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SOFIA
Igo into the guestroom, check on Mateo, who hasn’t moved since I put him down, and rush through a shower. As I rub lotion all over and dress in a tank and boy shorts, I ignore the many alarms blaring in my mind that tell me I need to slow this down, to proceed with caution, to protect myself and Mateo—and even Nico. But I don’t care about any of that. All I want is more of him and the way he makes me feel when I’m in his arms.
This is madness.
I don’t do things like this.
I work and take care of my son and study English and keep my head down since I left Joaquín, promising myself I was done with men forever.
That was before Nico Giordino walked into his aunt and uncle’s restaurant one night and blew all my promises to bits. I didn’t even try to hide my fascination with him. I happened to be working with his cousin Carmen, who’d gotten me the job in the first place and noticed me staring at him like a lovesick teenager.
“Don’t go there,” she said. “He’s nothing but trouble for women.”
After what I’ve been through, those words should’ve been more than enough to end my fascination right then and there. But it only grew every time I saw him, which was often once I realized the fascination was two-sided. He seemed to come in every time I was working, which of course Carmen and the others noticed. She and Jason come in for dinner most Saturday nights, which is one of my usual nights.
“He’s never here this much,” Luisa, one of the other waitresses, told me.
I got the feeling she was pissed that he was obviously coming to see me and not her. The more I saw him, the more I wanted him. I even dreamed about him—more than once—and the dreams were R-rated. I’d wake up sweating and throbbing and wanting him with every part of me, even if I’d been told that wanting him wasn’t a good idea.
I didn’t care.
I just wanted.
And now… Now I can have him, and I’m terrified I’m going to be the one to screw things up for him rather than the other way around. If I had an ounce of decency in me, I’d take Mateo and leave Nico’s home to go somewhere else that Joaquín and his friends couldn’t find us. But where?
Where could I go on my limited resources? I make very decent money at the restaurant—the most money I’ve ever made in my life—but it barely covers the rent, utilities, food, clothing, transportation, childcare and small monthly payments on the staggering medical bills from Mateo’s illness. That’s why I had to stop most of the PT and OT for now. There’s nothing left for the co-pays when the other bills are paid.
Vincent added me and Mateo to the restaurant’s health insurance as soon as he possibly could, and that’s been a lifesaver. In between occasional therapy appointments, I work with Mateo as much as I can on the things we learn.
Leaving the area isn’t an option with Mateo’s doctors and therapists here, not to mention my job.
I hate feeling like I have no choice but to accept the help Nico has offered, even though I worry about what his generosity toward us will cost him. Now two of his vehicles are damaged, the second one most likely done by another friend or family member of Joaquín’s looking for revenge by hassling the new guy in my life.
It’s all so ridiculous.
Our marriage was in trouble long before our son got sick, and Joaquín was nowhere to be found during those dreadful first days. And when he finally decided to show his face, he was angry with me for incurring hundreds of thousands in medical bills to save our son. “It’ll take the rest of our lives to pay down that debt,” he screamed, his face red and his fists raised to me.
When I look back at it all, that was the moment when I truly began to hate him. It wasn’t when he failed to show up or be there for us during the crisis. It was when he put money ahead of our son’s life.
Only when I was offered the job at Giordino’s, along with the friendship of Marlene and Livia, did I have the courage and the resources to file for divorce, thanks to a regular customer at the restaurant who offered to help me for free.
That’s when Joaquín got really angry.
A soft knock on the door drags me out of the rabbit hole I’ve fallen into. I go to the door to open it to a shirtless Nico, which is a thing of beauty. “You didn’t come back.”
“I… I was thinking.”
“Don’t do that.”
He makes me forget every problem I have the second he touches me in any way. He places his hand on my face and runs his thumb gently over my cheek. “Don’t think. Just feel.”
That quickly, I’ve forgotten why this could be a terrible idea, and I’m right back to wanting him with everything I am.
“I lit the fire for you. Want to come see?”
I nod. “Let me just grab the monitor for Mateo.”
A minute later, he leads me into his room across the hall and closes the door. The fire has cast a cozy glow in the room that makes it look so inviting. I try to imagine what it would be like to live in a house like this one, and I just can’t.
