Chapter 33
MATTEO
I’m getting changed after my shower when Mama calls. She’s excited about my visit and wants to know what I’m doing in Croatia.
I tell her I’m here with a friend for a friend’s wedding.
I purposely keep it vague and don’t say too much.
I don’t want her to know that I’m here with a woman, let alone someone I’m starting to have feelings for.
I don’t want her to know just yet, because I’m still trying to figure it out for myself.
But Mama always knows about the words I don’t say. “A friend?”
“Just someone from work.” I feign a yawn, but I can hear her brain ticking furiously in the silence that follows.
“Just someone from work?”
I pause, wondering why I didn’t refer to Elizabeth as my girlfriend. I have a hard time knowing exactly what to call her, because she feels like more than just a girlfriend.
“What’s her name, figlio mio?” she asks.
My son. I love hearing those words from Mama.
“Uh.” I pause, but I don’t know why. Maybe because saying it out loud will mean something.
“Is she coming with you?”
“I never said it was a she, Mama.”
“You never said it was a he, either.”
I can feel her smiling at the other end.
“Her name is Elizabeth, Mama, and no, she's not coming with me. She’s spending time with her friends.”
But the fact that I'd already thought about it, about asking Elizabeth to come with me to Soave, to see Mama, is a big deal. Elizabeth is a big deal to me. Then why can’t I put a label on it?
“Elizabeth, eh? Another time, perhaps. I can’t wait to see you.”
“Can’t wait to see you. Love you, Mama.”
Talking to my mom always makes me happy. I miss her. We all miss her. I wish she’d come back to the States and live with us. I want my mom around, we all do, but she keeps saying she won’t come until she has grandchildren.
I’m wondering if Rio will step up to the challenge. Could be Jett, or Dex—those boys seem pretty loved up. But Mama’s talking about her boys, though she often asks about “Aurora’s boys.”
She’s always been interested in their lives and how they are doing.
We used to find it odd at first, at least I did.
Why she was so fixated on them, but now that we’re all becoming closer, I see that Mama was being wise, not nosy.
She understood that we were all connected, and that our lives would always be entwined.
She never asks about the old man.
I pace around the apartment after that, debating whether to go to the bar or not.
It's tricky, and yet, not.
I need to think with my head, not my heart. Just like Mama did. I need to push aside my biased opinions of Vlad.
I don't know the guy, but Elizabeth thinks highly of him, so I need to trust her judgment, and let my assumptions fall to the side. Our constant bickering has shown our worst sides, and I hate that. This mini-vacation was supposed to be stress free and uncomplicated, but it’s turning out to be anything but that.
I need to fix it. I need to be the bigger man and put Elizabeth at ease, because I don’t want her fretting over this awkward situation like she has been. I don't want her trying to placate Vlad and me.
I decide to go to the bar, so I make my way downstairs.
As soon as I walk in, I see them. They're sitting at a table, and Vlad is holding Elizabeth’s hand in his.
They’re laughing about something. It's a far cry from how she and I have been lately and something twists in my gut. I force myself to breathe through it.
They're just friends.
I walk over.
“Hey.” I rest a protective hand on Elizabeth’s shoulder, rubbing it gently with my thumb.
“Hey.” She looks up at me, a little tentative, but smiling.
I slide into the empty seat opposite them, then feel my body relax when Elizabeth comes over and sits next to me.
I relax even more when she snuggles against me, and I take her hand in mine.
I want to salvage our vacation, for her sake, more than mine.
“Good of you to show up. I’m looking forward to getting to know you,” says Vlad, putting out his hand. I stare at it, confused.
“Let’s start again, shall we. I’m Vlad, Vladimir, but I prefer Vlad.”
I shake his hand. “Matteo. Just Matteo.”
I can’t quite decipher the look he gives me. It’s not cold, but a warning of sorts.
“What are you drinking, Just Matteo?” He signals for the attention of a waiter.
“I’ll have a beer, thanks. This is an amazing hotel. What do you do for a living?” I jump straight in, not wasting any time.
“This and that,” he says vaguely. “I made my money in crypto, but I have other ventures. Tell me, what line of work are you in?”
“I’m in tech and cybersecurity,” I reply, noticing that he deflected quickly.
“We’re not so different after all.” He lifts his glass of water as a toast. I tap my bottle against his. “That explains why you have this little genius working for you,” he says.
I squeeze Elizabeth’s hand and stare into her eyes, hoping she’ll forgive me. “Yes. She’s amazing. Super smart. She’s the only woman on the floor and she’s better than all the men.”
“She was the only woman in our group,” Vlad says.
Our group? That’s something I never knew before. “She worked for you?” I turn to Elizabeth. Because she’s never mentioned it, and I figure that’s a normal thing to mention in the context of how they met.
“We met through an online forum. I already told you that,” says Elizabeth, wearily. Something about her tone is off.
Vlad chuckles. “Those were the days.”
“You’re a computer whizz, too?” I ask, wanting to extract as much information as I can from him, to fill the holes that Elizabeth deliberately left out.
“I dabble.”
“Let’s talk about the wedding,” Elizabeth says to Vlad. “That’s why we’re all here. Tell us about the events you’ve got planned.”
He proceeds to tell us that he and his fiancé are hosting a small dinner this evening for the guests who’ve arrived already.
I’m even more interested in going now, hoping to unearth some more information about this guy.
He tells us that there’s also a barbecue at a cliffside venue tomorrow evening, followed by the wedding the next day, and then a couple of days spent with the newlyweds after that.
He mentions something about a yacht trip along the Adriatic.
It sounds glamorous, and I’m not too keen on spending this much time with everyone, but I will go wherever Elizabeth wants to go. My hand slips and rests on her thigh, and she turns to me, her eyes curious and searching.
Are we okay? She’s asking.
I nod, giving her thigh a gentle squeeze. She scoots closer to me, and my arm goes easily around her shoulder. She snuggles closer, fitting perfectly alongside me and I have a feeling that this vacation might not be so bad after all.