by Cora Brent
At any rate, Leo was gone, his widow was devastated, and Gio and I were too young to be of any real use running the restaurant. For a couple of years everything seemed to be normal. Both Gio and I were working in the kitchen at this point. Cousin Steven was in charge of the kitchen since his father didn’t often deign to set foot back there. It was Steven who taught us the most about food and the age-old family tricks that went into making a perfect pie. Sometimes he would talk about moving out of state and opening his own place, but I didn’t pay much attention back then. Steven was one of the best pizza chefs around, but by the time I reached high school and started working with him in the kitchen, I understood his star had already started to fall. He drank a lot. He started running an illegal numbers racket and squandering large sums of money. By this time he and Beth had a little girl and a very rocky marriage. But the restaurant was thriving, and there was a good future to look forward to for all of us. Or so we thought. We were wrong.
All these memories passed through my head in a flash as my grandmother waited for my answer about her eldest grandson.
“I’m not sure when Steven’s coming,” I answered as I very gently tucked the blanket around her. In her haze of pain and confusion, she probably didn’t remember that Steven and I hadn’t spoken in ten years, that if I showed up on his doorstep, he’d be as likely to punch me in the mouth as to say hello.
Gio returned with a nurse who offered Donna a few sips of water from a paper cup. A moment later a cheerful big fellow, who looked like he might play defensive lineman in his spare time, arrived to escort my grandmother up to her room. We followed, and then Gio pulled me aside while a nurse came into the room and gingerly checked Donna’s vitals.
“Tara will be here soon,” Gio told me. “She’s going to leave Leah with her mother and stay with Donna all day.”
I sighed. “We ought to be the ones standing by her bedside.”
“Nonsense,” my grandmother called in the saucy voice that I remembered from my childhood. It was a voice that tolerated no debate. “You boys have two restaurants to run. You don’t need to waste your time sitting here watching a clumsy old lady take a nap.”
I was going to say something, but she cut me off sharply before I finished the first syllable.
“I mean it, Dominic,” she warned. “Your lives shouldn’t be wasted mooning around a hospital. Go do what you need to do. And that’s an order from your grandmother.”
My brother and I looked at each other, each of us silently daring the other to argue. Gio grinned and shook his head. His silent message was right. There was no use in arguing with Donna Esposito. If she wanted us to leave, she wouldn’t relax until we were gone.
Half an hour later, when Gio and I were happy that our beloved grandmother was comfortable and in good hands, we walked out to the parking lot together.
“Surgery is gonna be rough at her age,” he commented.
“She’s a tough lady,” I said. “She’ll probably be square dancing in the Sonoran Acres cafeteria before Christmas.”
He chuckled. “Yeah, you’re right. You heading over to Espo 2 now, or do you have time to grab some breakfast?”
I checked my watch. “Nah, I better go in. We’ve got to place food orders, and Melanie said she’d take care of the inventory count this morning, but I don’t like asking her to go above and beyond.”
We’d reached the spot where my pickup was parked. Gio’s car was parked just three spots away. He stopped behind my truck and drummed his fingers on the top of my truck’s tailgate.
“How is Melanie?” he asked carefully. “She stopped by Espo 1 yesterday to post the staff schedule and pick up some vendor records that never made it to the new place, and I didn’t get a chance to talk to her. I was busy dealing with a cash register issue.”
I didn’t want to get into an ethical conversation about Melanie, not out here in the parking lot of Phoenix Regional Hospital. I owed her an honest conversation about our status before I went ahead and discussed any specifics with my brother. Sometimes I got the feeling she didn’t want to have that conversation, that she was afraid of it. I hated the idea that she was uncertain about where I stood. The truth was, I would do anything and everything in my power to romance Melanie Cruz. I just wished we’d gotten together under different circumstances—where she wasn’t my employee, and we weren’t all walking the tightrope of a crucial business venture.
“She’s good,” I said casually. “Works hard, gets shit done. You know that. You’re the one who hired her.”
He seemed to be searching my face for something. “I’m sure you’ve heard that Tara told her about how everyone knows about the two of you.”
Actually I hadn’t heard that, because Melanie hadn’t said a word. But then again, neither had I. I hadn’t told her about the gossip in the kitchen or that Gio and I had already clashed on the topic.
“Sure,” I told my brother. “I knew that. But I’m not planning a staff meeting to examine the details.”
He made a face and exhaled slowly, looking at the ground. “I gave you a hard time, and I still think you deserved it, but I also think she might be good for you.” He looked up with an earnest expression. “No more secrets, okay, Dom?”
I thought about Donna’s comments about the past and her startling question about Steven. All this time I had no idea she’d kept in touch with him. But of course she wouldn’t have cut all ties to her first grandson, not even if he had helped destroy the family business.
Gio hadn’t been in the room for that conversation. Telling him now would just open up old wounds at a time when we needed to be a team more than ever.
“No more secrets,” I agreed and opened the driver’s side door. “Espo 2 is only ten minutes away from here, so I’ll stop by this afternoon to check on Donna.”
“Good.” Gio peered at his phone. “Tara’s on her way right now. She’ll let us know if there’s anything to worry about.” He looked up and smiled. “I expect Donna Esposito will be treated like a queen. You know Tara.”
I chuckled at that, and he waved as he departed. I watched him as he walked to his car. Only when he started pulling out of the parking space did I climb all the way into the driver’s seat of my truck.
I was relieved that the doctor seemed optimistic about Donna’s recovery chances, and I certainly breathed easier than I had when I walked through the hospital doors earlier this morning. Yet I still felt like there was a thunderstorm hovering directly overhead. My grandmother’s offhand mention of Steven and Beth had rattled me, but I knew that wasn’t the only source of this deep disquiet. No, there’d been something else, something about my grandmother’s words that had struck a strangely ominous note in my mind at the time.
As I turned the ignition, I was still bothered. Yet for the life of me, I couldn’t remember why.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
MELANIE
“How is she?” I asked Dominic. When I walked into the office, he’d been on the phone with the hospital again.
“They just gave her some more pain meds,” he said. “But the CT scan came back good, and Tara just said the surgical team stopped by. Her hip repair is scheduled for tomorrow morning at eleven.”
“And she’ll need to stay in the hospital for a few days?”
“At least.” He stretched his arms and sat down at the desk chair he never used, because he was always in the thick of the restaurant action and almost never in here. “I think the nurse’s station is ready to ban my calls. Even Tara’s tired of dealing with my constant check-ins.”
I got behind him and put my hands on his shoulders, trying to squeeze the tension out. He relaxed under my touch, his eyes closing and his head rolling back slightly. I had to admit I thought it was utterly adorable the way this big, strapping man worried so much about his grandmother. All day I’d kept telling him that he could leave the Esposito’s business to me and stay with her at the hospital, but he’d declined. He said Donna had already ordered him out of there
once today, and he didn’t want to risk incurring the stubborn, old woman’s wrath.
“That feels good,” he said with a moan as my fingers massaged deeper into his hard muscles.
“Quiet,” I warned with a smile. “The staff will think there’s something erotic going on in here.”
He cracked open an eye. “There could be.”
“Down, boy.” I slid my hand down the top of his shirt and tickled his chest because I knew it would make him flinch. Then I headed over to sit at my own desk so I wouldn’t be as tempted to hike my skirt up and swing one leg across his lap.
“Can you handle the dinner crowd?” he asked. “I was going to take off at six and head over to the hospital whether Donna thinks I ought to be there or not.”
“Of course I can handle it,” I said. “Are you coming over later?”
Dominic looked serious all of a sudden. He laced his fingers together on the desk. “Do you think we should talk, Mel?” he asked slowly. Then he sighed. “I’m worried that we’ve been avoiding a serious discussion for weeks.”
I picked up a pen, mostly because it was there and I had to do something while I collected my thoughts. I didn’t like the heavy sound to his words. If I didn’t start clicking the pen repeatedly to ease this sudden nervous energy, then I’d start pacing or wringing my hands like a comic book character.
“We’re not avoiding anything, Dom,” I said, congratulating myself on my even tone. “And you can talk anytime you’d like. I’m not stopping you.”
He looked troubled. “Baby, please don’t look at me like that. I’m not blowing you off, if that’s what you’re thinking. Not even close.”
Part of me exhaled with relief, and part of me was annoyed. Why didn’t he just come out and say whatever it was he wanted to say?
Why don’t I?
I didn’t really have time to piece together a response, because Patsy burst through the door without knocking.
“Oh!” she exclaimed when she saw Dominic. Her face instantly turned a color that matched her frizzy, red hair. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to do that. I thought it was just Melanie in here.”
“It’s okay,” I told her. “What’s up?”
Patsy nervously glanced at me, then at Dominic, then back at me. “Ashlyn’s school called. They think she has pink eye again. I’m sorry. I’ll be back as soon as I can. I just need to pick her up, get a refill on her antibiotics, and drop her off at my sister’s. I’ll be back before the crowd gets heavy.”
“Go ahead,” I said. “It’s early. Take care of your little one.”
Patsy flashed me a grateful, bucktoothed grin and scampered away.
“She sure has a lot of emergencies,” Dominic commented.
“So what?” I snapped. “She’s a single mom. What the hell do you expect her to do? She’s always here when we need her.”
“Okay, okay.” He held up a hand. “Truce.” He got to his feet with a sigh and started for the door. He had his hand on the knob when something occurred to me.
“Wait,” I said as I stood up. “Do you remember that you have a meeting tomorrow with Cal Destin, the head of the Phoenix Restaurant Association?”
He exhaled with irritation. “Nope, I forgot. Can you take care of rescheduling that?”
“No. His assistant already thinks I’m a flake because I lied last month when you decided to cancel at the last minute. I told her you had an urgent dental problem to take care of, and you were currently writhing around on the floor like a fish in agony. She let me know that Cal was already unhappy about scheduling this meeting on a Saturday morning, but something tells me he’ll be even more unhappy if you cancel.”
He shrugged indifferently. “I can’t go. I’ll be in the waiting room during Donna’s surgery.”
“You said it wasn’t until eleven. The meeting is at eight thirty and won’t last longer than an hour, so you’ll have plenty of time to make it to the hospital.”
“Fine,” he grumbled, and returned to the kitchen where he was most comfortable.
Something I’d already learned in the short time we’d been open is that the dinner crowd during the week started earlier here than it did at Espo 1. The calls for takeout orders started around four thirty, and by a quarter after five, there was a line of tired office workers waiting to pick up their food after a long workday. Not everyone came here to pick up and run, though. When Dominic left for the hospital at six, the dining room was already three-quarters full.
“I’ll be back in an hour or two,” he told me on his way out the door. I would have liked to give him a comforting hug, but he didn’t show any hint that he would welcome one. True, the dining room was full of customers, and the staff would have gaped, but according to Tara no one would have found it newsworthy if Dominic and I were seen embracing. Yet we hadn’t talked about it with each other. We hadn’t talked about anything important. Our plans were all vague. Someday we’ll do this, or sometime we’ll go there. That had to change at some point.
“So let me ask you something,” said a man who was scanning the menu board at the order counter.
“Shoot,” I said.
“Do those cannolis taste as good as they look?”
“Even better,” I promised.
He smiled. It was a nice smile, and he was nice looking. Clean cut, black suit, silk tie. Before I met Dominic, this guy would definitely have been someone I’d consider, particularly when he flashed that flirty grin. But the mercurial, devastatingly gorgeous Dominic Esposito might have already ruined me for all ordinary men.
And what’s more, I liked being ruined.
The man lingered for a few seconds after he placed his order, perhaps trying to figure out a way to extend the conversation. I gave him a friendly nod, nothing more, and moved on to the next customer.
When I’d been hired, it had been understood that my regular role wouldn’t involve serving, but I found that I actually liked helping out in the dining room during especially busy shifts. I’d never thought of myself as the service-oriented type, but there was something satisfying about carrying dinner over to a hungry family. At first I’d felt self-conscious, scanning everyone who walked in to make sure it wasn’t someone I knew, someone who had somehow heard what happened to my career and would gloat over the fact that I appeared to be taking pizza orders. But that hadn’t happened, and I learned to relax. Anyway, I was proud to work here, proud of the job I was doing.
I helped Patsy bring a large order over to a family of five. I’d seen them when they walked in and kept my eye on them, only because they radiated a special kind of light. Maybe it was because the couple and their three daughters were so good-looking, like a family in a commercial. Or maybe it was because of the way they laughed so loud and often in each other’s company. The man was tall, muscular, and covered in tattoos to the point where he could have seemed scary. But the good humor in his face wasn’t an act. The woman had to be his wife and the mother of the three girls. One of the girls looked just like her, with the same shiny, brown hair and clear, green eyes that fastened shrewdly on everything in sight. The brunette and a wistful-looking blonde seemed to be around sixteen, while the remaining girl, who shared features with both sisters, appeared to be on the cusp of adolescence.
“Can I get you folks anything else?” I asked, smiling as the girls attacked the food with delight.
“I think we’re fine,” answered the woman, and she smiled up at me. I noted the intimate way the man kept his heavily tattooed arm casually draped over the back of her chair. They wore matching gold wedding bands, although if I’d first laid eyes on them separately, I wouldn’t have guessed them as a couple. He had “bad boy” written all over him, and she seemed like a well-kept soccer mom. But they were obviously together and obviously in love, because the man grabbed a slice of pizza and set it on her plate before he took one for himself. It was a small gesture, but sometimes those small gestures spoke the loudest.
“Are you okay?” the youngest girl asked me,
because I was just kind of hovering over them and breathing on their food.
The man and woman looked up at me with curiosity.
“I’m sorry,” I said, “I was just wondering what your tattoo says.”
The woman glanced down at her left arm at the line of spidery script. It was her only visible ink, although her husband looked like he could have starred in some kind of tattoo reality show.
“I’m sorry,” I said, feeling embarrassed. “It’s none of my business, so please—”
“It’s all right,” the woman said softly as she looked down at the tattoo on her arm. She touched it with gentle fingertips. “I had this done many years ago.” She held her arm up. “Here, read it for yourself.”
I peered at the words. Amor vincit omnia.
My knowledge of Latin was virtually nonexistent, but I must have heard this particular quote before because I knew it instantly.
“Love conquers all,” I said, and the woman smiled.
“That’s right.” She nudged her husband. “Most important life lesson ever learned. Don’t you agree, Cord?”
The man grinned. “Seventeen happy years of marriage confirms it,” he said solemnly.
They looked into each other’s eyes, then the man picked up his wife’s hand and kissed it as if she were a princess in a fairy tale. It was a brief, sweet gesture. Nonetheless, their daughters gagged and turned away. I didn’t turn away. I stared in rapt fascination. This was what true love looked like. This was what my parents had before tragedy cut their journey short. This was what I saw in their faces every time I looked at that photograph in my living room. This was what I wanted. Maybe it was even possible that I’d already found it.
It was in bad taste to just stand there and stare, so I retreated. I did send the table a plate of complimentary cannoli, though.
An hour before closing Dominic returned. He looked tired and troubled, but he said that Donna was resting comfortably, and the meds had diminished her pain. The surgeon had explained that there were additional risk factors for anyone Donna’s age, but her vitals were stable and they expected that she would come through the surgery fine and make a recovery with the aid of physical therapy.