Page 45 of In My Blood
Cold crept in around me, and suddenly the toasty heat of the house left me. Maybe it was the freezing cold floor I stood on, but I couldn’t even find my shoes, and the ones in the closet had been three sizes too big too. I was pretty sure Rafe had sent Gia shopping without my sizes, which made sense, since he would have no way of even knowing my sizes.
“Hi!” I turned sharply at the loud greeting and found someone jogging down the last of the stairs. He stopped at the bottom and turned to me with a wide and welcoming smile. I was confident I hadn’t met him yet, which had to mean he was Callan, unless there was someone I was forgetting who lived there. It was hard to keep track with everything going on.
“Hey,” I greeted trying not to show my nerves as I forced myself to stand tall. I might look like trash, but I was determined not to behave like I was.
“You must be Cara. I’m Callan, Arran’s brother.” His smile never wavered as he walked towards me, carrying himself with confidence, and why wouldn’t he? He was hot. Standing at around six feet he was slim, but in the way a professional athlete was slim. I could see that he was likely lined with toned muscle beneath the hugging jeans and close fitting black wool sweater he wore. He had the sleeves pulled up to his elbows and I could see tattoos up both arms - likely full sleeves - was my guess. His hair was longer, hanging down around his ears and kind of shaggy looking, but in a cute way, especially with the tones of light and dark blonde mixed through it. His face was striking, his bone structure strong, especially around his jaw and hischiselled cheek bones. The smile on his face only cemented my idea that he had to be some kind of a model – and not one of those too thin male models who walked down catwalks. No, Callan was like a finely sculpted sports model that you would see half naked on the cover of some high end magazine.
“You don’t look much like him,” I pointed out as I took him in without trying to make it obvious.
“No, not much, but I assure you he is my brother,” he laughed. Fuck. Just when I thought one man couldn’t be any more beautiful he laughed and his bright green eyes sparkled. I wasn’t sure I had ever seen a man look so perfect. He was male perfection in my eyes.
“Nice to meet you,” I told him with a nod, mentally checking myself.I wasn’t still staring, was I?I forced my eyes down to the ground between us and discreetly took a breath. I was being crazy and I knew it. I hadn’t even been interested in men really in my whole life, and now I seemed to be drooling over every guy I met. My last breath came out shaky and unsteady and Callan noticed right away.
“Are you alright? Cold?” he asked. I looked up at him again and made myself focus this time.
“A little. This floor is beautiful, but it’s not warm,” I laughed, or tried to anyway. It fell a little flat between us as he seemed to take me in.
“You need some slippers,” he told me.
“Oh no. I’m good, thanks.”
“I’ll pick you some up later, but for now I’ll run and grab you some thicker socks, and maybe a hoody? It gets cold in here in winter and you’re so petite. You’ll feel it more. I’ll be right back,” he announced, then he was running up the stairs before I even started to argue with him.
Once he was gone I moved down the long hall, unsure of where I was going, but I could hear voices and I went towards them, hoping Rafe would already be in the kitchen. I knew Arran and Dario, but after what Arran had seen of me, the night before, I felt anxious about seeing him again.
I stopped before a door at the back of the house and took a calming breath, then I pushed it open, refusing to give myself any more time to over think things.
The first person I saw was Rafe and that instantly helped me feel reassured. He smiled and stood from the stool he had been perched on, coming right over to me and wrapping his arm around me.
“There you are,” he said, pulling me into his side. “Everything alright?”
“Yeah,” I nodded. I gave him a nervous smile, then forced myself to lift my head and look around. The kitchen I had walked into was large and modern. The cabinets were a pale grey colour, high gloss with neat little round handles on them. They lined the entire space on three sides, and the final side was a huge set of bi-folding doors that looked out over a small, grassed yard. Light beamed in through the wide windows and flooded the modern room with brightness.
The cabinets were topped with dark wood counter tops that gave the entire space a warmer, more homely feel. The floor was thesame as that in the entrance way - polished, white marble - and that too shone. In the centre sat the biggest central island I had ever seen. On one side it seemed to be a work space for the kitchen, but around all three of the other sides sat tall, high backed stools that fit in perfectly with the aesthetic of the space. Rafe had been sitting in one of the stools, and Dio was in another. There was no sign of Arran, for which I was grateful. I knew I’d have to face him eventually, but I’d happily put it off for as long as possible.
“I think you better hand her over before my Mum loses her shit, Rafe,” Dio laughed, and when I turned to look at him fully, I realised he wasn’t the only one in the kitchen.
Terza was standing in the corner behind Rafe and I, and she looked just as I remembered her. She was dressed in dark trousers and a thick knitted sweater, just as she always used to in winter. I wondered if her long floral dresses still came out in summer as I took her in. She smiled and her blue eyes – so much like her son’s – filled with tears as she seemed to take me in too. She had always seemed so tall when I was a child, but now I realised she was petite, slim, and standing just a few inches taller than my meagre height. Her hair was cut short, just as it always had been, but there was a few grey hairs peppered through the dark brown tresses nowadays.
“Terza,” I squeaked emotionally as I finally broke down and fled from Rafe, right into her open and awaiting arms. She pulled me tight against her and I inhaled the perfect familiarity of her floral perfume, even that the same as I had always recalled it.
“Oh Cara. You’re home,” she sniffled. Her head was resting on top of mine and I could hear her whispering in Italian over and over again – “Grazie a Dio! Grazie a Dio!” Thank God.
And yes, I was aware that ‘Dio’meant God, in Italian. That wasn’t why I called Dario that though. It was just the way I had been able to pronounce his name when I was tiny, and I’d never called him anything else since then. Rafe and Dio used to joke about it when I was younger, but it never stopped me from calling him that. It felt odd to call him anything else all those years ago, and it did right then too.
“I missed you,” I told her. She had been like a mother to me when I was younger. Terza and Louise had been the only loving women we had ever known. While Louise had been a lot like a cool older sister to us, Terza had been the one I had longed to be my mother. Gia had even asked Rafe once if Terza could be our Mummy. She had always been there for us, not just sheltering us from the worst parts of our life, but trying to make memories with us that would be good and happy. Some of my best memories of my childhood were cooking with Terza.
“You have no idea how much you’ve been missed, sweet girl. We were all in a form of mourning, just waiting for you to come back to us,” she sniffled.
“I’m back now,” I tried to soothe her.
“You are, and you’re all grown up. Look at you! Such a beauty!” she told me, making me blush. “You’re too thin though. How long since you ate a decent home cooked meal?”
“Erm, a while, I guess,” I shrugged. I didn’t think it would do any good to tell her I hadn’t eaten a real home cooked meal since the last day she cooked it for me.
“We’ll fix that. Get you good and healthy in no time,” she told me as she released her hold on me and instead cupped my facebetween her hands. Her eyes locked on mine and she looked so filled with emotion I wasn’t sure what to do.
“Okay, Mum. How about you whip some breakfast up for Cara and let her breathe for a minute?” Dio cut in, his tone gentle and playful. I was grateful when she nodded. She leaned in and kissed the centre of my forehead, then released me completely.
