Chapter 14
LORENZO
“Okay, Gilberto, after you trim those steaks, I want you to start working with Juan on the shrimp,” I tell the cook I’m overseeing as he starts with another filet round. “Make sure the shrimp are perfect. They’re the showpiece of one of the pasta courses. And save the shells for the stock!”
Gilberto nods, answering, “Yes, Chef.”
I’ve spent as much time as I can in the kitchen with Esmar and his crew, laughing and joking as we prep and work side by side.
They are a well-oiled machine, providing interesting and flavorful dishes to the resort’s restaurant.
Some might look down on a ‘hotel chef’ a bit, snobbily thinking that a true chef owns his own restaurant, but I can see the fire in Esmar and sense a kindred spirit in him.
He works where he does because he is passionate about food and experience, not business and the hours of paperwork being the owner requires.
I feel like I have already learned a lot from him and will miss him after this event. But not yet because there is still much to be done.
While Abigail has gone to do her impromptu photo shoot, I’m getting ready for tomorrow’s rehearsal dinner which requires one hundred meals, and Saturday’s wedding, which is less than twenty-four hours later and will serve over three hundred.
These are not events you prepare for on the fly or on the day of, and as such, the true hard work begins today. Now.
Vegetables have to be cleaned and cut, proteins shaped and prepped, and fruits selected. About the only thing we aren’t prepping are the starches, but that’s because risotto can’t be prepared in advance and the pasta sheeter is going to be cranking out fresh fettuccine tomorrow.
Cranking. Such a fun American word, I think.
CR-anking, cr-ANK-ing, crank-ING, I repeat in my head, unable to stop the smile from blooming on my lips as I emphasize various syllables.
Languages are such interesting and funny things.
An entire group of people simply agreeing that this sound means that thing.
If only we could all agree more often, I think wistfully.
I know something I could crank. Or more precisely, someone.
I tilt my head, trying to decide if my crude wording makes sense in English, but ultimately, my mind focuses on the better part of the question. Abigail. Mia rosa.
The thought of Abi brings a surge of tension underneath my apron. She was all that I imagined and more. Last night was magical.
It wasn’t just the almost unlimited passion we had for each other and the touches that left me feeling like I could make love to her body all night long and never, ever tire. It was the pleasure I felt from every gasp, every sound she made, and every touch and look, even every smell.
It wasn’t the setting, although Esmar’s suggestion of the ‘Blue Lagoon’ certainly was a good one. It was the woman I was with. She was better than I could’ve dreamed possible. She was a goddess.
Right now, I would do anything to give her the same pleasure and feeling that we shared last night.
The memories flood my mind, and I relive them, my cock surging to full hardness.
I’m so lost in what I’m thinking about, in fact, that I don’t notice what I’m doing until the flames flash up, and suddenly, I’ve got a pan on fire.
“Shit!” I growl, grabbing a nearby lid and tossing it on top. Well, there goes that batch of herb-infused olive oil for the vinaigrette.
“Lorenzo, Lorenzo!” Esmar calls, hurrying over with a concerned look on his face. “What happened?”
“Shit. Sorry, Chef,” I tell him, pulling the pan off the fire and setting it aside to cool. Looking at it, I sigh. “At least it wasn’t the good olive oil.”
He chuckles good-naturedly, clucking his tongue. “Are you all right, my boy?”
Chefs are notorious for being fickle, and I’ve seen chefs go on screaming rants over a lot less, but he seems more concerned for me than that I almost burned his kitchen down. “Yes. Just a little tired. Had a busy night.”
Proving that we have an audience of cooks watching to see Esmar’s reaction to my fuck-up, a friendly chorus of oohs and oh, yeahs go through the crew.
Gilberto, ever the jokester, calls out, “You used Chef’s suggestion well. Welcome to paradise, indeed.”
I laugh, and Esmar follows suit, quickly figuring out exactly what my late night entailed.
“Ahh,” Esmar says knowingly. “Paradise can be enchanting. Careful, my friend, or you will find yourself with one of these.” He holds up his left hand where a thick black silicone band circles his ring finger.
“Kitchen safe and too tight to ever come off.” He demonstrates, pulling at the ring, “at my bride’s request.” By his tone, I think Esmar’s wife didn’t so much as request that he wear the ring but demand it.
That he does is sweet, as kitchens have a rather notorious reputation for ‘friendships’ between the staff.
“It’s not that serious,” I correct. “We’re just getting to know each other.”
Esmar nods sagely and Gilberto slaps me on the back. “Get to know her well, Chef. Very, very well.”
The second batch of oil goes much better than the first, and when I turn off the heat, I know that the herb-infused oil will make a perfect salad dressing for the wedding reception. All of the flavor without the risk of getting a leaf stuck in your teeth or catching in the back of your throat.
As I check my to-do list, my phone rings in my pocket, a huge no-no on the line.
“Not it!” shouts out from all around the room in a symphony of voices.
“Cazzo! It’s on Do Not Disturb. Sorry!”
Esmar looks over from his station. “You will be. If someone is not dead or dying, there’s no excuse. You’ll have to do pans today.”
Ugh! I guess his kindness on the kitchen fire has been stretched to its maximum. Every chef has rules, along with consequences for breaking them, but no phones during service is pretty standard. As is dish duty for noncompliance.
“Yes, Chef,” I tell him apologetically, stepping off the line into a dry storage area to pull out my phone. When I see it’s an urgent call from Violet, my heart jumps into my throat.
I’ve been putting off her texts and calls since earlier this week, but if she’s breaking through my Do Not Disturb setting, perhaps something is truly wrong.
“Violet,” I growl as I answer the phone. “This had better be fucking important.”
“Oh, it definitely is, Lorenzo.” She drawls out my name in a way that says I’m in trouble. Ironically, in America, my first name becomes longer, each syllable drawn out. At home, in Positano, my family will add my middle names and last name and invoke Mary, Mother of Jesus, when I fuck up.
“Is Carly okay?” It’s my true first concern but also a way to edge around Violet’s violent tendencies when her feathers get ruffled.
Hopefully, by doing a little invoking of my own of her sweet, adorable daughter, she’ll be reminded that murder is a bad idea that will have her seeing her daughter from behind a plexiglass window.
“Of course she is, and you damn well know it. This is about Abi!”
I wince at the hysterical note to Violet’s voice but continue poking and prodding as I usually do. She’s not thanking me in the slightest. She’s warning me, but casual and cool, I tell her, “No worries, cousin. I’m quite happy to help your friend out of her sticky situation.”
That warrants a full-blown, animalistic growl.
I think motherhood suits Violet because she is quite the Mama Bear and has taken Abigail on as a cub that needs protecting as well.
“You’d better not be giving her the wrong vibes if you don’t mean it.
If you hurt her, don’t come back to the States.
Because if you do, I will find you and I will destroy you until you beg for mercy, but there will be none for the likes of you! You manwhore, playboy, douchewaffle—”
“Whoa!” I exclaim. “First off, I don’t want to hurt her. Second, fuck . . . words hurt, Violet. And third, what I do is none of your business.”
“She is my sister-in-law as well as my best friend. It’s damn sure my business. And how about your mom’s? Or Aunt Sofia’s? Think they’d see your ‘honeymoon’ as none of their business?” she sing-songs, already knowing the answer to her question.
“You wouldn’t,” I challenge. God, I pray that I’m right. Violet is a reasonable woman. Surely, she wouldn’t throw me to the wolves of our family with this crazy story. Not after what her own story did to the family.
Although, with how well that turned out, maybe they wouldn’t be so harshly judgmental?
I consider that. But wait . . . if we go based on how Violet’s mess turned out, Mama and Aunt Sofia will have me and Abigail married off for real with demands for bambinos before the ink is dry on the marriage license.
I’m not sure if that’s preferable or if a backlash of epic proportions is more desirable.
“I would,” she vows.
I’m beat and I know it. Violet has me by the short hairs. “No need to sic the family on me. I’m not going to hurt Abigail. I care for her.”
Violet snorts. “Of course you do. I might call you names, Lorenzo, but you’re not a bad guy.”
“Grazie,” I say solemnly.
“That doesn’t mean you’re a good guy, either,” she corrects before my head has a chance to swell.
“You are romantic and sweet, and apparently, Abi thinks you’re sexy as sin, but you know as well as I do that you’re going to leave.
It’s what you do. Abi knows it too, but I think she’s conveniently forgetting that. ”
Violet sighs heavily. “I want you to remember that when you move on to the next exciting thing, she’s going to be left behind and I’m going to be the one supergluing the pieces of her heart back together with ice cream while we curse your entire lineage.”
The line goes quiet, and I hear Violet murmuring in Italian. It’s not spot-on, more Americanized, but I catch something about my daughter’s pigs never bearing . . . cabbage? The curse might be wrong, but the meaning is clear, as are her good intentions.
“Violet,” I interrupt her blasphemy before it gets any further, now that she’s moved on to my grandchildren’s feet smelling like cheese and attracting owls. Does she even speak Italian, I wonder? “I hear you loud and clear. I won’t hurt her.”
“I hope not. She’s more fragile than she seems. Remember that.” She sighs, changing the subject from my potential failure. “So, how bad is Emily? Please tell me she’s ugly and has a hunchback and smells like rotten cheese.”
Huh, maybe she did know what she was saying.
“She’s fine, I guess.” I shrug even though she can’t see me.
“Blonde, tall, slim, married a guy named Doug. He’s okay, a bit of a ‘polo shirt at the golf club’ sort, if you know what I mean?
The competitiveness is off the charts, though.
Just when I think Abigail can leave it be and we can just enjoy the day, Emily will come along and sour it.
And Abigail lets her, time and time again. I don’t understand it.”
This is something Abigail and I have touched on, but the nuances of female hierarchy are as foreign to me as they are to most men, I suspect.
Though I didn’t want to talk to Violet, maybe this is the perfect opportunity to get some clarity on this because I sure as fuck haven’t a clue about Queen Bee hive dominance fights.
“Oh, God,” Violet says dramatically, “you have no idea. Back in school, Abi was clueless for the longest. We kinda stuck to ourselves, I guess. She had this heavy name and Ross’s reputation casting a big shadow, and she just wanted to do her own thing.
But Emily would never let her. Abi let it go on too long, I guess, but when she decided to fight back, she did it right.
You’ve heard the expression ‘the best revenge is a life well-lived’? ”
“Yes,” I hum.
“That’s what Abi did. She didn’t attack Emily, though she could’ve.
She didn’t kill her reputation, though she could’ve done that too.
She ignored her, which ate Emily up inside.
Abi simply did her own thing and excelled at it in every way.
Emily couldn’t keep up and it pissed her off so much.
That’s why, eventually, Emily went after Abi’s guy.
He was just a pawn, though I don’t feel sorry for that asshole either.
But I think Emily saw it as the ultimate win. Has she flirted with you at all?”
I flinch in shock. “No. Not at all. She seems devoted to her new husband. She and Doug have moments of happiness and a few arguments here and there, but that’s normal, right?
” I realize that I have no idea. I’ve seen decades-long marriages in my family, and that’s how they behave, but a recently-wed, young, happy couple? That’s entirely out of my wheelhouse.
Violet laughs. “Yeah, totally normal.”
“But Emily hasn’t flirted with me.” The very idea is repulsive.
“Hmm, that’s good, I guess. Just watch her and look out for Abi. Emily has an end game. She always does.”
“Thanks, Violet. I will do that,” I reassure her.
“You’d better, or the threat of a curse remains.”
With that, she hangs up, leaving me with much to think about.