Chapter Fourteen
Roberto
I take the back corridor that smells like garlic and onions, the one that leads straight into the kitchen. I could send a text and call Bianca to my office with the papers, but I like seeing her in her element. She belongs here. If I’m honest, I like seeing people where they belong.
It’s mid-morning, and the kitchen has that soft bustle I love. No tickets are firing yet. We’re not open for business. Right now, it’s just a simple kitchen.
Bianca is at the sauté station, sleeves rolled, a towel set just so, tasting spoons set out as usual. She moves with the grace of a world-class dancer, completely at home in the kitchen. She’s got something light and golden bubbling in a shallow pan, and she knows I’m here before I say a word.
“Hey,” she says without turning, voice bright. “You just figured out a way to steal my lunch, didn’t you?”
“I wouldn’t dare,” I say, and she laughs because we both know I would if she told me I could.
I’ve had a soft spot for Bianca since the first time I saw her at her grandmother’s restaurant after the funeral. Not the same way as my brother does, seeing as they’re married with a kid now, but she makes every room she steps into more welcoming.
She turns then, and her eyes go warm in the way they only do for two people—my brother and their son. Gio walks in behind me, cradling Stephano like he’s a priceless jewel.
Gio looks like sleep’s been escaping him, but the love in his eyes more than makes up for it. The baby is wide-awake, dark eyes huge, little fists pumping like he’s swimming through air.
“Look who’s here, Stephano,” Gio says, grin crooked. “You get two for one today. Mama and Zio Roberto.”
“Your best dish yet,” I say, and walk over, tugging off the jacket of my suit before I even think about it.
I fold it once and set it over a low shelf.
I scrub my hands at the prep sink because Bianca will toss me with a smile if I dare touch her child with hands that haven’t seen soap in the last thirty seconds.
When I turn back, Gio is already offering Stephano without asking.
He knows me. I take the baby, and the world narrows to those big eyes and toothless grin.
He’s heavier than last week. His head is warm under my palm.
His hair is a dark whorl, stubborn and soft under my fingers.
He looks up at me and does that newborn stare that feels like judgment.
“Hey, ragazzo,” I say, lowering my voice. “You working the line today or just inspecting?”
He blinks and lifts a fist toward me. I adjust the baby in the crook of my arm and take his little fist, shaking it with my fingers lightly.
“Inspector Stephano,” Bianca says, stepping around me to check a pan, then her son, then me again. “You'd better pass him, Roberto. He’s intense.”
“He’s a Conti,” I say. “He can’t help it.”
Stephano’s mouth twists in a slow smile, then settles in a serious little line that looks exactly like Gio’s.
I press my lips to his head and take in his scent.
He smells like clean laundry and that warm, milky sweetness that puts a hand right around my heart and squeezes.
I’ve never liked that feeling, and I’ve always loved it.
I want to hold it tight and throw it as far away from me as possible.
I envy the kind of life that doesn’t know loss yet.
“Hungry?” I ask him. He answers by staring at my tie. I tuck the silk a little deeper between buttons. He doesn’t need fiber.
“Here,” Bianca says, sliding a tiny spoon up to me. “Don’t feed him, feed yourself. Tell me if the lemon’s strong enough once it cools.”
I lean in, still holding the baby, and take the spoon. The broth hits my tongue, and my mouth brightens with the taste. Silky, lemony, a little something spicy beneath it.
“Perfect,” I say.
“Liar,” she says lightly, already reaching for the wedge of lemon.
“No more than two drops,” I say. “Then it’ll be perfect.”
Smiling, she squeezes the lemon lightly into the broth.
Gio watches us with that look he gets around family. Loving, a little dreamy, satisfied. Well, since meeting Bianca anyway.
Before that, he was never very expressive, choosing to keep things to himself. It was only meeting her and going through the fear of almost losing her to a rival family that opened him up.
“How’s he sleeping?” I ask because it’s what you ask new parents.
“Fits and bursts,” Gio says. “But he gives us three solid hours if we sacrifice to the appropriate gods.”
I lift a brow. “And those gods would be?”
“The gods of White Noise,” Gio says. “The gods of Swaddle, the saints of pacifier, and, when that fails, the goddess of taking a drive down the beach at 2:00 a.m. while singing old songs.”
Bianca gives him the soft smile meant for the private world the two of them live in. She trusts him. It’s still new enough that I enjoy watching her show it.
Stephano lets out a sigh that’s too big for his body and rests a hand on my shirt. He kicks once, strong, then settles again. His lashes are dark like his mother’s. His mouth is firm like his father’s. The mix sits easy on him. If the world is fair, it always will.
“You’re good with him,” Gio says.
“I like good bosses,” I say, smoothing the curve of a tiny shoulder through the cotton onesie. “He’s the best one I’ve had.”
“You’re ridiculous,” Bianca says, but it’s fond, and she takes a second to look like she’s going to cry as she watches her son before she tamps it down.
“I brought you actual work,” I say, nodding toward the folder on the low shelf under my jacket. “Nothing heavy. You sign, I countersign, I file, Caterina updates a spreadsheet. It’s the last bow on you being back in the building.”
Bianca wipes her hands and reaches for the folder with a nod.
Bianca flips the folder open on a clean corner of the prep table, scans the flags I’ve marked, and signs with quick, decisive strokes. She doesn’t posture or pretend to read every clause; she trusts me to have done the boring part and to tell her if something bites.
“You know you don’t have to rush back,” Gio says, knowing full well there’s no point in saying it.
Bianca snorts without looking up. “You try keeping me out of my kitchen,” she says. “I’ll throw you out on your pretty face.”
Gio laughs, low and helpless; Stephano answers with a squeaky sound that might be agreement.
She sets the pen down, wipes her hands on her apron, and holds them out to me. “Now, give me my baby.”
I kiss the soft crown once more and transfer him carefully into her arms. He settles like a stone, his little body going boneless against her chest.
“Hey, amore,” she murmurs, rocking without thinking, already checking his fingers, his breath, the set of his mouth. “Did Zio let you read any contracts? I told him no legal briefs before six months.”
“No briefs,” I say. “Just a performance review. He exceeded expectations.”
Gio hooks a hip on the prep table and watches them with the look of a man who can’t believe the life he gets to live. “We’ll add a line to his resume.”
I think about the fact that he almost didn’t get to live this life. He almost lost Bianca and Stephano before they knew he was even there.
The start between her and Gio was rocky because we’re Contis and we never do the easy version. Then came Adriano Russo with plans for revenge over the death of his only son, Gabe.
Somehow, Bianca ended up being the target for his revenge, though we didn’t even know her at the time that Gabe was killed.
The memory of Giovanni’s rage and fear won’t fade any time soon.
He meets my eyes like he knows where my head went. He angles closer, bumping my shoulder with his, telling me to stay in the present. I bump him back.
Stephano yawns and draws my eyes. I feel ridiculous and raw at the same time. I want to put him in a safe and swallow the key. I want to tell him he will never know a single hard thing. That’s the lie adults tell babies.
It’s something I never got to tell my own. We talked about it, Maria and I, but we wanted to enjoy a few years of married life before we tried for a kid. Then she was taken away, and so was that choice.
Now, all I have are flashes of that with Stephano and Luca’s youngest daughter, Alessandra, who’s growing way too fast for my liking.
Footsteps in the hall announce Caterina’s presence. She appears in the doorway, an annoyed look on her face.
She takes one look at Stephano in Bianca’s arms and her face softens in a way I only ever see when she looks at family. She walks straight to her cousin and presses a kiss to his forehead that he will not remember but will carry always.
“You,” she tells him, “are the only person allowed to interrupt my 9:00 a.m.”
He gurgles something that sounds like an agreement. She grins. Then she looks up and sees Bianca’s pan and grabs a spoon with the speed of a thief caught in the act.
“No stealing,” Bianca says, mock-stern, still rocking Stephano.
“Quality control,” Caterina says, tasting, eyes going half-closed for a beat. “Okay,” she declares, tapping the spoon on the pan. “That is so rude. In a good way.”
“Rude,” Gio repeats, amused.
Caterina sets the spoon down and gives the paperwork still on the prep table a pointed look. “Signatures?”
“Done,” Bianca says before I can answer. “I’m officially back. You may all stop panicking.”
“Not official until I’ve filed them,” I correct. “Then she can stop panicking.”
“I don’t panic,” Caterina says, a bit haughtily. Then she laughs at herself. “I like you here.”
“I like me here,” Bianca says, smiling.
“Okay, now. I have a few quick minutes for baby time,” she says, already on her way to the sink. “Then I have a meeting in my office.”
Caterina scrubs her hands fast, then returns with them held up like a surgeon.
“Gimme,” she says, already smiling.
Bianca obliges, easing Stephano into her arms. He settles, blinks up at her, then fixes on the glint of her necklace like it’s a star he can grab.
“You’re shameless,” she tells him, swaying. “And devastating.”