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“I can’t say I’m surprised,” she said. “What happened?”
“My brother,” I admitted. “He was walking into the restaurant as we were leaving, and she saw that he had a gun in a hip holster. And I think it brought back some PTSD or something. She shoved me again, and the movement was a little too much. It’s okay,” I assured her. “I treated it, and I don’t think she needs to go to urgent care or anything unless it looks worse today. But I wanted to let you know.”
“Let me guess,” she said, shooting me a knowing smile. “She is embarrassed about it because it was your brother.”
“You know your daughter well,” I said, grabbing a handful of clover and tossing it into the five-gallon bucket I’d found at the side of the house. It was already more than halfway full of plucked weeds.
“I do,” she agreed, moving herself down to the very edge of the garden bed. There wasn’t much left to do. I’d been taking my frustration out on all the damn dandelions, clover, and creeping Charlie plants. When she was done with the weeds on the end, though, she stood up, gathering her kneeler, likely set on the beds in the backyard. “Can I say something, Nino?” she asked, head cocking to the side a bit as she looked down at me.
“Sure,” I agreed, nodding.
“I think I know my daughter well enough to know that she is letting you take care of her not because you are forcing her, but because she likes you,” she said, nodding for emphasis. “And I don’t know what is holding you back,Mr. Grassi, but I think you should make it clear that the feeling is mutual.”
And with that, she was spinning around, and disappearing to the dark at the back of the house.
Leaving me to sit there on my knees in the grass, wondering if I was reading way too much into what she said.
No.
Not what she said.
The emphasis on two particular words.
Mr. Grassi.
Was it just me, or did she say it in a way that suggested she knew exactly who I was? And what I did?
But if she knew, why didn’t Savannah?
CHAPTER TWELVE
Savannah
“Mom!” I yelped when I stepped off onto the back porch to see her sitting there, already cradling a cup of tea between her hands, rocking in one of my chairs, looking the picture of calm and happy.
While my thoughts raged out of control.
Mostly about Nino.
And his brother.
And the whole, you know, incident.
He could try to sugarcoat it all he wanted; I was well aware of what a fool I must have looked like to his family.
I was never someone who stressed so much about making a good first impression. But that was also likely because I’d never been so serious with a guy that I got to the ‘meeting the family’ stage.
I mean, not that I was serious about Nino.
Well, yeah, you could draft up a pretty good argument about my sexual feelings for Nino being pretty damn serious. And, fine, yeah, I was even pretty into the guy. Especially after sitting across from him over a meal and listening to him talk about his life and his family.
He would laugh and smile.
And, yes, get those sexy little eye crinkles while he did so.
I liked him.
But we weren’t, you know, dating.
