Page 49 of Wild Card

Catriona

I sleep for most of the afternoon.

When I wake up, I’m under a blanket on the couch. The smell of warm, home cooked food greets me, and I wish my stomach were in better shape. I sit up slowly and stretch carefully, not wanting to wake up any injuries. I get to my feet just as slowly. I feel better, stronger, but I don’t take it for granted that the feeling will last.

I make my way to the kitchen. Gio’s large body is hunched over the table, and his grandmother sees me and waves.

“Gattina,” she says. “How are you?”

“Fine, thank you.” I smile at her but sit next to Gio. I want to know what he’s doing.

He has a bag in one of his big hands and squeezes it, filling a pastry shell. It seems like delicate work a man of his size couldn’t manage, but I know better. Those talented hands can make all kinds of magic. I flush at the memory of it.

“I didn’t have time to make the pastry from scratch,” he says, feeling my eyes on him. “But I did make the filling.”

“Gio’s cannoli are wonderful,” his grandmother says. “Me and his mama taught him well. He said you’d never had them! No wonder you’re so skinny.”

Maybe it’s the lack of cannoli, or maybe it’s trauma and my resulting inability to eat much, but who can say.

I’m not going to put that on his grandmother though.

Also, so many jokes about Gio’s cannoli run through my mind, and I can’t make any of them in front of his grandmother. Well, at least not directly.

“I can’t wait to try it.”

I “accidentally” run my foot over his shin.

He’s too busy concentrating on his dessert, though, and dips the ends of the one he’s holding in a bowl of mini chocolate chips and hands it to me.

“It’s simple,” he says, as if in apology. “Just the standard filling. But I was afraid anything richer would make you sick.”

The jokes write themselves here. I bet Gio’s never made anyone sick with his cannoli. Hopefully.

I look at the pastry, turning the golden shell in my fingers. I close my eyes and take a bite.

It’s sweet, but not overly so. The crispy shell breaks, and I lick the filling off of my fingers. When I open my eyes, Gio is staring at me with an intensity that’s hotter than it should be given we’re in his grandmother’s kitchen. Thank God her back is to us.

I finish the cannoli and suck a finger into my mouth under the guise of catching any escaped filling.

I’m teasing him, and it’s probably foolish, but it’s nice to feel some kind of power.

“Delicious,” I say. “You’re very good at this.”

His dark eyes linger on my lips, and it goes right to my core. I’m playing with fire, but I’d like a flame that could match my own.

He looks like he wants to devour me, and I think I want that too.

His grandmother pulls something out of the oven, and the resounding bang of the door snapping shut breaks the tension.

“You need help with that, Nonna?” he asks.

She sets a large casserole down on the stove top.

“It’s just got to settle. I made Chicken Tetrazzini. Something light.”

Mrs. DeLuca’s idea of light would make my mother shit a brick, so to speak. Chicken and pasta in a creamy wine sauce and all that parmesan cheese? Rose could never…

Gio’s grandmother spoons a heaping scoop on my plate. I thank her and eat slowly.

---