Page 20 of Ache for You (Slow Burn 3)
Apparently, I scared it as much as it scared me.
My heart pounding, I throw off the blanket and sit up. It’s still early. Sunlight streams through the windows and illuminates the polished wood floor to a blinding glow. Rising, I scrub my hands over my face and walk through the quiet house until I reach the kitchen, where I find Lorenzo sitting at the big wood table, sipping espresso and reading the papers. He’s in another impeccable suit, this one charcoal gray. I wonder if he ever sleeps or if he just changes clothes and keeps working.
“Good morning.” I yawn, taking a seat across from him at the table.
“Ah, good morning, signorina.” He folds the paper and sets it beside his cup of espresso, then looks me up and down in that swift assessing way he has that suggests he never misses a thing. “What can I get you? Espresso? Eggs? Some toast and jam, perhaps?”
“You don’t have to wait on me, Lorenzo.”
He rises, smiling. “But it’s my pleasure.” He chuckles. “Also it’s my job.”
“In that case, I’ll take an espresso.”
I watch him walk across the kitchen to the sleek black coffee machine on the opposite counter. There’s an economy in the way he moves, as if no energy is wasted, no step taken that isn’t planned. He exudes efficiency. He must’ve been a godsend for my messy, scatterbrained father.
Papa.
I bite the inside of my cheek so I don’t break down into tears, then struggle to compose myself as Lorenzo brews the espresso. By the time he sets the little white porcelain cup in front of me, I’ve regained most of my control, but my voice still comes out shaky.
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” He takes his seat across from me again, folds his hands, then simply gazes at me in silence.
“What?”
“Forgive me for staring, signorina. It’s just that I feel as if I already know you. Your father spoke of you so often, I feel as if we’re old friends.”
Shit. I start to get choked up again and have to look away and blink hard to clear the water from my eyes. I gulp the espresso, wincing as it scalds my tongue. “How long did you work for my father, Lorenzo?”
“Since the marchesa and he were married, in June.”
It’s August. My father kept his marriage a secret from me for two months. I know it isn’t the espresso that causes that bitter taste in my mouth.
Lorenzo says, “But I’ve been with the marchesa for more than thirty years.”
That surprises me so much I almost drop the cup. “Thirty years?”
He inclines his head. “Since before her first husband died. It has been my honor to serve in her household for so long.”
So this mysterious marchesa was a widow for thirty years before marrying my father. Almost exactly as long as my father was a widower. That bit of information seems important somehow, but I don’t know why. Then something else strikes me as important. “You say it’s been your honor to serve in her household?”
Lorenzo answers with quiet pride, “I’ve never known any other person as fine.”
I inspect his face, but find no trace of sarcasm there. His opinion of the marchesa is certainly not in line with Dominic’s. I don’t know how to reconcile two such opposing viewpoints, especially since I’m inclined to hate her for not getting her fine ass to the hospital.
“Has she been told my father died?”
Lorenzo doesn’t blink at my tone, which is just this side of hostile. “Yes, of course.”
“And?”
Lorenzo draws his brows together in a quizzical frown. “I’m sorry, signorina?”
“Well . . . was she upset? What did she say? How did she react?”
A flicker of emotion rises in his gray eyes—there, then instantly gone. In a steady, quiet voice, he says, “The marchesa does not share her feelings with her servants. And—forgive me—even if she did, I wouldn’t share them with anyone else.”
He’s in love with her.
