Chapter 15
ENZO
Ihadn’t known what to expect tonight, but Lucy got me good. If she’d seemed genuinely interested in Hudson, I would have left. But she spent more time looking at me than him.
And now…
Honestly, I don’t know what I’m doing, but I’m not ready to stop.
“I can’t walk there with you,” Lucy hisses, her tone scandalized as we step out of the restaurant. “What if people see us together?”
The wind is bitter tonight, and she’s not wearing a scarf. I’m tempted to unwind mine and tie it around her neck, but I know better. She’d never allow me that victory.
“You don’t want anyone to know we’re talking?” I ask, feigning innocence. “I was going to offer to carry your food for you too.”
“No. I am very capable of carrying a plastic bag, thank you very much. And we are not talking. I’m interviewing you for the app. The same way I’ve interviewed everyone else.”
“Exactly,” I say. “Wouldn’t it look more suspicious if we’re seen sneaking in separately through the back door?”
“I’m beginning to think you just enjoy arguing for the sake of argument.”
“Then you’re beginning to know me, Lucia. Let’s go.”
She definitely wants to argue more, but a brisk wind comes in off the water, prompting her to start walking briskly in the direction of the town square, rubbing her gloved hands together.
She walks with purpose, but she’s distractible, too, her attention drifting to the window displays and the holiday wreaths lining the streets.
We pass tourists, some of them holding stuffed shopping bags from earlier purchases, as well as Hidies.
Several people are clutching cups of hot chocolate that are probably already chilly enough to be a disgrace to the drink’s name.
Lucy told me she loved this place, and it’s evident on her face. Her green eyes are full of appreciation, with a hint of excitement. I’m surprised by how much I savor her joy. I wouldn’t say it helps me see Hideaway through new eyes, but it strips away some of my resentment.
When we cross the town square, there are people clustered around the tree. A group of drunk-looking people dressed up like Santa’s reindeer are playing some kind of game.
Lucy’s gaze lingers on the drunken group of reindeer.
“You think Charlie would want to paint them?” I ask.
The smile I was hoping for flits across her face before vanishing. “Yeah, maybe.”
“This class you’re making the app for. It’s a programming class?”
“Yeah,” she says as we stroll toward the shop front, the giant Christmas tree looming to our left. “I’m taking some classes to gain skills for an app I want to make.”
“The Hideaway Harbor one?”
“No.”
We’ve reached the corner of our block, and I nod toward her BANNED flyer of me.
“I still think I should grow a mustache like that.”
She smiles slyly at me, her hair whipping in the wind, and I think about wrapping her up in my scarf.
I shouldn’t want her to put on something that’s mine, but there it is—an intrusive desire I can’t shake.
“I thought it was a nice touch,” she says.
“I considered adding some devil horns in green, but Charlie convinced me there’s something to be said for subtlety. ”
“You should have gone for it.” I nod to the flyer I put up beside it—Lucy, gorgeous as all get out, except for the hairy mole sprouting from her forehead, which has been joined by an oozing lesion on her cheek.
“What even is that?” she asks, groaning.
Then, no shit, she takes out her red marker and draws a Santa hat on her head.
“You really brought your red marker with you?” I remark. “That looks a lot like cheating, if you ask me.”
She smiles at me. “We have rules now?”
“Oh, there are always rules.”
“Do you know what they’ve been saying about us?”
It’s like icy liquid is flooding my veins, taking away the fun buzz of being around her.
“What are you talking about?”
“I wasn’t the one saying it,” she clarifies.
“I’d guessed. Go on.”
“It was in Lady Lovewatch.”
I nod and rock on my heels. “Oh, that. Yes, I’ve seen it.”
“Aren’t you…upset?”
“Not really.”
She frowns. “Seriously? According to Hudson, people are betting,” she says, gesturing back and forth between us, “like on who’s going to win the hate-off.”
“Ah, bless the Hideaway Harbor gossip mill. Nothing can happen without thirty people you barely know remarking upon it. Which of us has better odds, out of curiosity?”
She points to the drawing of her, now wearing a hat. “It must be me.”
“Can I borrow your marker?”
“Absolutely not,” she says, sticking it in her purse.
“Fine, this round goes to you, Mrs. Claus. But I reserve the right to make a hat for myself too.”
“Fair is fair.” A smile flirts with her lips, and I feel a fresh awareness of her. The way little curls are constantly billowing around her face. The pinkness of her cheeks in the cold. The mischievous glint of her eyes whenever she looks at me.
I gesture for her to precede me down the stairs—see, Lucy, I can be a gentleman—and she narrows her eyes at me before descending the steps.
Even though I didn’t ask her to go first so I could watch her go down, I find myself doing it. Taking in every sway of her body. She’s covered by that big coat, but it’s still doing it for me.
Sighing at my own folly, I follow her down the stairs and unlock the door, then flick on the lights. It’s well past eight, so the deli’s been closed for an hour and no one’s here—thank God, because I would never hear the end of this if anyone were.
“Wow, I wasn’t expecting you to have a tree,” she says, glancing at the ornamented Douglas fir set up to the right of the door. “It’s actually nice.”
“Thanks for the commendation,” I say with a laugh.
“You really decorated this?”
“Well, no,” I admit. “I hired some high school kids.”
She seems satisfied with this, as if it’s further proof of my flawed character.
“They needed money for Christmas shopping,” I say. There. Now I’m a Christmas hero.
“Of course that was what motivated you,” she says, rolling her eyes. Then her stomach growls, and she gasps. Embarrassed, maybe.
“Would you like a wet sandwich?” I ask.
She shakes her head in a study of annoyance. “No, I have food. I guess…if we’re going to do this interview, we should sit down somewhere.”
“Feel free to eat your dinner. Don’t stand on ceremony for me. I don’t care if you get fish in your teeth.”
“Gross.” She scrunches her nose, which is cuter than it has any right to be, but eyes the takeout bag. Her stomach growls again. “I guess I am a little hungry. Are you sure you wouldn’t mind?”
“Not at all,” I insist, then signal to one of the tables in the back. “Let’s sit down while you eat.”
We sit down, and she shoots me a self-conscious glance before shedding her coat, revealing the tight black sweater dress underneath, shot through with gold thread. She wore it for another man, technically, but I tell myself she really wore it for me. To piss me off. It’s enough.
When she pulls out her box of food, it hits me that she doesn’t have a drink, so I grab a pompelmo Sanpellegrino for her from one of the refrigerators and set it in front of her. Sour and sweet for Lucy.
“Oh. Is that for me?” she asks, sounding so shocked I almost laugh again.
“Yes,” I say, “and before you ask, it’s sealed. I may be godlike, but even I can’t poison a sealed drink.”
She rolls her eyes and cracks the drink open. Then she takes a fry out of the box and waves it at me. “What about you? Didn’t you bring your food back?”
“I’ll eat it later, but if you’re offering to share your fries, I won’t say no.”
She scoffs, “I might be a nearly thirty-year-old virgin, but I know what a double entendre is.”
“It wasn’t one,” I say, struggling not to react to that. Or to the fact that french fries are a much more sensual food than I ever gave them credit for. I can’t stop watching as she lifts one to her mouth, parts her lips, and then bites it in half.
Her cheeks flush slightly. “You can have a few. Would you mind if I record our conversation?”
“Not at all.”
I watch with growing anticipation as she sets her phone face up on the tabletop.
“Tell me about this place,” she says, her tone professional. “I know your grandparents opened it. What was their vision?”
“They wanted to open a family business. Something that could make a good life for us here but also bring Italian food to Hideaway. When they moved here, they were one of the only Italian families. They thought they had something different to offer, and the fact that Hidden Italy’s still here says they were right.
” I shrug. “We’ve been flooded a few times, so the location isn’t the best, but my grandfather won this unit in a poker match. ”
“He didn’t,” she gasps as she sets down a half-eaten fry.
“He did,” I say, grinning. “My grandfather was a persuasive man. The guy he won it from was friends with the current mayor’s grandfather.
No one believed this man would actually hand over the deed, but he was honest if not sensible.
You know, the two of them became good friends, and on his deathbed, my grandfather admitted he’d cheated.
The guy who’d handed the deed over without argument said he’d always known but hadn’t cared.
He’d admired my grandfather’s audacity.”
Surprised laughter gushes from her, the sound like music. “That’s amazing. I wish I could have met him. He sounds like a real character.”
“My whole family’s amazing,” I say firmly.
“They’ve thought about relocating the business over the years, but my grandmother is not a woman who embraces change.
Whenever there was flooding, she’d clean up, restock, and start again, like nothing had happened.
My grandfather was like that, too, but no one ever questioned who was in charge. He admired her leadership. We all did.”
“I can see why you think so highly of your family,” she says. “It’s hard for me to imagine having so much history. It was always just my mom and me.”
“You didn’t know your grandparents?”