Chapter 31
Chapter Thirty-One
A ball of wadded paper bounced off his forehead, startling Alex out of his thoughts of warm sand, icy water, and dark curls tickling his cheek.
There you are, Lev said.
He leaned forward in the leather chair and set his elbows on the conference table. Sorry, what?
Lev rapped his knuckles on the table. You need to get more sleep.
I ll sleep when this deal is done, Alex grumbled. Are we ready to close or not? He glanced through his office window at that eyesore, the Paradise.
I m ready on my side, Jack said. I ll wire the money when Lev says go.
We re a go to close on Monday, Lev said. You two will be the proud owners of the most dilapidated casino on the Strip.
Bring in the demolition crew on Tuesday, Alex said, leaning back in his chair. Lev was right. He could use some sleep. He hadn t slept well for two weeks. Since…her. His room was too quiet, and the bed felt too big, too cold, too empty.
I can t get the permits that fast, Lev said.
Call in favors. Make it happen, Alex snapped. I want to look out my window on Wednesday morning and see a crater where that dump used to be. He waved at the window.
Lev grumbled something Alex couldn t hear, but he started tapping furiously on his laptop.
Jack leaned back, too. But he wasn t looking at the Strip. He was assessing Alex. There s something going on here. More than your history with the Paradise.
He broke up with his girl, Lev muttered, still typing. Been a right svoloch since then.
Your girl? Jack raised his bushy white eyebrows. Since when have you had a girl?
What is this, a sorority house? Alex snarled. You two about to start painting each other s nails and talking about who s taking who to the big dance?
Jack ignored him and turned to Lev. Who s he dating?
Mary Forza. The pretty brunette with the fantastic rack and the brothers who want to kill him.
Your event planner?
Alex said nothing.
Not anymore. Lev stood. She quit. He walked to the far side of the office and lifted his phone to his ear.
I should never have hired her, Alex grumbled. What hurt the most was that he d needed her. He didn t want to need anyone else ever again. It was better when she hated me. When she didn t want anything to do with me.
This is fascinating, Jack said. She hated you?
I stood her up in high school. Because of the investigation around my father. She didn t speak to me after. Though Mary, with her soft heart, had forgiven him as soon as she d moved back home. If their situations had been reversed, Alex would never have forgiven her.
Sounds a bit like your relationship with the gaming board, Jack said. You pissed them off, but then Ray Richardson took a risk when he trusted you with his daughter s wedding.
That was more the bride s choice, but, yeah, I guess so.
And now you re buying the Paradise. You ve got a foothold in the center of the Strip.
True. Pride swelled in his chest. How are those permits coming along, Lev?
It s fucking Friday afternoon, boss, he called from the other side of the room. It s going to take me a minute.
Just get it done.
And Mary, Jack said, making Alex s stomach clench. She planned the wedding. She helped you win Richardson s support.
Barely. Alex pulled his prickly emotional shield around himself like a coat. The thing was, it was scratchy and too small now. Like Mary had tossed it into the wash on hot and handed it back to him, a triumphant gleam in her eye. Stubbornly, he kept it up. The wedding was a disaster. There was a fire, and we lost power.
Jack cocked his head. And still, Miss Richardson got married? And her father was so pleased he rallied support for your bid?
Yeah. Everyone lit up their phones, and it was fucking magical. Except for the fact Mary wasn t there.
Seems like it turned out all right in the end. Why d she quit? Jack asked.
Because we thought I d lost the Paradise. Because she was cutting her losses.
Is that what she said? Jack asked. Mary didn t seem like the type to care about that. Didn t you say she forgave you after things went down with your father?
But…but she shouldn t want to tie herself to a loser.
Jack caught his gaze and held it. Alessandro Villa, you re no loser. Whether you ve got the Paradise or not. Whether you ve got a casino or not. You re a good man. Mary saw that. So why did she quit, really?
Alex couldn t look at Jack, so he sank his face into his palms and rubbed his itchy eyes. Because I pushed her away. I thought I d be better on my own.
On your own? You ve got Lev and me and a whole staff here. You re not on your own. As a CEO, you should know about delegating. I d be concerned about my investment if you thought you could do it all.
I know how to delegate. Alex lifted his head to nod at Lev, still sweet-talking his contacts at the permit office. See?
Sometimes others will do things their way, not a way we d have done it. If I m not mistaken, you d have marched into the permit office and knocked some heads to get what you want, right?
Alex narrowed his eyes. Probably. Though I d have wasted time driving there.
And you might have missed anyone who worked from home today. So, Lev s way might be more efficient.
True. And I m letting him do it his way. What s your point?
Partnership isn t only for business. One thing I ve learned from forty years of marriage is that you can do anything with the right person at your side.
Alex lifted his head from his hands, though his eyes still burned. That might be true for you, Jack, but even if Mary were the right person for me, she d never forgive me a third time. He didn t deserve happiness, anyway. Eighteen years ago, Mrs. Campo had speared him with that uncanny, unblinking stare and told him he deserved to live the rest of his life in misery.
She was right.
You can t know she won t forgive you if you don t ask her, Jack said. It might be worth it to have a partner like Mary. Love is like the frosting on a wedding cake. It makes something tasty even more delicious.
Love? Alex scoffed. I never said anything about love. Besides, feelings have no place in business.
I ll have to disagree with you there, boss, Lev said, walking back to the table. The sweet old lady at the permit office, the one who goes to my church and pinched my cheek after my confirmation, just promised to get our demolition approved on Monday.
* * *
Later that afternoon, after Jack and Lev left, the sinking sun blazed off the glass of the shadow box on his desk and speared him in the eye.
Instead of tipping the box over like he should ve done and continuing to scan the spreadsheet on his screen, he leaned back in his chair, out of the beam of reflected sunlight, and rubbed where his forehead ached.
He should hide that shadow box away. He had no right to keep the photo anymore. Not after how he d treated Mary. Every time he left the casino, he half-expected her two meaty brothers to be waiting outside, ready to jump him and give him the beatdown he deserved. He d welcome it. Maybe then he d feel something other than numb.
When he took his hand off his face, a person dressed all in black stood in his doorway. He jumped to his feet. Mrs. Campo. What are you—would you like to come in?
She lifted her chin and strode into his office, her black flats silent on the thick rug. She wore a short-sleeved black blouse and a longish skirt that flared slightly at her calves. She carried a black handbag large enough to fit a human head, and a gold cross gleamed at her throat.
She reached into the bag, and Alex had a vision of all the noir films he d watched as a kid, when the woman pulls out a Glock. He held his breath.
For you, Mrs. Campo said, holding out not a gun but a bottle of brown liquid. Take it, she urged him.
He took the bottle from her. Even sealed, it gave off a strong alcoholic aroma.
Nocino. My nonna s recipe, she said.
So, it wasn t poison. Probably. Thank you. He set it on his desk next to the shadow box. He studied the tiny woman. In the fifteen years he d been secretly supporting her and her family, she d never come to see him, and now she d visited twice over a summer.
Dante talked to you? she asked.
Yes. I appreciate his apology. He smiled, bitter. Though someone wise once told me that accidents are a part of life, and it s how you deal with them that s important.
That was a wise person. She squinted at him. I hope you took those words to heart.
I did. He d lain awake every night since the wedding, thinking of all the ways he could have better dealt with the disaster.
But have you really? she asked, stepping closer.
Yes, of course. I even gave Dante a testimonial to use on his website. Though I think he should raise the limits on his liability insurance.
No, no. She slashed a hand through the air between them. I mean you. And your guilt over what your father did.
Alex ground his teeth. What he did was no accident.
No. But it wasn t your fault. She raised a hand. I know, I know. I told you it was. I was angry. Heartbroken. Grieving. But deep down, I knew you were a victim, just like my family and me.
I…but… His stomach pitched like he was falling. He d lost control of this conversation, unable to predict what the woman would say next.
What you did after, giving everyone back their money, working so hard, supporting my family, taking care of your mother, and building up a business that employs so many— She waved her hand in a circle to encompass La Villa. That shows character. It proves you re not like him.
That sounded a lot like what Mary had said. The words he d been too afraid to accept as truth. You don t need the Paradise to prove you re a better man than your father. Anyone who knows you already believes it.
Thank you. That means a lot, coming from you.
For the first time, she looked down. When she looked up, she pursed her lips. I shouldn t have cursed you. You were only a boy then. You re a good man now.
Stepping closer, she touched his forehead and muttered something under her breath. Then, stepping back, she said, It s gone.
Wait. You lifted the malocchio? Like a lot of Italian Americans, Alex had grown up under a mysterious cloud of superstitions from the old country. He d never really believed in them. Well, except sometimes he had an irrepressible urge to touch his left nut or to hold something made of iron. But older people like Mrs. Campo sure as hell believed in them. And he d never known any of his elders to take back a curse.
She scoffed. You said back then you didn t believe in that nonsense.
He squared himself up. And I don t. Ninety-nine percent.
Regardless, it s gone. You can live your life with happiness now.
Thank you. He still felt off balance, like he was in a funhouse.
Now, what are you going to do about it?
I…I guess I ll keep working. Open up La Villa Prime and hire back the people who worked at the Paradise.
Mrs. Campo growled, Not about work. About the Forza girl.
His shoulders slumped. Did everyone know about what he d done to Mary? We broke up. It s over.
Is it?
I ve humiliated her twice now. I don t think I can come back from that.
Pride is your sin, she said, not Mary s.
You think she d take me back?
Isn t that what you want?
He remembered how Mary had squealed in the surf in San Diego. How they d made love in all five bedrooms of the beach house. How the firelight flickered across her thighs spread for him. How her warm hand had gripped his as the sea breeze tossed her curls and kissed her skin.
It doesn t matter what I want. I ll never be worthy of her, he said.
Her brown eyes pinned him. Don t you think that s something she should decide?
Let someone else make a decision that affected him? No, thank you.
When he was silent, Mrs. Campo tutted. I think you ve been hiding behind that curse. And now it s gone, you don t know what to do.
Alex took a few steps toward the door and was relieved when Mrs. Campo went with him. At the door, he paused. You know I don t believe in that stuff.
Don t you? She narrowed her eyes. Then why are you so afraid to seize your own happiness? Turning on her heel, she marched away toward the elevators.
* * *
Alex almost spat out his sip of the bitter brown liquid. It burned down his throat and into his stomach. Mrs. Campo s nocino might not be poison, but it was the most disgusting stuff he d ever tasted.
He plugged up the bottle and stashed it in his freezer. Bad luck to throw away a gift from a wise woman.
Shuffling into his bedroom, Alex switched on the lamp next to his lonely bed, then the gas fireplace. His penthouse seemed so much colder without Mary. Even though everything about her seemed out of place in his ordered world, from her chaotic curls to the smear of her red lipstick on his pillowcase.
That was the thing he couldn t wrap his mind around. He didn t want to change anything about her. Not her scrappy little business, not her cozy house stuffed full of tacky mementos of three generations of Italian Americans, not even her knuckle-dragging brothers.
Mrs. Campo s words swirled in his brain. Was he worthy of Mary s love? And did he have the courage to ask her for it?
To be loved—to let Mary love him—he knew, had always known, he had to change himself. To open a window and let Mary peek in. To open a door and let her poke around and rearrange things.
And that scared the shit out of him.
But now, all alone in his penthouse, he realized that was what he had to do. Let her bring the plastic La Pieta and her pothos with the tiny Italian flag jammed into the soil. Let her invite her surly brothers to track grease onto his rug and threaten him with a thrashing on the regular. All he wanted was to nestle into a pile of flowery cushions, drink a glass of too-cold Chianti, and soak up Mary s love.
She d lit up the gloom within him just like she d lit up that blacked-out ballroom. Now he couldn t face returning to the darkness. Even if it meant he had to compromise. If he had to trust. If he had to jump, not knowing what lay below.
If there was the slightest chance Mary might catch him, he had to leap.