Page 188 of Merciless Daddy

“Somewhere to write what you want.”

“I have spreadsheets for that.”

“No plans for surviving.” He touched the cover. “No lists of threats. Just wants.”

I opened it. The first page remained blank for a long time. Then I wrote one sentence.

I want another date.

I turned the notebook toward him.

Sal read it. His face changed in that quiet way he had, as if he kept his biggest feelings behind locked doors and only opened them for me.

“I can arrange that,” he said.

“Good.”

He kissed my temple.

“I have several ideas, in fact.”

Salvatore Scordato could organize an international extraction, bankrupt a man with a single phone call, but apparently he couldn’t fry garlic in oil without burning it.

I sat on the kitchen counter with bare feet swinging above the tile while smoke curled from the pan.

“So is that supposed to be black?” I asked. “It’s a Sicilian delicacy?”

“It is browned.”

“It is charcoal.”

“It has character.”

“It has died.”

Sal gave me a look over his shoulder.

The windows stood open to the darkening sea. Music drifted from a small speaker near the fruit bowl. Something old and Italian. Something slow enough that the breeze seemed to move with it.

Sal wore linen trousers and nothing else. I had put on one of his shirts over my swimsuit after the beach. It hung open at the throat and fell to my thighs.

He scraped the garlic into the bin.

“I hope you appreciate how much humility this requires.”

“I do. I’m documenting it for the historians. Future civilizations will remember you as Sal the Humble.”

“You’re very cruel for someone waiting to be fed.”

“I have been fed repeatedly today. Like a prize pony.”

“You like mango.”

“I do like mango.”

He made pasta after that. It was good. Not because he was brilliant at cooking. Because he watched the pan too hard and tasted the sauce four times and asked whether I liked it as if the answer mattered.

We ate at the kitchen island with our knees touching. Afterward, he washed dishes while I dried them badly. The domesticity made me nervous.