“So, late one night, I left him. I took what money I could and tipped off the people Mickey was conning at the time.”
She felt her shoulders lower. There it was. But there was more.
“I went back to the town where I’d grown up and found my grandfather’s tombstone in the cemetery. I thought there would be weeds, but there weren’t. People in that town knew him and loved him. Someone had even placed some flowers there. True, they were old and dried out. But someone at some time had thought enough of Grandpa to bring him flowers. And when someone pulled the weeds, they didn’t take them away and throw them out. I suppose to some people they would have been trash. But I don’t know. Even dried and withered flowers can be nice, you know?”
One plump tear escaped her eye, followed by another and another.
Damn it.
She hastily lowered her head and brushed them aside and then saw a wrinkled and weathered hand holding out a handkerchief. She took it and looked up. It was Rocco’s grandfather. She noisily blew her nose.
“While I was standing there, I heard someone call my name. ‘Nico, is that you?’ It was a man who’d been a friend of my grandfather’s. He used to bring his car into my grandfather’s shop. He said they’d worried and wondered what had happened to me. They’d even put out an Amber Alert, but of course I was never found. I told them about Aunt Milly and Uncle Jack but not the truth. I told him they were family and that I’d had a good upbringing. He wondered if I was still racing and took me out to the track just outside town, the one Grandpa used to take me to, and there were a couple cars they let me take around the track. It was wonderful to be behind the wheel without Mickey there. The man said if I was really serious, he knew a guy out in Nevada, just outside Vegas, who might be able to help. And I thought,Vegas, of course. I could make good money there, doing the only thing I knew how to do, the only thing I was good at other than racing—playing poker and pool.
“So, I went. Eventually, the man sponsored me. After a while, he put me in touch with other people, and I was able to gain more sponsors. My racing career took off from there.
“I never knew what had happened to Mickey, but I figured he’d probably left the country to escape the authorities. Eventually, he was able to track my whereabouts, and he sent me threatening letters for a couple years but then stopped.
“And then just as I was about to sign with Maverick Racing, I received a letter postmarked from Italy. I knew at some point he would find me.”
She paused.
Now that night at Drink and Dive.
“On New Year’s Eve, the night before I was set to sign the contract with Maverick, I went to a bar—”
She blinked as she saw Sofia and Beatrice tiptoe into the room, holding their fingers to their lips.
“Sofia and Beatrice!” Isabella cried. “What are you doing?”
Sofia tilted her head, raising one shoulder. “We wanted to see Nico.”
Beatrice mimicked her sister, raising the other. “Most definitely.”
“It’s okay,” Nico said. “I think it’s okay if they hear the rest.”
“All right,” Isabella said.
Nico drew a deep breath. She was close now. Almost to the end of it. “I wore a short blonde wig. Like I used to when I”—she glanced at Sofia and Beatrice before looking away—“when I, well, you know. I don’t know why I did that. I don’t know if it was nerves over the fact that I was going to sign a contract to race Formula 1 or that letter arriving when it did, but I didn’t plan on doing what I did. Not until I entered that bar and saw Rocco.”
She told them about the pool game and the money. She left out what had happened outside the bar.
“I never spent any of the money. In fact, here it is,” she said, pulling it from her purse and placing it on a coffee table. “I never dreamed Rocco would turn out to be my teammate. And I certainly never dreamed …” She swallowed. “Well, that just seemed like the stuff of fairy tales.”
And it is, she thought.
What you were playing at with Rocco wasn’t grounded in reality at all.
She sighed. “Well, Rocco figured it out. I know I should have told him. I just couldn’t think how. It’s good he knows. He should know. I only wish I had had enough courage to tell him myself. I’m just so sorry that Mickey entered your lives. It was because of me he did. And that’s it.”
Nico stood up immediately. She didn’t want to make this more awkward than it already was. She didn’t want to make them feel like they had to say something—anything. She took a step, intending to move quickly to the door but was stopped when Beatrice ran over and blocked her way. The girl stood there, gazing up at Nico.
“Did you really wear a blonde wig?” she asked.
Sofia rushed to her sister’s side. “Was it short and really, really, really blonde?”
Frowning, Nico hesitated. “Yes.”
They faced each other, clutching arms.
