. But Marco’s your best friend. That’s way too close for comfort. I can only imagine what you must have thought when Maxine brought me in for that interview.”
He pointed a finger toward the windshield. “Turn left here—this is his apartment complex, and truthfully, I forgot all about Marco until after our notorious interview.”
“Because I wowed you with my culinary resume? No, wait. It was my serial-killer glam, right? You know, the crazy hair and baggy clothes?” she teased.
His hand brushed hers, making her pulse thump. “It was just you,” he said into the quiet hum of her tires.
Frankie’s stomach jolted, stupidly wishing he meant her and not just the nuttiness that had been her on that day. “I’m an awesome first-impression maker.”
Nikos’s laughter made her tingle. “First building straight ahead. And you definitely made a first impression.”
Frankie swung her car into a slot and shifted into park. “Do you need help?”
He turned to her, his eyes a deep black. “Nah. I got him. If you don’t want to wait, I can always call Cos to come get me.”
She gulped at the thought of her and Nikos in the close confines of her car—alone. All alone. “No, don’t wake him. Chef Boyardee’s cranky enough. When he’s tired, he’s the pits. I’ll wait.”
Nikos slid from the car, popping open the rear door and grunting when he dipped his head inside to pull Marco out and launch him over his shoulder, fireman style. “Be right back.” He kicked the door shut with his foot and made his way into the complex, walking with an easy gait despite the fully grown man on his back.
She flipped on the radio while she waited, settling on a station exclusively playing Christmas music. Her head fell to the cushioned headrest as she closed her eyes and pondered the loyalty Nikos showed not only his family but his friend, broken by the end of his marriage. Maybe he wasn’t as much like Mitch as she’d first thought. Maybe his magnetic charisma sprang from genuine feeling.
Maybe.
The questions she had about the where and when of Mitch’s hooking up with Carrie drifted off when she sank farther down in her jacket, comforted by the strains of “Silent Night” and her Nikos musings.
A hand, callused and warm, flitted across her cheek. “Frankie?”
A small sigh escaped her lips when her name was called, breathy and content. “Hmmm?”
“Do you want me to drive?”
Her eyes popped open, her hands gripped the wheel. “No. I’m okay. How’s Marco?”
“Trashed. I put him to bed and left him a note. He’ll be fine.”
Frankie started the engine as Nikos clicked his seatbelt into place. “Sounds like you’ve done this a time or two,” she said, backing out of the parking space, fighting to forget Nikos’s fingers on her cheek and the tremble it wrought. Composure, composure, composure. Find some, girlie.
“Like I said, he took the breakup pretty hard. He’s been boozing it up off and on ever since.”
Her nod was of understanding. She knew all too well the acute pain a betrayal of trust created. It hurt your bones to move. For her, it had stripped away every shred of her identity. Took her purpose and smashed it to smithereens. “I get it. Some people drink the depression away. Some people, like me people, sleep it away. Whatever it takes to dull the pain.”
Nikos’s jaw hardened, but she caught a glimpse of his eyes, and they were soft. “That doesn’t excuse his behavior, Frankie. He can’t keep this up. He’ll lose his partnership at the practice. I really thought a few months away from here would help.”
“I’m not saying that to excuse how he behaved tonight, Nikos. He behaved badly in a public place, and that’s not okay, especially because he’s sort of a public servant. Riverbend’s a small town. I’m saying it from a place of understanding, from sympathy. I’m also thinking if Maxine can drag me out of bed and make me suck it up, maybe Marco should call her and see if she can help him, too. I know he wasn’t a trophy wife, but there must be a male version to the ‘suck it up, princess’ technique.”
His jaw relaxed, and his tone took on a smoky quality. “You’re a really good person, Frankie Bennett.”
She chuckled with a nervous twitter, pulling into the diner’s parking lot to come to a stop. “This from a man who watched my kitchengadgetry meltdown. It takes guts to label me anything but certifiable.”
Nikos turned in the passenger seat to lean into her, placing one arm on the dashboard. His eyes were no longer playful, but serious. “I mean it, Frankie. Marco made a real scene in there tonight with you right in the middle of it. To find a common thread with him because he’s in self-pity mode instead of flattening him with a good right hook makes you a decent woman.”
Frankie’s throat tightened, but she couldn’t tear her gaze from his. “Contrary to the impression I created during my last television appearance, I’d never hit anyone.”
His smile lit up the interior of her car, the grooves on either side of his mouth deepening. “You kinda suck at accepting compliments.”
“Looking the way I do, they’re pretty few and far between these days,” she quipped, low and shaky, unable to move away from the draw of his luscious lips, the tangy scent of his cologne. Her hormones awakened with a fierce flame in her lower belly.
“I was complimenting your character.”
“Which could be the only thing I have left to compliment.”
“That’s not true,” he responded, his voice suddenly a whisper, a whisper that left her mesmerized, transfixed on their close proximity. The car became nothing more than the two inches of space between them.
Her breathing shuddered, hitched, then almost entirely subsided while she tried to think of something to refute his words. “No. I know what the truth is. The truth is, I’m a hot mess—a shadow of the woman I used to be.”
Nikos tilted his head, h
is jaw covered in dark stubble. “Maybe you’re still in the discovery process of finding the woman you’ll become.”
God, she really hoped there was truth to that statement. After all the shit, she was due some awesome. “May . . . be.” Somehow, her eyes had drifted half-closed, Nikos’s cologne surrounding her with its heady undertones, making her head swim. The heat of his body, bulky, strong, encompassed her while Johnny Mathis sang “O Holy Night.”
“I’d be very interested to see who you turn out to be on the other end of this mess you’ve been in,” he murmured, inching closer until, from hooded eyes, she saw that his eyes were drifting shut, too.
Her heart began to crash when he husked out a breath of air, fanning over her face with the scent of wine and something minty.
Frankie’s stomach muscles tightened like a clenched fist.
This was it. All her nighttime fantasies come true. Every hot Greek second of them.
Fear, excitement, and more fear swelled when Nikos moved so close to her his lips all but grazed hers. Wait. Did she really want him to kiss her? Maybe the buildup was going to be far better than the payoff.
But then Nikos took care of any misgivings she had when he let his forehead fall to hers while her heart slammed against her ribs and her hands itched to reach up and drag her fingers through his thick hair and tug him back toward her.
Okay, so yeah. She really did want him to kiss her. And if it dispelled a myth or two—so be it. At least she’d know. Plus—bonus—she’d finally get a restful night’s sleep.
Disappointment, heavy and stinging, settled in her belly.
He huffed out a breath she couldn’t decipher as regret or irritation. “I won’t do this. Not this time.” The arms that had bracketed either side of her moved away to the tune of her puzzled frown, leaving her cold even with the heat in the car on.
Nikos sat back, his hand on the door, his face granite hard with a determination Frankie didn’t get. “Thanks for your help tonight, Frankie. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
The passenger door clicked before Frankie had the chance to so much as blink.
But not before some serious regret set in.
What. The. Hell had just happened?
You just experienced your first almost kiss, Frankie. Delicious, no?
Her cheeks were back to flaming again while questions swirled in her head.
What exactly wouldn’t Nikos do “this time”?
And why, why, why wouldn’t he do it the hell with her?
“Frankie Bennett?”
Her head lifted, wary with caution. Oh, if the universe were feeling charitable, this wouldn’t be someone who wanted to experience her crazy firsthand by way of an autograph. “Maybe,” she said without turning around, scrunching her eyes shut to ward off the stranger’s next words.
“It’s Marco Sabatini.”
When she turned, she half smiled, her eyes teasing when she took in his sharp suit and tie and his freshly scrubbed, albeit, lined face. “Sorry, I didn’t recognize you because you didn’t slur your words.”
He let his head hang to his chest, the curls on it gleaming and still damp in the stream of sun from the diner’s window. “I’m ashamed, Frankie. I had way too much to drink last night, and I’m always an ass when I do.”
Throwing the towel she’d just cleaned the front countertop with over her shoulder, Frankie nodded in total sympathy. “I get it. Not the drinking part, but the ‘find a way to dull the pain’ part. I didn’t drink when Mitch and I split, I slept. For six solid months.”
He smiled, though Frankie wondered if it was just out of courtesy. There was nothing in it beyond its dental perfection that said he felt it. He was as numb as he could be without the aid of booze. “Nikos mentioned that on the phone this morning. I bet you were a lot less hazardous that way, though.”
“Well, there is that. So how do you feel this afternoon?”
“Like a shithead. That’s why I’m here. To apologize.”
“Not necessary, and I’m sorry, too. For what Mitch did to your marriage. I really had no idea. I thought Bamby was his first affair. Crazy that, huh?”
Scrubbing a hand over his face, he pulled at the lines beginning to form under his aquamarine blue eyes, as though he could erase the dark shadows forming there. “I don’t know who Bamby is, but I’m sorry you had to find out about Carrie by way of my out-of-control behavior. I’d like to make it up to you.”
Frankie cocked her head to the left. “You don’t have anything to make up, Marco. It’s over. Though, would it upset you too much if I asked you a question?”
“Shoot.”
“I don’t understand the Mitch-Carrie thing at all. When did this all go down?” And which part of stupid was I lost in when it did?
Marco shoved his hands in his trousers, his face grim. “Your hus . . . Mitch was checking out diners to do some show or something.”
Bells clanged in her head. The road trip to scout potential places to shoot the show. Of course. The original plan for Mitch in the Kitchen had been to call the show Mitch in Your Kitchen. Mitch would show up, take over the restaurant’s kitchen, and have a cookoff—or something like that. The idea was canned in favor of the production costs at a time when the Bon Appetit Channel still wasn’t sure Mitch could fly solo. She sighed. “I remember—about a year and a half ago, right?”
Marco’s nod was somber. “Yeah. Carrie was a real fan of his from his days on some other show—”
“Road to Randall,” Frankie interrupted as the memory rushed back. “He and Chef Randall were friends. Well, until Mitch’s popularity rose and Randall’s didn’t. That’s when the Bon Appetit Channel offered him a test run for his own gig.”
Marco’s grim look returned. “Carrie was excited to meet him. So when Nikos accepted the invitation, mostly because Carrie begged and pleaded for him to at least meet with Mitch and the production crew, she was beyond herself. She told Nikos he could always say no and that would be that. No harm, no foul. Nikos only agreed because Carrie was my wife. He never would have let Mitch film here. Trouble is Carrie didn’t follow her own advice. No doesn’t seem to be in her vocabulary. Not where Mitch was concerned, anyway. They met while I was at, of all things, a dental implant convention. She, according to Nikos’s version, got pretty friendly, and well . . . you know the rest.”
Embarrassment flooded her. Her fingers gripped the ties on her apron, fiddling with them while she struggled to come to terms with her ex-husband’s philandering. Philandering that clearly stretched across at least two states. “I’m so sorry.”
Marco placed a consoling hand on her shoulder. “It’s hardly your fault, Frankie.”
Her eyes held Marco’s. “Then why do I feel like it is?”
“Probably because all good mothers, even when murder’s involved, always ask themselves how they could’ve missed the signs,” Nikos said, all smiles and lighthearted chuckles this fine afternoon. The afternoon after the night where he had almost kissed her, then run off as if she’d held a gun to his head and forced him to almost mack on her.
Humph.
It was all she could do to get to sleep last night, and he was behaving like he hadn’t given her the diss of all disses. Charming and carefree as always.
Though, his analogy about Mitch and her playing the role of his mother wasn’t exactly far off the mark. There were many times when she’d felt like Mitch’s conduct required motherly attention.
He slapped Marco good-naturedly on the back with a playful grin. “How’s the head this morning? Did you take the aspirin I left on your nightstand?”
Nikos’s presence brought another thought to mind. One Frankie had yet to allow the freedom to process because their almost kiss had gotten in the way. Oh, but when she had a minute to herself, she was all over it.
“It’s got a freight train running through it right now. I can’t wait to get to the office and fire up the drill,” Marco commented, his face sheepish. “I was just apologizing to Frankie.”<
br />
“Good thing, too. Mama would have your hide if she knew what you did last night. Come in back and see her, huh? She’s missed you.”
Marco shook his head, his eyes avoiding Nikos’s. “Not yet. Maybe another day. I need to get back in the swing of things again.” His eyes sought Frankie’s once more, soft and filled with a sorrow she could almost taste. “So how about dinner—to make up for screwing yours up last night?”
Nikos’s face did that light to dark thing again before he said, “Frankie’s probably busy.”
Really? Had Nikos taken to looking at her day planner? Okay, so she didn’t have one, but if she did . . . Frankie was most certainly not busy. She might have been busy if Nikos had manned up and kissed her last night. As of now, she was as free as an ex-con out on parole. She gave Nikos a cocky glance before smiling at Marco, bright and shiny. “Nuh-uh, Frankie’s not busy at all. So I’d love to have dinner with you, Marco. Two victims of Mitch and some spaghetti—it’ll be like Dawn of the Living Dead meets GoodFellas.”
Marco chuckled, with a warm, and this time, genuine hint to it. “Great. I’ll drop back by soon and we’ll make plans.”
With a raised eyebrow and a cocky swing of her neck, she popped her lips in Nikos’s direction before addressing Marco. “I look forward to it.”
Nikos glared down at her. “Don’t you have onions to peel?”
The smile never left her face. Whatever was pissing Nikos off, and she had to hope it was because his best friend had just asked her out, made her almost coo with pleasure—loud and proud. “You’re a mean one, Mr. Grinch.” She wiggled her fingers over her shoulder at Marco. “Byyye,” she said flirtatiously, pushing her way through the kitchen doors, pleased she’d left that conversation with the upper hand. Nikos had no right to her personal life. He’d made that clear last night.
Voula gave her a nod and a wink of approval. “I like you today, Frankie.”
Frankie put her arm around Voula’s abundance of shoulder and grinned. “You know what, Voula? I like me today, too.”
“Frannnkieee?”
“Mr. Grinch?”
Burning Down the Spouse Page 15