Page 121 of Effortless

“Cam,” Tommaso said, looking like she’d just punched him in the gut. “What the hell, donna?”

“Hey, I’m making friends,” she replied.

Lou grinned, and punched his number into the phone. “I like her, Tom. You should bring her around more often.”

“Yes,” Adriano agreed as he handed over a red file to Tommaso. “I agree.”

“He’s been up there a while,” Camilla said, glancing upward at the high ceiling.

“Business,” Tommaso’s mother replied.

Camilla nodded, and went back to the bread she had rolled. Using a knife, she cut a cross-cross pattern along the top part of the loaf.

“I don’t usually cut it like that,” Abriella said.

“Sorry.”

“No, it’s fine.”

“I can roll it up again, if you want.”

Abriella laughed, and patted Camilla’s cheek with a floury hand. “I just meant to say, that’s a new way to cut the loaf.”

“Oh.” Camila set the knife aside, and brushed her hands off on her jeans. It left flour handprints behind, but she didn’t mind. Abriella had asked her to help with the bread she had been baking, and Camilla didn’t want to refuse. “Well, my mom does it like that because it makes it look like a cushion after it’s done.”

“Huh.” Abriella picked up a bit of flour, and sprinkled it over her rolled dough, and the countertop. She went about rolling the dough again. “I like it. How are you liking Chicago?”

“It’s all right. I mean, it’s not New York or anything.”

Abriella smiled. “I feel the same way when I leave this city. It takes some getting used to.”

“But I like it here. Tom took me around today, and showed me different places.”

“Met some people, too, didn’t you?”

Camilla nodded. “A lot of them were at dinner, but yeah. It was nice to meet everyone again—one on one.”

“We are a large family.”

“Not like mine,” she admitted. “It’s just my mom and dad, brother, and a couple of aunts that moved away years ago.”

“No grandparents?”

Camilla shrugged. “My mom’s parents, but I’ve never even met them.”

She could see the question lingering in Abriella’s gaze, but the woman didn’t ask for more. She was grateful because honestly, she didn’t even know what to say about her mother’s parents. All she knew was that they were not nice people.

“We’ve made our family big over the years,” Abriella said quietly, still working away at the bread. “Tommas’s mother and father are dead, and so are mine. What we had left were relations made by marriage and friendships.”

“Makes for peaceful business, I bet.”

At least, Camilla assumed it would. She knew the closer a family was, the less likely they were to fight on the mafia side of things. Or, that’s what her father liked to say.

Abriella glanced up from the dough with a sly smile. “And just how much do you know about business, Camilla?”

She laughed. “Enough to know my place.”

“That’s a start. What about my son?”