“Let me catch you.”
He put his lips on mine. I bent under him, yielding completely to his mouth, the rhythm of his lips, the force of his tongue. I allowed myself to hope that there was a way out, and at the same time, the hope lived with resignation.
I didn’t want that kiss to end. It shouted down my confusion. I wanted to drown in it. Take my last breath with him. Die connected in a painless flood of arousal and sorrow. But through the window came the pop of a wine cork, and he straightened.
“Let me take you back to the house,” he said, his voice covered with a thin sheet of urgency. “I swear I’ll meet you there.”
“Do you not want me to talk to your wife?”
“I don’t want her to talk, period.”
“This intrigues me.” I slipped away from him and strode quickly back to the street. I opened the restaurant door to Daniel filling the glasses. “Don’t you have a campaign to run?” I felt my face getting red in the warm dining room. “You’ve been socializing without talking politics.”
“Gerry wants me out of the way until the trick you played at the wedding dies down.”
He handed Valentina a glass. She swirled it, avoiding eye contact with me.
“Sorry about that.”
He handed me a glass. “No, you’re not.”
“No. I’m not.”
Behind me, Antonio spoke sharply to Valentina. “Non bere quell vino.”
“Salute.” She raised her glass and, in a single open-throated gulp, poured the entire contents down her throat.
Antonio groaned as Valentina clacked her glass on the bar and made a swirling motion above it with her finger. Daniel refilled it.
“Sit down for primi,” Zia said as she burst through the swinging doors with a tray of manicotti. She set it in the center of a round table, which had already been set for four.
“Grazie, Zia! Bene!” Valentina said with an enthusiasm I hadn’t noticed before. She grabbed her glass and the bottle and sat.
I sat across from her, and when Antonio placed himself next to me, I whispered, “Isn’t Zia eating?”
He made a tsk noise with a shake of the head and placed his napkin in his lap.
“What about Antonin? Where is he?” I realized the question was just on the other side of inappropriate when it was all the way out of my mouth.
Valentina took the half-empty glass from her lips and answered. “I sent him home. It’s hell here. I don’t know how you stand the smells. Car exhaust. It’s everywhere. When I was first married, I had to scrub it out of my husband’s clothes every day. I will not have my son smell like street grease.”
“He took a plane home alone? To Europe?” Daniel asked, sliding a cheesy tube onto her plate.
“Non-stop flight. We do it all the time. Only Americans circle their children like helicopters. Give me another one please.” She indicated the manicotti and brought the wine to her lips again.
“Tina, enough,” Antonio said, reaching for the glass.
She slapped him away. Had I thought she was haughty and controlled? Because she didn’t seem that way anymore.
“Tell me, Tonio, what have you been doing here? Besides pretending you’re dead and letting your girlfriend drink all she wants?”
“Avoiding this guy.” He smirked, pointing his fork at Daniel.
I took a slice of manicotti and watched as Valentina shoveled down half of one neatly and efficiently.
“You fail at this,” she said after she washed it down. “He’s right here.”
Daniel smiled and pushed his cheese around the plate, obviously finding this whole thing very amusing. He filled her wine glass, and she graced him with a beatific smile. God, she was stunning. A thoroughbred.
I got Daniel’s attention and mouthed, “More wine.”
He grinned and got up for another bottle.
“What else?” She swirled her wine around as if she was baiting Antonio.
“Just running my business.”