Chapter 5 Elio #2
We had a whole cabinet full of clothes in case someone in the house needed them.
No one really lived in the main house other than Father and me.
If I had more siblings, though, they’d have some of the houses in the wing where I lived all by myself.
Sometimes Agatha came by, but she’d be really discreet about the whole thing.
I sifted through the clothes in the cabinet, never having opened it myself before.
There was always someone in the house who’d get me what I wanted, but at this time at night, there wasn’t anyone around.
Something told me that my father had bid all the help in the house to leave me to my own devices.
He had to punish me in some way, and it seemed he’d picked this.
He could have picked something worse, and I’m glad that he hadn’t.
Maria was pleasant company.
In the end I decided on picking out a bunch of t-shirts and some pajamas that I could take to her room. There were other matters that I had to tend to. My father expected me to act the part of the don’s son, and that meant that I had to do some unpleasant things before the night was over.
I put that out of my mind just yet and headed to the guest wing with her spare clothes in my hand.
“Master Romano,” the butler, Thomas, was sitting by the main door, polishing his glasses. He was nearly as old as my father, and had been his lifelong attendant. A really loyal British guy with a thick accent and a way of knowing where everything in the house was.
“Tom, you’re up late,” I said.
“At my age, Mr. Romano, when death is so close, it makes little sense to waste what precious life I have by sleeping. Here, I’ve got this beautiful book of poems,” he said, showing me the book on his lap. “And I intend to sit in the moonlight and read it.”
“Tom, you need to get a life. It seems like we both do,” I said, showing him the clothes I was holding.
“Are these for the guest staying with us?”
“Yep. Maria. She’s… eccentric but in a way that matches my eccentricity. Does that make sense?
“Are you smitten, Master Romano?” Tom smiled at me. “Because it sounds to me like you’re smitten.”
“Jees, Tom, no one’s smitten anymore. It’s not the 1800s.”
He shrugged and went back to his book.
“But, err, if you could get someone to send some tea and some late-night snacks to her room, that’d be swell. I don’t think she ate dinner.”
“I’ll see what the kitchen staff can manage, sir,” he said, closing his book and getting up. “Anything in particular?”
“Do we have steaks?”
“Of course, we have steaks, sir.”
“Maybe some steaks. See, I’m hungry too. No one offered me a plate at the auction, Tom. Can you believe it?”
“I can practically hear your stomach groaning, Master Romano,” he said, giving my shoulder a thump as he walked past me and toward the kitchen.
I went upstairs to the guest wing.
When I was young, I’d always find the lack of people in all the many rooms of this house spooky.
I’d wake up and go to my mother, crying.
She’d hug me and insist that I sleep with her in the same bed.
My father would protest, but then she’d give him a stern look, and he’d be fine with it.
Those were the best mornings, when I’d wake up next to my mother.
It’d feel like nothing could ever go wrong in the world.
The sun shining through the oak leaves outside our window, the air smelling of breakfast, and my father getting dressed for work while I stayed in bed with my mother, thinking about skipping school.
As I grew up, I found some kind of solace in the emptiness of the house. Outside, it was loud. People rushing on the streets, people yelling at each other, the big blaring ads on the billboards, and car horns. People loved to romanticize New York, but they never talked about how loud it was.
However, when I’d come home, it’d be peaceful. Yes, even with my Father in the house, it’d be peaceful, because there were dozens of rooms where I could avoid him.
And not all the rooms in this mansion were bedrooms. We had a game room, a steam room, a spa, a pool lounge, a theater, a massive library, and a big courtyard that reminded my father of Tuscany.
He’d often sit there reading books and smoking cigars.
He was an absolute fiend for coffee, so there was always someone coming from the kitchen with cups of it.
We also had a music room where my Father kept all his records. Recently, I’d started putting some of my records in there too. He hadn’t seemed to mind. It was just everything else I did that he didn’t like.
I shrugged myself free of that thought and walked toward the room where she was staying.
I knocked on it.
“Come in,” she said.
I walked into the sight of her standing there in a black bra and matching panties.
“Jesus, dude! Get out!” she said, covering herself.
“But you said come in!”
“I thought you were the house help!”
“I don’t have any!” I retorted, covering my eyes. “Here. I bought you some clothes!”
“Thanks. Please get out while I get changed. Jesus Christ, that was fucking embarrassing!”
I closed the door behind me, blushing red in the face. And yet, despite the embarrassment, I couldn’t get that picture out of my head. Her standing there, slender-bodied, her breasts so supple, her thighs thick, long like a model’s.
Seriously, how did this girl end up in my life out of nowhere?
And why the fuck was she so unbelievably hot?
The door opened, and she peeked from behind. “All right, if you want to come in, you can do it now.”
“I’m really sorry about barging in like that,” I said, taking my coat from her and putting it on my arm.
“You’re fine. It’s not like you haven’t seen a girl in her underwear before,” she said, checking herself out in the mirror.
“None as beautiful as you, though.”
“I’m pretty sure a guy like you says that to all the girls he meets.”
“Yeah right, because I must naturally be a grade-A douchebag,” I said, grinning at her.
“Dude,” she said, giving me a cut-the-bullshit look. “We covered your boat party in the news. There’s a picture of you with four girls in bikinis grinding against your body atop a yacht. And I’m pretty sure two of them were Victoria's Secret models.”
“Actually, the other two were also Victoria's Secret models.”
“So… quit it. I ain’t got shit on them,” she said.
“Not true,” I said, shaking my head. “I think you’re pretty.”
“Do you really mean it or are you just fulfilling your end of the deal with your father?”
“My father’s not here,” I said.
“Right.”
At that moment, there was a knock on the door.
“Come in,” I said.
Tom opened the door and came in with a trolley.
“What’s this?”
“Oh, this? It’s got four wheels, lugs around food and whatnot,” I said.
“Master Romano wanted to treat you to a late-night dinner,” Tom said, giving her a slight bow. Way to embarrass me, Tom.
“What a gentleman,” she said, grinning.
“Oh, you may just yet find that he’s more gentlemanly than most people give him credit for, ma’am, but I may be biased. I practically raised him ever since he was in diapers,” Tom said.
“Jesus Christ, Tom, I’m pretty sure she doesn’t want the image of me in diapers in her head. She’s been through enough today,” I said, glowering.
“Right you are, Master Romano,” Tom said, nodding at me and going out of the room.
“I think that was really sweet of you,” she said, looking at the trolley laden with food. “Come on. I’m not going to eat it all by myself. I’m pretty sure you’re hungry too.”
“What gave it away?”
“Dude, your stomach practically groaned when he pushed the trolley into the room,” she laughed, and I laughed with her.
There was something so freeing about her that it made me want to laugh without any worry in the world.
And yet, there were worries that waited outside, worries that I needed to attend to before the night ended.
“Be with you in a moment,” I said, slipping out of the room.
I checked the clock. It was twelve-thirty.
The night was still young.
Wherever Jimmy’s goons were—the ones who had chased us through Manhattan all the way to Long Island—I’d find them.
I took my phone out and dialed Robert’s number. He was Uncle Lucas’s son, and usually on top of everything. He’d know what to do. My father hadn’t said that I couldn’t be resourceful.
“Elio,” Robert said, his voice grave.
“Hey, how are you doing, brother?”
“Not too shabby. What’s this about?”
“Four black Ford F-150s without license plates, tinted windows. They came near the compound but turned back before they could cross over to our territory. Most likely Jimmy Donaldson’s men. I need you to apprehend the vehicles, round up the drivers,” I said.
“Give me a day,” Robert said. Robert was a made man, and it had nothing to do with the fact that he was Uncle Lucas’s son. Robert was probably the most resourceful guy in our team. He lived for this life. He knew everyone, and everyone knew that he was dangerous.
“Get back to me when you’re done,” I said.
“Roger that.”
It was kind of an open secret that my father and Uncle Lucas wanted Robert to be my right-hand man eventually.
Well, why not now?