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“Holier-than-thou. That was it.” Stefano sighed, leaned a shoulder against the doorjamb and crossed one moccasin-clad foot over the other. “Sounds good but it’s repetitive, don’t you think? Considering that someone who’s sanctimonious is those other things, too.”
Fallon glared at him. “How dare you barge in here?”
“I didn’t barge, I knocked.”
“With what? A feather?” she said, blowing the hair from her eyes and folding her arms over her chest. “I certainly didn’t hear you.”
“Well, you couldn’t have. You were making too much noise, stamping your feet and breaking the place up.”
Color streaked her cheeks. “I have never stamped my feet in my life. You have a vivid imagination.”
Stefano raised one eyebrow and looked down at the tile floor. Fallon looked, too, and her color deepened.
“I was in a hurry. I dropped a few things.”
“So it seems. I’ll bet there’s a king’s fortune of magic elixirs there.”
“What I do with my stuff is my business.”
“I thought women loved all those silly little pots of nonsense.”
“It’s not nonsense.”
“Then why throw them away?”
“I have no use for them anymore.”
He gave her a long, indecipherable look. Go on, she thought grimly, I dare you. One more lecture on Facing Reality and she’d smack him…Or fall into his arms and weep.
Oh, God. Was she that close to tears? Was her mask ready to slip? Quickly, she bent down and began scooping up the scattered cosmetics. Stefano squatted beside her and grabbed her hand.
“Let me do that.”
“I am perfectly capable of cleaning up after my own messes.”
“I’m sure you are,” he said calmly, “but there’s nothing wrong with accepting a little help.”
That wasn’t a topic she wanted to pursue. Instead, Fallon gave him a scathing look, reached for the basket and began dumping makeup into it.
Stefano picked up a little container of eye shadow.
“Caramel Crème Sundae?”
“If you think it’s your shade,” Fallon said sweetly, “be my guest.”
“And Wild Honey Mousse,” he said, plucking a tube of lip gloss from the floor. He looked up, his eyes meeting hers. “Why is it these things always sound like the menu in a bad French restaurant?”
“Give me that,” Fallon demanded, snatching the gloss from him and tossing it into the trash. “And go away. I told you, I don’t need your help.”
“You need someone’s,” he said quietly. Before she could respond, he scooped up almost all the remaining containers and tossed them in the basket. “I’m almost done.”
Glaring, Fallon sat back on her heels. He was right; he’d finished the job. He could pick up several of the little pots and tubes at one time. The stuff looked like sample sizes in his big hands.
Such capable, comforting hands.
Fallon shot to her feet. “Thank you,” she said stiffly.
“You’re welcome.”
“And I’m sorry if I made so much noise it bothered you.”
“I didn’t hear a thing until I was right outside the door.”
“Then why—”
“I came to apologize.”
She blinked. “Apologize?”
“Right.”
Stefano brushed off his hands, then wiped them on the seat of his jeans. It was crazy, but the simplicity of the gesture was disarmingly boyish.
“I was an ass,” he said.
“I beg your pardon?”
“You heard me. Telling you how I thought you should handle things was wrong.”
Fallon stared at him. Did he really think an apology would erase her memories of his arrogance?
“In fact,” he said with a little smile, “I was a sanctimonious, self-serving, holier-than-thou ass.”
She didn’t want to smile, but how could she prevent her lips from curving just a little bit?
“Close, wasn’t I?”
Stefano grinned. “Yeah, but close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades.” His smile tilted. “Seriously, I was dead wrong. What happened to you was hell. You’re the only one who can possibly know the emotional cost involved.”
He really did look sorry for what he’d said. All things considered—he’d stayed with her every moment in the hospital, brought her to his home to recover—she supposed she could bend a little and accept his apology.
Besides, she was leaving the castello soon. Surely, under those circumstances, it was simple good manners to forgive a man who was willing to admit he was a jerk.
“I didn’t mean to hurt you,” he said softly. “You must know that I’d never do that.”
Their eyes met and held.
No, Fallon thought, he wouldn’t. He’d meant well and if she were to be brutally honest, he’d given her advice she knew, in her heart, she needed to take. Wallowing in self-pity, hiding from the world, wasn’t going to change the past any more than it would help move her into the future.
Stefano reached out a hand, as if to touch her. Then he pulled it back and cleared his throat.
“I’ll leave you alone now. But if you change your mind, if you want company or someone to talk to…” He smiled. “Or if you’d like a target to throw things at, all you have to do is—”
“You were right.”
She knew she’d blurted the words in one quick rush, but how else could she have gotten them out of her mouth?
“What?”
Fallon swallowed hard. “I said, you were right.” She looked at the floor, at her feet, anywhere but at his face. “I’ve been drowning in self-pity.”
“No,” he said quickly. “That’s not true. I was wrong to imply it. I only meant—”
“Self-pity. And denial.” Fallon took a deep breath and looked up. “I keep thinking, if I hadn’t been on that road, if it hadn’t started to rain…” She caught her bottom lip, worried it between her teeth. “I know that thinking that way is a waste of time.”
“It isn’t, when it’s a part of healing. That’s what I overlooked.”
She smiled a little. “When I was little, I broke my arm riding my brother’s bike. It was a dumb thing to do—the bike was much too big for me and I knew it. Afterward, when I found out I’d have to wear a cast for almost the entire summer, I moaned and groaned and finally my mother said, Fallon, my girl, if you’d put half the energy into getting on with things as you’re putting into regretting them, you’d be a whole lot happier.”
Stefano grinned. “Are you sure your mother isn’t Italian? That’s pretty much the same speech my grandmother made when I ran home crying because Mr. Rienzi caught me stealing a water pistol from
his store and boxed my ears.”
“You? A thief?” She smiled again. “I’d never have believed it!”
“Hey, it was the price of initiation into the Mott Street Mohicans.”
“The Mott Street…?”
Fallon laughed. Really laughed, and the sound went straight through him, from the top of his head to the tips of his toes. So far, he could count on one hand the number of times he’d seen her laugh since the accident. What he wanted, more than anything, was to hear that sweet sound, see her eyes light, all the time.
“Uh-huh. What can I tell you? It was summer, we’d been playing cops and robbers and I’d already blown my allowance on candy and comic books. How can a cop catch a robber without a gun?”
“Plus, swiping a toy was a rite of passage?”
“I think getting your ears boxed and your backside warmed was the actual rite of passage.”
They both smiled this time, and then Fallon’s smile wavered.
“The thing is, my mother would probably have told me exactly what you did this afternoon. I need to look ahead, not back.”
“I’m glad to hear you say that,” Stefano said softly. He moved closer, reached out and tucked her hair behind her ear.
“I wasn’t angry at you, I was angry at myself. You—you’ve been wonderful. Kind and generous and compassionate.” Her lips curved in a smile. “Not alliterative, but true.”
He smiled, too, and slipped his arms around her.
“You’re a remarkable woman, Fallon O’Connell.”
Fallon’s eyes blurred with tears. “I’m not,” she said, shaking her head as she leaned against him. “I’m a mope.”
Stefano chuckled. “If you are, you’re a beautiful mope.”
“Please don’t lie to me, Stefano. I know what I look like.”
He bent his head and pressed a kiss into the silkiness of her dark hair.
“Then you know that your eyes are the color of the sea,” he said softly, “that your mouth is as pink and soft as the petals of a rose.” He framed her face with his hands and raised it to his. “And you know that the woman you really are is as whole as she was before that accident, and that she’s more lovely than any man deserves.”
His words swept through her like sweet fire. She met his eyes, and when his gaze dropped to her mouth, she sighed his name and parted her lips as he kissed her.
