CHAPTER 7
DOVE
My hands are a mess, and I can’t help but giggle at how strange it feels to have them covered in butter, garlic, and herbs.
But that’s what happens when making the chicken I have planned for tonight’s dinner.
I use my wrist to turn the facet on in the kitchen and wash my hands while eyeing the chicken that is now ready to go in the oven.
I don’t know if he’s always been this way, but Angelo is very predictable when it comes to his schedule.
While he’s spent a lot of time with me in his penthouse home, there have been times when he’s had to go into his office.
I have no idea where it is or what it looks like, but I would bet money that it’s posh as fuck and there is always a flurry of activity.
I can only imagine, seeing as I’ve never worked in an office environment. When I was younger, I waited tables, but those jobs never lasted long. It’s not like I did anything wrong, but trouble has a way of finding me no matter how hard I try to avoid it.
Having Angelo Amato seeing me, abducting me only to move me into his place, and telling me things to make me wonder if I entered some fairy tale parallel universe is proof of that. If the situation I find myself in isn’t trouble, I don’t know what is.
Over the last few days, Angelo has been making sure I have everything I need and have felt comfortable settling into his place. I’ll be honest, it doesn’t quite feel like it’s my place. Not yet.
I’m not entirely sure if it’ll ever feel that way.
How could it when everything in the penthouse is sleek, modern, and minimalistic?
It’s not really my style. Even though I’ve never had much, I usually go for color and cozy over sterile and straight lines.
Angelo’s home is the kind of place where you step inside and know a fancy designer decorated it.
If they were trying to make this place feel like a home, they failed. If they were trying to make it worthy of a magazine spread, then they succeeded. I’ve been scared of breaking something by breathing nearby.
That doesn’t mean that Angelo hasn’t been trying to help me feel comfortable here. He has. While I get the chicken in the oven, I can’t help but think about how cute he looked when my entire apartment, except for the furniture, found its way to his living room in perfectly packed boxes.
I say they just showed up there because I never heard or saw a soul. When Angelo carried me to the shower, my stuff wasn’t there. The next time I walked into the living room, showered but not dressed properly for the day, it was all there.
And in the middle of it all was Angelo.
He turned toward me and smiled. It was a boyish smile which had my heart melting for him. I could feel it happen—my insides just turning to mush.
I wanted to slap myself. Falling into some fantasy would not end well.
The problem is that Angelo has been steady. He’s not even questioning himself and what he’s gotten into with me. The man is determined.
When he was standing in the middle of my life, I realized what a small one I had been living. It’s been hard and I’ve done the best I could. I’m not denying that, but that doesn’t mean I was particularly proud of it. He looked so big in relation to my belongings.
Then I thought about what I had seen in his space. It wasn’t exactly full of life. Quite the opposite. It was devoid of it.
I started to really look at the small things I had acquired. While I couldn’t do it often, I had been able to visit places fairly close by. Whenever I had the chance to visit a new place, I picked up a reminder. They were somewhere in the boxes.
Last year I decided to teach myself how to make a snuggly blanket. It felt like something your grandmother might teach you. Considering I’d never had one, I decided I might as well teach myself.
The blanket I crocheted was somewhere in the boxes.
Angelo moved closer to me, his steps soft and curious instead of commanding. His large hands cupped my cheeks and raised my face until I was looking at him. His hazel eyes were brimming with questions.
“I don’t have much,” I blurted out.
“You have what you have.” He said it so simply and suddenly I wasn’t as worried about my lack of things.
Since then, I’ve unpacked. Begrudgingly.
Now it’s Christmas Eve. For the last few days, Angelo has quietly infused Christmas into the penthouse. A tree appeared while I was unpacking. Begrudgingly.
I swear a new garland has been magically appearing here or there about every hour when Angelo has been around. Nothing appears when he’s out. It makes it pretty obvious who is playing Santa.
Yesterday a set of keys showed up on the island along with a wad of cash and a note. Of course, Angelo left it.
“Go shopping, la mia pace,” his scrawl was flowy but with an edge and surprisingly legible. “Buy whatever you need or want. I’ll be home around five or I will call you.”
I wondered how he got my number, but when I looked at my phone, I had a text.
Il mio re: I took the liberty of adding my number to your phone. There’s no point in arguing with me about it. It’s already done. Have fun today.
I looked it up. It means ‘my king’ and all I could do was roll my eyes. His self-assuredness should have been a turn-off. It wasn’t. It only made me want him more.
After looking through the kitchen, I went to the grocery store. I knew someone was following me because I’m not stupid and I’ve gotten this far in life by being observant. They haven’t interfered and I don’t see any reason to bring it up.
When arms wrap around my waist and pull me from my thoughts, I don’t jump. I know who it is. His scent is all woodsy smoke with a hint of citrus. It makes me want to curl up in his lap and snuggle against his chest.
For a muscular man, burrowing against him is surprisingly comfortable. Then there’s the fact that I want to do it at all. I’ve never been much of a cuddler, but with him, it’s all I want to do.
It makes no damn sense.
He plants kisses up and down my neck, the warmth of him seeping into me while he gently sways us from side to side. We’re almost dancing, and the whole thing strikes me as so silly and ridiculous that I can’t help but giggle. I would never have imagined this moment.
Never.
“Merry Christmas Eve, la mia pace,” his words slide against my skin, and they feel like a caress. “It smells good in here.”
“Merry Christmas Eve,” I echo, my voice sounding small compared to his. I’m still not sure about all of this.
Angelo is though. And it shows.
“I’m just making some chicken. We have some time while it bakes,” I tell him while glancing at the timer.
He makes a humming sound and picks me up to carry me into the living room. The same room where a Christmas tree with all the trimmings appeared the other day. Well, it was there and it was lit up, but the ornaments were in boxes around it like a holiday offering.
As we decorated the tree together, he asked me questions. They were the light, airy questions you always ask when you’re getting to know someone. The difference when it came to Angelo wasn’t in the questions, it was in the way he listened intently to my answers.
I swear the man was putting together a mental spreadsheet about me.
I’m not used to his kind of focus.
“How was your day?”
Angelo’s question pulls me out of my thoughts, and I relax against his chest from my seat on his lap. When I look at the tree, I’m glad there aren’t any presents underneath it. It would be too much.
I would have gotten him something nice. I wanted to. With a small shake of my head, I push away the memory. Things did not go as planned.
“It was okay,” I tell him. “I went out and did some shopping.”
Not a lie. I did go out. I did buy things. Which means shopping happened. Did I get everything I wanted to? No. But that’s not the point.
He makes a humming sound again as he grips my chin and tips my face up toward him. When he takes my mouth, the kiss starts out sweet. It doesn’t stay that way.
I don’t know what it is about this man, but whenever he kisses me, it’s like I lose myself. In him. In the way he makes me feel. In the pleasure flowing through my body.
As much as I could get used to it, and desperately want to, I try to keep some emotional distance between us. Angelo doesn’t allow it. He pushes past the defenses I try to put up. He closes the distance between us, never letting me stray far and that goes for metaphorical and physical distances.
It’s maddening.
And incredibly endearing.
And probably a giant fucking red flag.
Somehow, when it’s him, I don’t mind.
Neither of us has mentioned Romeo since the kitchen incident on the first morning of my…relocation, for lack of a better word. But I know he’s not Angelo’s only family.
“Are you sure there isn’t family you need to spend time with tomorrow?”
This isn’t the first time I’ve asked, and he insisted there isn’t anything he’ll be missing tomorrow by being at home with me. I’m not so sure.
“I’m spending the holiday right here. With you. It’s where I want to be for Christmas so that’s how it’ll be.” When I continue to look at him, waiting for more of an answer, he sighs. “Stubborn,” he rumbles before leaning forward and kissing my forehead.
“You would know, Mr. Amato,” I tease him. “You’re the most stubborn man I’ve ever met.”
He takes a deep breath and lets out a sound of contentment that echoes through me with recognition.
“My parents are on a trip. When they first talked to us about the trip, they said they planned to come back for the holidays but then realized their boys are grown men who don’t have the same wonderment when it comes to Christmas.
They laid on the guilt and mentioned it would be different if there were grandchildren in the mix. ”
I can’t help but chuckle. It’s hard to imagine an older version of Angelo, and the man who ran the family before handing off the title of Don, trying to persuade his son to get married and have some kids.