“They are better,” he said, but he didn’t sound as pleased about that as I would’ve expected. In fact, he sounded… perturbed. It made me forget about my shame enough to press for answers.
“So there’s no pain?” I prompted.
“Tightness but no real pain. Not anymore.”
“Then, why do I feel like I’m missing something?”
He didn’t respond for a few moments, and when he did, it was to change the topic. “Are the deposits ready?”
Marco’s tone had turned brusque. Even aggravated. But I didn’t know why.
Did he feel like I was giving him mixed signals? Maybe instead of being a slut, I was a tease. And maybe that was worse. The shame I’d felt came back full force.
Still, somehow I managed to murmur, “The deposits are ready.”
He nodded, then stepped back out of the office. I went to the door and watched him leave the bistro, feeling baffled by everything that had transpired between us. We’d gone from having a serious conversation about my job, to the two of us making out, to me being mortified at my loss of control, to him vanishing out the door. All of this within ten minutes.
Was this what it felt like to suffer whiplash?
I’d had this brazen sexual encounter with my boss. A Varasso. A man my brother believed might be guilty of who knew how many crimes. Beyond that first vague inquiry into who the Varassos were, I hadn’t mentioned anything else about them to David.
He didn’t know t
hat the ownership of the bistro had changed hands. He didn’t know that I was working side by side with one of them, and he certainly didn’t know that I’d kissed Marco. I knew what my brother thought of the Varasso family, and I had enough to flip out over without adding that to the mix.
Especially now that I was making so much more money because of it.
I’d been careful to conceal this from both David and my parents. Instead of saying anything, I simply paid the bills without any fanfare. I took care of all the payments, catching up each of the late fees and shut off notices. I’d decided to chip away at my mom’s medical debt next. It may be a losing battle, but it meant I could keep the collection companies from haranguing them.
At least for as long as I could keep this job.
And I had to keep this job. I was so glad that Marco and I were on the same page where getting romantically involved was concerned. We had this heated chemistry between us, but it couldn’t go anywhere. I didn’t really think Marco was what David thought he was at all, but kissing him again would not only be crazy, it’d be reckless.
Which meant no matter what, I couldn’t instigate any more contact between us. Both the kisses we’d shared had been my fault. He hadn’t laid a finger on me until I threw myself at him. I had to make sure I didn’t do such a thing ever again. That’s all. I had to keep all our interactions strictly business.
So I would.
All I had to do was concentrate on maintaining the appropriate distance between me and my boss. As long as I did, I could get my parents out of debt. My brother would remain none the wiser about me working with someone he believed to be part of a criminal organization. And Marco would have an office manager he could count on.
Everyone would win.
10
Marco
I picked at my chicken parmigiana, not having enough of an appetite to eat much. The conversation rose and fell around me without my participation.
“You’re doing so good with your chicken parm, sitting at the table like a big girl,” Molly cooed at my almost two-year-old niece, who was sitting in a booster seat beside her. No one looking from the outside in would ever assume Anna wasn’t Molly’s biological daughter, they adored each other so much.
Though the tradition had been to not include children at the table until the age of five, my eldest brother had decided to break with it so his growing family could share in our Sunday meal. He balanced baby Antonio on his shoulder as he ate his own food, interacting with all of us informally as patriarch of the family, husband and dad to his two young kids.
He sat in our father’s place, but instead of Molly being situated all the way at the other end, she sat beside him, with Anna stationed between them. He’d also asked that we not talk shop at the table, or at least not about anything that wouldn’t be family friendly. Due to this, there tended to be a disproportionate amount of baby talk over adult discussions, which could be irritating on occasion, even if it was nice to see Luca relax for once.
Another thing that could be irritating was the way he and Molly would look at each other.
Sometimes, they’d just stare at one another as if Sandro, Gabriel and I weren’t even in the room, their infinite devotion obvious. It’d taken six months to rebuild the mansion, and Luca and Molly had celebrated their wedding in the midst of the rebuild, settling back into her cottage outside the boundaries of the estate.
Much of that time for me had been spent in the hospital going through various surgeries, so I hadn’t been privy to the goo-goo eyes brigade. Maybe because of this, the time I’d spent at home around the two lovebirds hadn’t bothered me.