Chapter 11 #2
“I know who everyone is,” she cut him off, then proceeded to list his entire family.
“Michael, your father’s parents are Clyde and Nancy, aka Bampi and Momo.
He was married to Teresa, they had three daughters.
The oldest is your sister Paulina, she’s married to Ramesh, who is a heart surgeon.
Their wedding was beautiful, by the way.
They have twin boys who are twelve, Rohan and Ravi, and a fourteen-year-old daughter, Zoya.
Next is your sister Pippa, the middle sister, her husband, Roger, is twice her age but quite a zaddy.
He’s a tech billionaire, and they have Freddie, who is six.
The baby is Phoebe, who is married to Duane, who works in bioengineering.
He lost his first wife tragically and has ten-year-old twins from his first marriage, Ezra and Elan, and they have Finley, turning eight, and Bristol who is five months. ”
He stared at her, not having any clue how to respond to all the information that had just come out of her mouth. “How did you know all of that?”
Lucy’s whine increased as she began to scratch at the window.
Frankie’s shoulders squared as her chin jutted out defiantly. “When I saw you at the hospital—”
“You saw me at the hospital?” He knew she’d been at the hospital, but he didn’t think that she’d seen him.
Her lips parted and her eyes widened. Her expression looked exactly like when he got caught her sneaking out to go to a high school party the summer before she was a freshman.
He didn’t let her get into the sixteen-year-old stoner’s car who was waiting to pick her up.
He took her on his bike and waited outside until she was ready to come home.
If he closed his eyes, he could still feel her pressed up against his back, her tiny arms clinging to him as he rounded corners. She was the only person who he’d ever allowed to ride with him. That hadn’t gone over well with girlfriends.
“Yes, I did.” She took a breath. “When I took Yaya to see Mr. Santino, I saw you.”
“What? Where? When?”
Her eyes cast down as Lucy’s whine rose to an unbearable level.
He set the gift bag on the console, got out, and walked to the passenger side of the car.
The air carried the scent of charred meat, cut grass, and water, with the distant sound of pop music and laughter floating up from the backyard.
His mind was reeling from hearing that Frankie had seen him at the hospital.
He’d just assumed the first time she’d seen him was the first time he’d seen her at his office.
He was so confused. He opened the passenger door, picked Lucy up, set her on the ground, and held her leash, allowing her to sniff and do her business.
“Continue.” His instruction came out sounding harsher than he meant it. Unlike other people, who might flinch at his tone, Frankie didn’t seem to notice. If anything at all, it irritated her.
“After Poppy, who I didn’t know was Poppy, took Mr. Santino for an X-ray, I was in the room with Taylor and Caleb and—”
“You were in trauma ten?”
“Is that where Taylor was?” she asked, her tone implying it was a stupid question she’d have no way of knowing the answer to.
He nodded.
“Then yes, I was.” She sighed. “And I saw you walking towards the room, and so I hid.”
He waited for her to say she was kidding, for her to get to the punchline. When she didn’t, he repeated, “You hid?”
“Yes. I. Hid,” she spoke each word with emphasis.
“Where?”
“Behind the white cabinet in the corner.” Again, her response made it sound like he was the one asking stupid questions.
“Why? Why would you hide from me?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“It does matter,” he countered.
She continued, “The point is, when I saw you in the hospital, and I heard Taylor and Caleb call you Dr. Davies, I really wanted to call my friend who owns a private investigation company to find out everything he could about you, but I didn’t because I wanted to respect your privacy. You’re welcome.”
“Thank you?” He wasn’t sure exactly what he was thanking her for.
“But after you left last night, after the day we spent together and finding out… everything, I thought that it wouldn’t be invading your privacy if I did some investigating on my own via Poppy. So, I did.”
Poppy was very active on Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook. She posted videos and photos and always tagged everyone in them. If Frankie looked her up, it would be very easy for her to research every branch of his entire family tree. That all made perfect sense, but one thing was still bothering him.
He placed his arm on the roof of the SUV above Frankie’s head and leaned down closer to her as he repeated the question, “Why did you hide from me?”
Her chin tilted up as she held his gaze, almost as if she was daring him to ask again, which he didn’t understand.
There was so much emotion swimming behind her eyes.
He wished so badly he could read her mind or that they still had the relationship that she would tell him every thought that passed through her mind as she had it.
She licked her lips, perhaps in a nervous tick, but he watched as her tongue slid along the seam of her mouth. He felt himself being drawn to her, like a magnet. Closer and closer. His eyes closed, and he felt her breath fanning his face.
“Uncle Liam! Uncle Liam! You’re here!”
His niece’s voice pierced his consciousness less than a nanosecond before his lips touched Frankie’s.
He blinked and took a step back as he lifted his head.
Finley was standing with a group of her friends at the back gate waving at him as more people arrived.
He’d gotten so caught up in his Frankie bubble, he’d been oblivious to the cars that had parked beside him or the half dozen people walking into the party.
“Ready?” He held out his hand to Frankie, knowing that this conversation was not over, wishing that they could go somewhere private to continue it.
She glanced down at herself. “Do I look okay?”
Liam had been doing his level-best not to notice how Frankie looked.
It took every ounce of concentration he had in him.
Now that she’d point-blank asked, he allowed his eyes to hungrily take her in.
She was the sort of natural beauty that always appeared accidental, as if she just rolled out of bed and glanced in the mirror as an afterthought, giving no attention to the way she looked.
Her hair tumbled in coppery waves over her shoulders to her elbow, golden strands catching in the sunlight pouring through the windshield.
Her sweetheart-shaped face was nearly too small for her oversized, almond eyes and full mouth tinted a deep shade of pink that made him think of other lips on her body.
Tan ankle boots matched an oversized off-the-shoulder camel sweater that slouched just enough to hint at the line of her collarbone, the fabric soft and loose but tucked with effortless casualness into a pair of faded blue jeans.
The jeans hugged her hips and thighs in a way that was so flagrantly illegal that when he picked her up, he had to forcibly redirect his gaze away when she walked in front of him.
She was quite literally the sexy girl next door, who he wanted to rip the clothes off of.
He’d never been a man to get distracted by beauty.
He’d trained himself, at great and grueling expense, to compartmentalize everything in his life, down to the molecule.
But nothing about Frankie Costas fit into any box he’d ever built.
She overflowed, leaked out, spilled through the cracks, and turned every plan into bright, stubborn chaos.
“Do I?” she prompted once again, breathlessly, gazing up at him with a raw vulnerability that nearly undid him.
He knew he could tell her, yes, but that wouldn’t come close to doing her justice.
“Do you remember that movie you used to watch on repeat with Ben Stiller and Ed Norton?”
“Seriously? I look that bad that you’re changing the subject?”
“Who was the girl in it?”
Her irritation at his perceived avoidance of her question was obvious as she sighed. “Jenna Elfman.”
“Do you remember the scene when she’s trying to leave, and Ben Stiller wants her to stay so he stops her in the doorway?”
Her brows knit together.
“God was showing off when he made you,” Liam repeated the line that perfectly encapsulated what he felt about Frankie.
Delight sparkled in her eyes as a slow grin spread across her face. She placed her delicate fingers in his palms, sending all the wrong signals to other parts of his body. “Let’s do this.”