Page 13 of A Very Rossi Christmas
“‘Woman dies when her hands fall off during her volunteer work,’” I intoned, suppressing a smile. “‘Cause of death: Stacking toys for children.’”
She poked at me and I squirmed away, giggling. Brooks was nothing if not dramatic. The work we were doing was beyond easy. Every year, the charity we worked with decorated rec buildings throughout LA for needy kids, going all out with Christmas trees, decorations, lights, a full sled getup, Santa Claus (or at least an actor who portrayed him), and stacks and stacks of toys put out for the kids to choose from. The conveyor belt in the back of each location—or ‘the line,’ as Mel called it—was just that: a supported belt with an engine attached so that the thing revolved around the entire room, the stacks of toys on it moving through the space like a fucking buffet for the kids.
It was one of my favorite features because it required at least a little bit of ingenuity when it came to figuring out how to put the toys on the belt in a way that would keep them stable even when they started moving. And I’d been there on Christmas, when someone turned the belt on and the kids got to see it for the first—or tenth—time.
The looks on their faces were worth every single penny.
“Stop complaining,” I told her firmly. “Remember last year when Mel made us go around hanging mistletoe? That was worse.”
Brooks shook her head. “I’m still surprised we both came through that alive.”
She was right. We hadn’t been able to reach a certain part of the ceiling, and someone (Brooks) had had the brilliant idea of stacking a smaller ladder on top of a table.
It had resulted in both of us hitting the floor a whole lot harder than we would have liked. I was surprised we hadn’t cracked our heads open on the linoleum.
I was laughing at the vision that brought into my head—limbs and hair tangled on the floor and both of us caught between laughing and crying—when I looked up and saw Joseph Rossi staring at me from the fake-snow-encrusted doorway into the auditorium.
“What. The. Fuck,” I muttered, riding the line between the fear of seeing someone you didn't expect, who you knew was dangerous ... and the thrill running up my backbone at the idea that the boy who’d once been the most important person in my life was in the same building as me.
The same thrill I'd always felt when I saw him. The one that I was now starting to think was way off-base.
Brooks, who had also been laughing, looked up as well, and then stepped protectively in front of me. “What’s he doing, fucking stalking you? Really?”
I peeked around her shoulder, half loving her for wanting to protect me and half hating her for having cut off my view of the room. “Yes, I’m sure he came all the way out to LA just to stalk me. It’s so much more convenient than just picking up a phone.”
I felt Brooks stiffen, and knew she was doing her best protective stance—which honestly wasn’t that impressive. I’d seen it from the other side when she was having a fight with her ex in high school, and it had just looked like she was about to turn and run away.
Still, it came from a good place.
“You don’t have to protect me, you know,” I muttered, shoving her to the side. “I know you think that you do, just because you’re bigger than me, but it’s not true.”
“Oh no?” Brooks asked, her eyes still front and center. “Are you going to say that same thing when Joseph Rossi gets here holding the gun I’m pretty sure he has in his coat?”
I turned to follow her eyes without asking anything else, and saw why she’d grown so stiff. Joseph was wearing an expression that said he was about to murder someone, his right arm folded over his chest and his hand resting just inside the edge of his leather jacket, his steps as he walked toward us quick and purposeful.
Shit. Maybe I’d been wrong about him not being here for me.
My body tensed, all of my instincts going on high alert as the muscle memory of being the hunted came back to me, and I was about to turn and look for the closest exit when my eyes caught on something else.
Someoneelse. SomeonebehindJoseph.
Caleb Massimo.
My ex, and the guy who hadn’t exactly taken it well when I broke up with him a year ago. The guy who hadn’t taken anything well when we were dating, either, if I was being honest, and the guy none of my friends had liked.
Breaking up with him had required my gun, let’s just put it that way.
I felt it the moment Brooks saw him too, by the increased stiffness in her arm.
“Well this just went from bad to worse,” she muttered.
“Agree,” I replied. I grabbed her hand, turned, and started walking. “I hope you don’t mind if we go out the back way.”
It wasn’t like they wouldn’t see where we were going. They were both following us, so it would be impossible for them to miss.
But the back rooms of this place were a fucking maze, and it had taken me years to figure out how to navigate them. I was counting on that experience—and Joseph and Caleb’s lack thereof—to give Brooks and me time to get to my car and get the hell out of here before anything went down.
I could flat out guarantee that my car was faster than anything either of them was driving.
