Gigi shakes her head. “You don’t want to know about their creative sex life. I know way more than I ever wanted to. Trust me.”
My eyebrows rise as I turn my gaze back toward the direction where Izzy just was. “Really?” I whisper.
“Wow,” Oliver says, echoing my sentiment.
“They may be old, but they sure as hell don’t act like it sometimes.”
“Who’s old?” Carmello, another cousin, asks as he walks out from where Gigi just was.
“Your parents,” Gigi tells him.
“Yep.”
“Your mom was just talking about your dad punishing her,” I say to him, hoping to get more details because my aunt Izzy has always been a wild one and someone I looked up to when I was little.
Carmello’s face turns pink. “They’re too much sometimes. I wonder if they’ll still be chasing each other around when they’re eighty.”
“I bet they will,” Gigi says to him. “Especially if your dad has anything to say about it.”
He holds up a hand and glances down at the floor. “I don’t want to talk about their sex life anymore.”
I don’t blame him. The very thought of my parents doing it turns my stomach. But I know how Zoey got here and how babies are made. I had already been born when they met. It is a complicated story that my mom doesn’t like to talk about much. The memories from her childhood are too painful for her because the man who’s genetically my grandfather was a real piece of work.
I didn’t even know Lucio wasn’t my biological father until I was almost a teenager. He never treated me like I wasn’t his. Zoey and I were equals in his eyes, and I never knew another father besides him. I am blessed to have him in my life and couldn’t ask for a better dad.
“So, what are we doing?” Gigi asks, leaning against the counter. “You have a design?”
I reach into my pocket, grabbing my phone. “I have the artwork saved.”
“Shoot it to me, and I can work it up real quick. And you?” she asks, looking over my shoulder at Oliver.
“She has it.”
“Send them both to me. Pike is just finishing up, and he’ll be ready by the time the final touches on the designs are finished. Are we doing black or color?”
“Color for me and black for him.”
“Excellent,” she says, clicking away at the computer screen as I send her the two designs via email.
“Got them,” she says a second later. “Want some water or something while I work on these?”
I shake my head. “We’re good.”
“Have a seat and relax. We’ll be ready soon.”
I smile at my cousin and nod. “Got it.”
Oliver takes my hand, pulling me toward the bank of chairs along the wall. I’m nervous. I don’t know why. I have tattoos, but every time I get a new one, I feel an energy that buzzes through my system. Whether it’s anticipation or fear, the feeling is one that puts me on edge.
“Relax,” Oliver says, placing his hand on my knee that’s bouncing up and down like it’s connected to a motor somewhere.
I take a deep breath and close my eyes.
“You want to skip it?”
My eyes snap open. “No way. I want this.”
“You don’t look like it.”
