Chapter 2
ENZO
Mama has cooked for all of Manhattan.
Her apartment fills with the familiar aroma of garlic and rosemary wafting through the air, and tomatoes that have simmered slowly for hours. Mixed in with all this is the scent of freshly baked bread, and something sweet and buttery baking in the oven.
I checked the oven earlier and saw her traditional jam tart baking in there. She’s also made tiramisu.
She sets out trays of sizzling, steaming lasagne and aubergine layered with mozzarella and a rich tomato sauce. Then, she takes out from the oven a steaming hot tray of roast potatoes drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with slivers of garlic and rosemary.
“Mama, there are thirteen of us, not thirty.”
She wipes her hands on her apron. “What if someone wants seconds?”
I smile at her, watching her stir something on the stove, and then check something in the oven.
She's declined all offers of help, from everyone. When the women hovered around, trying to do something, she shooed them all away. Jett offered to get takeout for everyone, but Mama firmly refused.
Then Dex suggested, “Why don't we have our private chef come over and cook?”
Mama swatted them both playfully.
“Boys, boys,” she said. “I am not someone who likes other people in my kitchen. I love feeding my family. Now, leave me be.”
My family.
Despite only being here for a relatively short time, she’s given this rented apartment her elegant yet homely touch. But I wish this was Mama's apartment. I wish she lived here, instead of all the way in Italy. She's been here a month now. She came after Matteo had his operation.
I have never looked forward to Knight family dinners so much. Though Mama isn't a Knight, and has never taken that name.
But she leaves for Soave in a few days' time and a sense of melancholy falls over me. We've shared so many precious moments together. The American Knights don't come here daily, like Rio, Matteo and I do. But they've come once a week.
I hover around her and try again, as I do each time I see her. “Must you return to Soave?”
“Not that again.” She wipes her cheek with the back of her hand. “I will come back, tesoro.”
Darling, my treasure. Mama talks to us so lovingly. She makes each of us feel so fully, and unconditionally loved. Rio mentioned that Father struggles to call us by our names, let alone use any affectionate terms.
“I have some things to take care of. My plants, my garden—”
“You pick those things over us?” I cry in mock-exaggeration.
She shakes her head as she passes by me, to grab something from the fridge.
“My friends are wondering where I am.” She cups my cheek fleetingly. “I have to leave, but I will be back.”
For someone who's built such a lovely life in Italy, I can't help thinking how much fuller it could be here. I'm determined to convince her to change her mind.
“You can live in two places. We'll buy you a place here. This can be your home too.”
She smiles. “When the grandchildren come ...”
“Mama,” I groan. “You can't blackmail us.”
“I'm not blackmailing you, baby.” She laughs softly. “I'm simply saying... when the children come, you'll all be busy. You're already busy with your lives and your careers, and I will be here for you all, for whenever you need me.”
She looks around the room. “I'm happy to see that everyone is...”
She stops.
Everyone is settled.
Everyone has a girlfriend. A partner.
Someone.
Her eyes settle on me.
I'm the only one who doesn't.
It's not something I think about. Not too much. My work and routine keep me busy. It's all good.
“I want someone to love you the way you deserve, tesoro.” She wipes her hands, and cups my face again, the way she has ever since I was little.
“Of course.” I try to laugh it off, because I don’t want her to worry about me, but I know that she does. I see it in her eyes, in the way she fusses over me, like I’m still a little boy.
When I tell her sometimes that I’m grown up now and she doesn’t need to worry, she says “You’ll always be my baby, tesoro.”
“I'm going to a masked ball in Venice,” I tell her as she starts slicing the red peppers.
She stops. “You mentioned it. At the Doge's Palace?”
I nod.
“I didn't think events were allowed there.”
“Apparently they are. I'll come and see you after.”
“Wonderful. Let me know in advance. Don't just turn up at my doorstep like Matteo did. I'll make sure I have your favorite dinner ready.”
She's a nurturer. A feeder. A gatherer of family and friends.
A woman who makes everyone feel comfortable.
A woman I am proud to call my mother. Sometimes I wonder how she ever ended up with someone like Paul Knight.
And then I wonder how her heart must have broken that day when I showed her the photo.
Everything changed that day.
That day, so many years ago, when my curiosity got the better of me and I pulled the photo out of my father's pocket.
Funny how he used to be Papa back then.
Now ... he’s Father.
At least I don't call him the old man.
What I didn't understand then, but I do now, is why Mama came into my bedroom the following morning, after Father had taken the boys out somewhere. She sat beside me on the bed.
“Enzo.” I’d never seen her looking so sad. Almost like she was going to cry, but she didn’t. “We must never tell anyone where that photograph came from.”
“I know, Mama, you already told me.”
She gently held my hand. “I'm just making sure, tesoro.”
“Okay.”
“I'll never tell anyone you found it.”
“Was it bad, what I did?”
She paused, shook her head then looked away. She never gave me an answer. I know now that she couldn't answer, because it was true.
“When is it?” she asks, pulling me back into the present.
“When is what?”
“Enzo?” She looks at me for a few seconds longer than necessary. “What are you thinking?”
I scramble to remember the date of the masked ball in Venice. “It's in a few weeks' time,” I tell her. “I'll let you know before I come to visit.”
She gives me that look again, like she wants to protect me. Like she knows I'm carrying something I shouldn't have to carry. I wonder if Mama has spent twenty years trying to protect me from the truth.
She finally calls everyone to the table, and we begin taking our seats while she brings over the last of the food.
“Grandpa!”
Little Brooke runs around the open-plan living room. Mama and I instinctively turn to her. She’s holding Jett's phone.
My stomach drops.
Why is Father calling Jett's phone?
“Nonna’s making lunch!” she giggles excitedly.
“Nonna?” Father asks.
Brooke started calling Mama Nonna not long after she came to New York, and Mama has loved it ever since.
Now Mama holds the phone out giving Father a perfect view of all of us. At Mama's apartment. Looking happy. Looking like family.
“What are you doing with my phone?” Jett mutters under his breath.
Dex and Rio exchange amused looks.
“We're having lunch,” Brooke announces happily, oblivious to the shock everyone is simultaneously experiencing. “Look! Everyone's here!”
Jett and Cari.
Dex and Dani.
Rio and Raquel.
Zach and Maya.
Matteo and Elizabeth.
Me.
Mama.
The room falls silent. The idea of Father seeing all of us together, like this, makes my stomach churn. He's recovering from the operation. He wasn't invited. Mama has never invited him, not even once. It would have been strange if she had.
Now, seeing this, he’ll think we're doing it secretly behind his back. Truth is, we are, but being caught red-handed, like we're the guilty ones, gnaws at me.
Rio and Matteo hold him at arm's length. I have a feeling that Jett and Dex do, too. It’s only Zach and me who feel a shred of guilt, of remorse, of something we can't quite label.
Zach used to. He was the only one of us all who made an effort, but he distanced himself once Maya's truth came to light, and I don’t blame him.
Father is a difficult man to love, and I despise him for what he did, for all the wrongs he's done to all of my brothers, but even so, knowing all of that, a sliver of pain slices through me.
Because I still remember the man I adored. The Papa who would lift me onto his shoulders and walk around. The Papa who'd team up with me when we'd play football with Rio and Matteo.
I try not to think about those days, because they always make me sad. The past pains me, filling me with sadness and guilt so overwhelming that the only way I can deal with it is to block that time out.
I grieve for the loss of the Papa I once loved so much.
But now that he’s recovering from major surgery, the idea of him sitting alone in his penthouse tugs at my heart. I can't not feel it, even knowing how despicable he’s been through most of his life.
I can't shake the guilt away, when he sees us all together, even though it's his actions that have created this outcome.
This is the future he created through years of lies, deception, and living a double life.
This distance between him and his children isn't something that happened to him, it's the consequence of his own choices.
“Say hi to Grandpa!” Brooke says happily, oblivious to the shock rippling around the room. We all stay silent. My stomach knots.
He’s recovering from surgery, but he's back home and getting stronger every day, and now he’s watching all of us, together. He's the only one who isn't here.
Guilt twists in my chest before I push it away. This isn't because we wanted to hurt him. This is what happens when you spend a lifetime building walls between the people you love.
Still, I can't help picturing him alone, realizing there's a family dinner taking place that he isn't part of.
Once upon a time, that thought would have broken my heart. Now it just makes me sad because while he deserves the consequences of his choices, none of us did.
“Jesus.” Dex mutters.