“I moved to London, Mamma Isabella. Didn’t Mom tell you?”
She didn’t respond but called to the back, “Lorenzo, get out here!”
I rolled my eyes. Mamma Isabella and my mom had been trying to get Lorenzo and I to date since we were both born. Lorenzo had a boyfriend and had been out since he was about fourteen. It didn’t stop Isabella though.
“Isabella, this is my friend Andrew,” I said, turning to Andrew.
She looked him up and down and smiled tightly, then turned back to the kitchen. “Lorenzo, did you hear me? Sofia is here.”
I grinned as a huge hulk of a man wearing a white chef’s uniform appeared from around the counter. “Sofia!” I turned back to Andrew and smiled at him as Lorenzo came charging toward me.
I squealed as Lorenzo picked me up and swung me around. “It’s been a while,” he said, setting me back down on my feet. “I hear you’ve been in London.”
“Yeah, I’m just back for a few days. This is my friend, Andrew.” I hadn’t expected all this fuss when we came in or I wouldn’t have come. Most times I came to Ferrara’s now, there were a bunch of strangers behind the counter and I could slip in unnoticed.
Lorenzo did an up-and-down sweep of Andrew just like his mother had, but his gaze wasn’t disapproving. He turned back to me with a grin. “Nice,” he said, before leaning toward Andrew and shaking his hand. “I’ve known this one since she was in diapers. I have all the dirt if you need any.”
I laughed. “You were in diapers too. Like you have anything on me.”
After some catching up, a pile of pastries stuffed into boxes, and lots of kissing, we were on our way.
“Sorry about that,” I said as we got out to the street. “I didn’t expect Mamma Isabella to be there. She can be a lot for an uptight British guy.”
He chuckled. “Nothing I can’t handle. But I have to warn you, I think she hopes her gay son is going to marry you.”
“I know,” I said, smiling and shaking my head. “Lorenzo’s boyfriend of five years spends the holidays with them. He’s out, but they still think he might marry a nice Italian girl. I’ve stopped trying to convince her it’s never going to happen.”
“So you grew up around here?” he asked.
“Sort of. My grandma lived around the corner and my mom cleaned at Ferrara’s before she went through beauty school. I’d always go with her—even as a baby—so I’ve known them all since I was born.”
He scooped up my hand into his and we walked north “It’s . . . nice seeing you in this environment. It’s different.”
“You mean when you’re not snapping at me or we’re not naked?”
“I suppose.” He looked a little confused, or at least like he was trying to figure something out. I was too happy to question anything. I was back home, among my people, with a man I liked more with every passing day. He was far from the monster Natalie thought he was, and so much more than most people gave him credit for. He was the most open and honest man I’d ever met. He was loyal and kind, and I was going to soak up every minute I was with him.
“How come you went to work with your mum?” he asked.
I shrugged. “My grandma was too old and frail to look after me, and my mom couldn’t afford childcare.”
“What about your dad?”
“He . . . wasn’t around. He was a British guy who left her when he found out she was pregnant.”
He squeezed my hand. “I’m sorry. You’ve never known him?”
“I’ve seen him a few times since I’ve been in London,” I said. “I’m . . . exploring that.”
“Wow. That must be . . .”
“It’s a lot of things. Confusing, challenging, sometimes good. I’m just taking one step at a time. A coffee here. A lunch there. I have to check my resentment, you know? He’s always had so much, and we never had much of anything.”
“He didn’t pay child support?”
“Nope.” I went on to explain his reasoning. “I get it. But it doesn’t change the fact that I went to cleaning jobs with my mom from when I was six weeks old so she could put food on the table. Speaking of, we need to get on the subway. Next stop is the New York Public Library. It’s free and safe and full of books—the best place in the world as far as I was concerned as a kid.”
We stopped in the middle of the street, strangers rushing by us. He pulled me toward him and landed a sweet kiss on my forehead. “I’m more than happy to go book browsing with you, but I draw the line at a subway ride. Let’s use my car.” He nodded at a limo on the street.
“You’ve had your car following us?”
He shrugged, like that was a totally normal thing to do. “We can taste the cannoli on the way.”
“You had me at cannoli.”
I pulled in a deep breath as the limo cruised to a stop in front of the library. There was nowhere in this city that felt more like home.
We left the remaining cannoli in the car—Mamma Isabella didn’t know what “no” and “too much” meant. Hand in hand, we started up the steps. “Hey, Patience,” I said to the huge stone lion on the left. “Hi, Fortitude.”
“Friends of yours?” Andrew asked.
“Friends of the city. Friends of the library. And anyway, who doesn’t like a stone lion? Do you guys have names for the lions in Trafalgar Square?”
“Not as far as I know. But lions aren’t my specialty. I’m more of a penguin man myself.”
I started to laugh. “Really? I would have thought you’d pick cheetah or eagle or something. Why penguins?”
“Those fuckers can withstand temperatures of minus fifty centigrade. They survive in the most inhospitable places on earth. They swim at twenty miles per hour, they’re waterproof. They’re indestructible.”
I nudged him. This playful side of Andrew was completely adorable. If only Natalie knew.
“I know it was only built at the turn of the last century, but being in here always makes me feel like I’m in ancient Greece or something.” I stared up at the cream columns nudging up into archways that seemed to reach so high, they were holding up the sky. “Come on, let’s go to the biology department.” I tugged at his hand.
“You think I need an anatomy lesson?”
“Absolutely not. But I have something fun to show you.” We wound our way up and down stairs, through doorways, this way and that through rows of books before finally finding the shelf I was looking for. “I want to see if it’s still here,” I said, my voice a half whisper despite there not being a soul in our immediate vicinity.
“What?”
“I’ll show you. Have patience, Mr. Blake.”
He glanced behind us then circled his arms around my waist, stopping me where we were and kissing my neck. “Hey, we’re in a public place.” He relented and took my hand as I led him deeper into the stacks.
“Can I ask how on earth you know your way around the biology department this well? What did you read at University?”
“What did I read? You mean what did I major in? Economics. With a minor in politics. Nothing to do with biology.” I scanned the bookshelves, searching for the hidden treasure.