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“Patty, where’s B?”
“Ah, she was right here a few minutes ago. You know what, I have to find my husband. If I see Bianca, I’ll tell her to find you.”
“Thank you,” I said and turned to my aunt. “Diana, I haven’t seen you in months.”
“I know, baby, I know, but I was at this retreat in Bali. You have to go there, Cat, it’s gorgeous. Tell me, how are you?”
Crazy for my guard, fantasizing about him day and night.
“Ah, you know, school is keeping me busy. It’s my senior year.”
“Pff, school.” She waved the subject away. “Tell me about boys. Is there anyone you have your eye on?”
YES!
“No, auntie. Jesus, you’re still relentless.”
“We can fix that tonight. I’ve seen Freddy has some guests from Atlantic City. They have some casinos together, and they came with some hunky, good looking young man. They had some big bulges in their pants.”
“Diana!” I laughed and slapped her shoulder playfully, grateful that my mom wasn’t listening. They were sisters but very different people.
“I’m just sayin’. If you don’t jump on them, I will.”
“Be my guest.” I already had my eye on someone.
Lola came to the table too, and we started chatting about hair and makeup, about some annoying clients she had at the salon this week. Lola was a hairdresser herself before marrying my cousin and opening her own place. Now she was the boss, but what I liked the most about her was that she was easy to talk to and always knew everything about everyone. She liked to say it was the hairdresser in her that pushed her to gossip.
“Oh, my God!” she said mid-sentence and grabbed my arm. “I love this song. I have to find Cenzo so he can dance with me.” She jumped up and went to hunt down her husband.
The singer was gone, and now the orchestra was making smooth sounds. I recognized the song immediately; it was La Bella Malinconica. I watched La Dolce Vita a million times, so of course, I knew the soundtrack by heart.
When I looked around the table, I discovered almost everyone had gone out on the dancefloor to enjoy the song. My mom was dancing with Freddy and Aunt Di with Roman. It was just me and the mistresses left. I liked the song too, and I wanted to dance to it. On my left I saw my cousin, Marco, and right across the tent, Hugo was drinking with Vito. My first thought was to ask Marco to dance with me because I knew he couldn’t tell me no, but my legs made a decision on their own and took me to Hugo’s table.
“Hey, Cat.”
“Hey, Vito. When did you get here?”
“Just now. I haven’t even seen the birthday girl yet.” Perfect.
“Caroline just took her to the house, go find them.”
He nodded and went to look for Gianna so I took his place next to Hugo.
“What is it?” he asked and shot the whiskey down his throat. “Why did you want to get rid of Vito?”
“To talk to you.”
“Not here, Cat.”
“Dance with me.”
“No.” His answer came like a reflex.
“But everyone is dancing.” I pouted. “Come on, we’re friends, right? Friends can dance.”
“Catherinelle, no.”
“Roman is dancing with my Aunt Diana. No one believes he’s fucking her.” There was a strong possibility Diana wanted it though. I put a hand on his knee, and his eyes shot up to look at me. “I want to dance.”
