Page 56 of The Holiday Hate-Off
Did she hurt herself when she fell down the steps?
Did she say anything else to my grandmother?
I don’t like that she knows about my mother. I’d prefer it if no one knew. But I can’t take the knowledge back from her.
Still, almost as if I’m in a dream, I find myself getting up and heading for the door. It’s madness. I don’t even know if she’s working today—she can’t possibly work every day—but she was over here earlier, and it’s possible she’s at the Sip now.
Besides, I’m being practical. I need to tell her not to talk to my grandmother about my mother.
I stalk out of the office and through the store, driven by the need to see her.
“Is it too much to hope you just had a genius brain stroke that’s going to make us all rich?” Giovanni asks from the register.
“Strokes are bad, numbnuts.” Nico smirks at him from the sandwich counter.
I ignore both of them and step out into the cold air. On my way up, I look for the slippery spot on the steps, then head back inside to get a shovel to take care of it.
I’m not doing it for Lucy; I just don’t want anyone else falling down the steps.
I pass the flyer again and pause in the doorway, making a point to open it but stay outside.
My gaze only takes half a second to find her, not behind the counter but sitting at a table in the back with a latte and a book in her hands. She’s staring down at it, her curls cascading toward the pages. Botticelli would have been pissed that he’d never had the privilege of immortalizing her in paint. Even though I haven’t sketched in years, not since those days of bird watching with my nonno, I find myself wanting to sketchher.
“In or out, son,” says a grizzled old man near the door.
“I don’t want to get arrested.”
A woman at the table next to him gasps. “Why, it’s the handsome man from that flyer. I thought it was a joke.”
“No joke, ma’am,” I say. “I got banned for talking to one of the owner’s assistants.”
Charlie, who’s standing behind the counter, throws a dish towel at me and laughs when I catch it. “Ignore everything he says, folks. He’s a known menace.” Then she calls out to Lucy—who must be reading something engrossing, because she appears to have missed our entire interaction—saying, “Your nemesis is here, Lucy.”
She drops the book, then curses and frantically thumbs through it to find her place. I barely feel the cold as I watch her, taking in the slightly red blotch on her right cheek. That must be where she collided with the door.
“Can I speak with you in private for a moment, Lucia?” I askas she marks her spot in the book with a receipt unearthed from her bag.
“You’d better go with him,” Charlie says. “He’s letting in the cold.”
“Why don’t you just come in?” Lucy asks, her eyes moving over me. “You’re not wearing a coat.”
“I’ve been banned,” I say wryly. “Even though certain promises were made to my grandmother, the flyer’s still out here, collecting new graffiti.”
She puckers her lips and gets to her feet. “Let’s take a look at it together. I take defacement of my property very seriously.”
“Don’t forget your coat,” I say.
She gives me a look that accuses me of being half a dozen things, a hypocrite first and foremost, but I merely smile at her in return.
She puts on the coat, so I guess this once she’d prefer being warm to being right.
“I’m calling the cops if she’s not returned safely within ten minutes,” Charlie taunts.
Lucy rolls her eyes at her friend, then steps through the door I’m now holding for her. Her body passes a whisper away from mine, her coat brushing my shirt. Should the brush of fabric against fabric feel this erotic?
Probably not, but this woman is my kryptonite.
I follow her, letting the door shut behind us.
