Chapter 20
Twenty
Mark
I owe Lexington payback for that picture she sent me last night, but I’ve been working all morning and haven’t come up with a revenge strategy.
Worse than her stunt—I can respect being well-played—is the fact Luca saw it and demanded to know why someone sent me a picture of my street.
It didn’t go well. “Just because” didn’t suffice, and he insisted I come to his restaurant today for lunch and give him the scoop.
I enter his cramped kitchen through the back and hang out by the fridge where I’m out of the way of the waiter coming in and out with orders and the cooks filling plates and washing dishes at the massive sink.
Luca glances over his shoulder but doesn’t pause in chopping onions. “So, about the photo of your building. Talk.” He uses English for a thin layer of privacy, although I’m pretty sure at least one of the cooks speaks fluent English.
“No greeting? No lunch first?”
“Ha. You’re not getting a thing out of me until I get the nitty-gritties.”
I stifle a hoot. Luca’s slang is a work of art. Teaching him old and awkward words isn’t making him less cool—I have a sinking feeling he’ll end up starting a huge citywide trend.
I don’t keep much from Luca. But this, yes. I’ve had all night to compose a quick, innocuous summary. “It’s some American I made a bet with. She and I exchanged phone numbers to work out the winner. That’s all.”
“And what does she look like?” He finishes chopping and grabs a head of garlic.
I freeze—and that is not a refrigerator pun. I expected his next question to be about the bet and how it relates to a picture of my apartment. “Why does that matter?”
“Because you’re being cagey.”
Well now I regret teaching him that word last month.
“Answer my question.”
“Brown hair. Medium height.” Sounds nice and average. Which Lexington is anything but.
Luca smashes the garlic with the side of a massive knife. I’m staying over here by the fridge until he’s done. “You think I care about her height? What does she look like?”
Gray eyes that turn blue when she’s emotional and passionate. A smile that makes the air itself lose its breath. I clear my throat. The less I think about her looks, the better. “I already told you.”
Luca stabs the knife straight into the wooden cutting board and it wobbles upright. I understand how the cutting board feels as he pins me with his sharp stare. “You know what I mean.”
Mr. Laid-Back Luca is getting pushy today. I have to give him something. “Nice smile. Straight teeth.”
Great. Now it sounds like I’ve been staring at her mouth, and not with a dentist’s professional interest.
The waiter pops his head into the kitchen, his massive frame eclipsing the sight of the restaurant behind him. “Your sister’s here, Luca. If you want to eat with them, we can cover for you in here.” He runs a hand over his shaved head. “She brought a friend.”
I grimace at Luca. “Is she trying to set one of us up with someone again?”
Luca rolls his eyes, brushes the onion and garlic into the hot oil, and hands his olive-wood spoon over to one of the other guys. Over the loud sizzle from his pan, he says, “Don’t try to wiggle out of this. For the third time, what does she look like?”
He pushes through the doors into the cramped dining area, headed for Mariella at the corner table in the back with two empty seats saved for us. I follow, then stop in my tracks. Lexington.
What? Did she meet Mariella at the reception, is this a coincidence . . . or is Lexington popping up on purpose to haunt me?
I’m processing way too slowly. I yank Luca’s arm and drag him back into the kitchen. That, I want to say to Luca. That is exactly what she looks like.
But I can’t risk my cousin knowing this bet is with her. Everyone in my family is a sieve. Like those homemade volcano science experiments with the baking soda and vinegar, one drop and we’ll have a full-blown, exploding mess everyone thinks is fun except the person in charge of cleaning it up.
“Dude, what are you doing?” Luca pulls toward the door but I keep a firm grip on his arm.
“Wait.” I have no explanation for my behavior, since all my brain seems capable of right now is repeating Lexington over and over. “Bathroom” is all that comes out. Nailed it.
Luca blinks at me like I landed my alien spaceship on his roof.
I release his arm. “I’ll meet you at the table, you go on ahead.”
I duck over to the WC on the other side of the dining area and stand in front of the mirror, gripping the edge of the sink.
I suck in a deep breath. We’re in my territory, with my family, at my cousin’s restaurant.
I have the advantage here, despite a few pesky questions I need answered.
This is my city, my life. She’s passing through. I can handle this.
I stand straighter, practice a polite, unaffected welcoming expression, and walk out of the bathroom headed for the table.
The moment Lexington and I lock gazes, she draws back in her seat, gray eyes wide. So this isn’t her next prank. But her surprise morphs, and soon she’s looking at me like a victor ready to enter round two of the tournament.
She’s waiting for me to make the next move in our little game, and I like that she expects payback for her actions from last night. I shake my head with a small smirk that says you have no idea what you’ve started.
She grins and raises an eyebrow. All her hesitation is gone and that challenging spunk takes over.
“Mark.” Mariella’s voice sounds exasperated, as if she’d called my name several times.
I drop into the last empty chair, on Lexington’s left, and turn to Mariella. “What?”
She’s giving me an impatient, searching look. In English, she says, “This is my new friend, Lexi Walker. Lexi, this is my cousin, Mark, and my twin brother, Luca. And guess what, Mark, Lexi is the daughter—”
Lexington shoots her a sharp look, a quick shake of her head, and holds out her hand to Luca. “Nice to meet you.”
What was that about?
When she shakes my hand, I feign confusion. “You look familiar.”
Mariella flaps open her napkin and lays it on her lap. “Lexi gave a speech at the reception. She’s helping with the festival.”
Lexington squeezes my hand in warning, and we both release. Not sure who had the upper hand there, pun intended. “That must be it.”
So we’ll pretend we haven’t run into each other six times over the last three days and spent a night next to each other on the plane. I just wish I wasn’t quite so conscious of our knees brushing under the white cotton tablecloth.
Luca tilts his chair back, reaching for the stack of menus behind him on the bar. “Lexi, I usually have our group eat whatever’s not selling as much, but I can grab you a menu so you can order what you want.”
She smiles. “No, I’m sure everything here is amazing.”
“Because it’s Italy, right?” Luca expects her to give the impersonal blanket compliment to all Italian food, with the assumption that every chef is equal by virtue of lineage. We all expect it. Mariella is waving down a waiter, only half listening.
“Because your sister said this was the best.”
Luca’s chair drops back to the ground and he zeros in on Mariella.
His polite chitchat amiability is replaced with such obvious hope that Mariella puts her arm down and gives him a small nod.
Luca gets flack all the time for not following in his father’s footsteps, for walking away from the family business, for switching careers midstream.
He doesn’t complain because he avoids conflict, but I haven’t heard him receive praise for his cooking skills or choice of work from his family.
And now in thirty seconds, Lexington has given him this gift, a salve on his wound.
Because that’s what Lexington does. She finds a person’s emotional paper cut and does what she can to soothe it. For everyone but me, thanks to our disagreement on the plane.
She’s fingering her necklace and must forget the lira’s gone, because she gasps and feels around the chain.
“Is something wrong?” Mariella asks.
“Oh.” Her shoulders drop and she frowns. “No, I had a coin on my necklace someone gave me. It meant a lot to me, and I forgot for a second I’d taken it off.”
I knew it. The second I saw her at the fountain yesterday, the way she was looking at the water as if she’d just lost everything, the way her eyes misted when I asked if she’d thrown it in, the way she dropped her defenses with me for a brief moment before that hawker selling flowers interrupted us and broke the connection.
I don’t love how compelled I feel now to make her laugh and ease her regret. All while keeping it secret from my cousins that she’s my competition in a bet. I’m walking a very thin line.
The waiter brings us a bottle of wine and then our first course, plates of pasta zinging with the delicious tang of ricotta and lemon.
Lexington hums with pleasure at her first bite. “This is amazing, Luca. I would be a changed woman if I had food like this every day.”
“What’s a normal lunch back home?”
“I have a smoothie, but there are, if you can believe it”—her eyebrow arches in exaggerated astonishment—“people who grab three bags of chips. Without a single thought to flavor or health.”
While Mariella and Luca echo her shock at this barbaric behavior, Lexington smiles at me. This woman is trouble.
“I bet they have good reasons, though,” I add. Weak, but I’ll have my opening for a comeback soon.
“And what could those possibly be?” She’s batting her dark lashes in an innocent-Bambi move that makes me almost lose it.
“Travel emergencies.” I drum my fingers on the table, shooting for nonchalant but hitting weird and random instead.
Her face contorts, trying to hold in a burst of laughter.
Luca gives a quick shake of his head, and I know he means, Be normal, dude. He’s used to me either being comfortable enough with family to let out my weird, or the silent guy in public, so my behavior with her must confuse him.
He asks about Lexington’s plans while she’s in Italy.
She lights up and explains her itinerary, which is pretty much all the popular tourist sites.
Luca looks impressed. “Sounds like you’ve been planning this for a while.”
“You have no idea.” Lexington takes a sip of wine.
“Good thing you didn’t lose your passport before getting on the plane,” I murmur behind my glass. “It happens, and then people are left hoping a hero comes along to save the day.”
She has to twist her head away for a moment so she doesn’t lose it, then turns back, narrowing her eyes with a get ready sparkle.
“Heroes are overrated. They’re always so die-hard about movie quotes.
” Before Luca and Mariella can question what in the world she means, she says, “Speaking of passports, were you all born and raised in Rome?”
Mariella nods and tilts her fork toward me. “Except him. He’s only half-Italian and grew up in Boston.”
“So I have a question for you and Luca.” Mirth and mischief bubble in her voice, and I sit up straight. Here it comes—she’s up to something. “What would you say is the heart of Italy?”
Whoa. The nerve. The brilliance. I have met my match.
I slip my hand under the tablecloth and flick her knee. She makes a surprised little squeak—half ouch and half laugh—but doesn’t look at me. Or move her knee away.
Mariella taps her knife on the table. “Great question, Lexi. I think I would have to say—”
Not so fast, people. I hold up my hand, palm out. “Hey, let’s let her figure it out herself. You know, a little challenge for her time in Italy. That would be fun, huh?”
All three of them turn to ogle me, and I don’t blame them. I sound like an awkward preteen who hasn’t been out of the house for two years. Lexington only lacks a box of popcorn and her enjoyment of the show will be complete.
“Stai a rosica, Mark?” Luca doesn’t know Lexington can understand his Romanesque slang, asking if I’m jealous they get Lexi’s attention while I have to sit this question out. But I can’t tell him because he thinks Lexington and I are complete strangers.
I shove his foot. Small tables and long tablecloths are my new favorite thing about Luca’s restaurant.
He smiles, unfazed. “What were you saying, Mariella?”
You know what? It’s fine. To win, Lexington still has to capture the heart of Italy in a picture and gain the majority of Italian votes, and she won’t, even if my cousins give her the perfect idea of what to take a picture of. I’m the photographer here, and the guy who lives in Rome.
Another glance at Lexington—that smile—and I realize she might be pretty good at getting what she wants. This is between her and me. I need a distraction, now.
Wasting good wine by knocking over my glass is out, and so is pretend falling out of my chair. Panicked for time, I inhale several times and release a massive staged sneeze.
All three of them edge back a little in their seats because we all know that extra couple inches will save you from a germ somersaulting through the air.
The sneeze only took a second, not long enough to be a sufficient interruption.
I merge the sneeze into an extended, uncontrollable cough.
Lexington hits me on the back, hard enough it’s clear she knows it’s fake.
Mariella offers me my glass, but I wave it away.
I don’t want anything that would stop this train wreck.
A minute of coughing should do the trick. There’s no way we’ll go back to Lexington’s question at this point. I let the cough die down. “I’m sorry, I don’t know what that was, piece of food thought it could cheat and skip the right way to go down, I guess,” I rasp.
Mariella’s mouth hangs open at my performance.
But this is apparently what I do, what I’ve done from the second I saw this woman in Boston. Overreact to Lexington Rose Walker. In every sense of the word.