My friends hadn’t hassled me about my lack of a love life in a long time—years, in fact—and I’d rather them keep it that way. Another of my orders was up, so I rushed over to collect it, thankful to have a reason to end the discussion.
4
Marco
I stayed and observed how steady things remained for the rest of the evening. Despite it being a weeknight, the bistro had patrons right up until their nine o’clock closing, which I took as a good sign. I felt more fatigued than I cared to admit—I hadn’t spent this many hours away from either home or the hospital in months—but I wanted to see this through. Needed to, even.
I craved to prove that I was fully back up on my feet, regardless of the fact that I was overdue to apply fresh bandages to my burns by two hours. The skin across my back and shoulders felt tight, itchy, and even as if something was stinging me in a couple of the worst spots. The combined effect set my teeth on edge, but I did my best to ignore it.
The cook had cleaned up the kitchen and departed, which left me alone with the servers as they washed down tables and swept up the floor. I’d thought there’d been two servers, but when I came out the office, I found myself there alone with Kelly Carr.
Ian had referred to her as the cream of the crop, and I understood why. She’d been on task the entire night, not once slowing down or wasting any opportunities to build rapport with patrons. Despite bumping into me near the kitchen a few hours ago, she seemed to have this natural grace as she moved about the room, almost like a dancer.
But her gracefulness and skill at doing her job hadn’t been the only reasons I’d noticed her. She was also ravishingly beautiful. Long shiny hair that reminded me of the caramels Rosa used to bring us as children. Flawless fair skin and full lips, both of which appeared to be unadorned with any type of cosmetic.
And then there were her eyes.
I’d never seen anything like them. They were a lush emerald color like you might spot in some faraway meadow. Within that deep green were starbursts one shade lighter. It was like looking at pictures from the Hubble telescope at nebulas out in space. For a moment, I?
?d been totally entranced by them. By her.
So I wouldn’t come across as some sort of creepy stalker, I’d reached out to shake her hand. She’d taken it, and the moment I’d touched the soft skin of her palm, I felt something I hadn’t experienced in what seemed like forever.
Desire.
Before the fire, bringing a flavor of the night into my bed had been a hobby of mine. An outlet. These women were where I went for fun, for release, and to distract myself from my life. Using my charms to acquire a different woman for as many nights of the week as possible had been my main focus outside of the chores I’d been set relating to the family business.
It’d been enjoyable.
Luca had even called me a manwhore because of my behavior. And even though it’d pissed me off at the time, in all honesty, he hadn’t been far from the mark.
Still, once upon a time, my relationship with the opposite sex had been anything but casual.
Back when I was fifteen, I’d fallen for a girl. Like, genuinely fallen. She’d been my first real kiss, my first sex, my first everything. Her name had been Emily, and I’d called her Em. We’d run into each other when I’d gone with Luca to bring a substantial sum of cash to a small Mom and Pop store down by the pier.
She’d been a year older than me and working the register as the lone cashier. While Luca went to the back, I stayed out front and flirted with her. The fireworks between us had been instantaneous.
During that summer, I’d spent every available waking moment with her. Even though we were both underage teenagers, I’d wanted to marry her and told her so. She’d even said yes.
I’d been too naïve to understand how doomed such a plan would be.
Her father, the owner of said Mom and Pop joint, had been out of town for a couple of months. The moment he returned and caught us making out in a back room, he went apoplectic with rage. He’d forbidden her from seeing me again, calling me a dirty Varasso boy, and when she’d protested, he’d sent her off to live with some relatives in Oregon.
I never saw her again.
Up till then, I hadn’t realized how my family was perceived. I didn’t know anything but the family business, and everyone we interacted with were either members of our family or those associated with what we did. Maybe I’d been fooling myself all along, but I hadn’t thought of us as criminals. Or at least, I didn’t consider myself or my brothers to be criminals.
We were merely us. We did the jobs we needed to do. The jobs Dad expected us to do. I’d always adored my mother and respected my father. When she died, I’d been thirteen. Losing my mom had been difficult for all of us, and my way of coping was to create a closer bond with my father. I went out of my way to defer to him, to impress him, to be the most obedient son ever.
So when I came home distraught over losing my girlfriend, I’d hoped for some sympathy. Some understanding. Some kindness. Maybe even some advice.
What I got instead was a backhanded smack across my face.
“Man up, you little pussy,” Angelo told me, his face a mask of disdain. “You’re a Varasso, and Varassos have to be strong. Hard. She’s made you soft. Distracted you from what you should’ve been doing. If I’d known you were fucking around with that girl, I’d have put a stop to it long before now.”
I’d sat there on the floor of the headquarters inside our home—the force of his blow had knocked me down—holding my bruising cheek and staring up at him in shock.
My father’s behavior shouldn’t have thrown me for such a loop, but it did. I’d been the quiet dutiful son my whole life. I’d done everything he asked without question. I’d admired and loved my father, and I’d been living under this illusion that he loved me. But he didn’t, and that night was the first time I realized it.