“On?”
“The author’s preference. But mostly, the author’s budget. Two narrators cost more, so some only have me doing the whole book.”
He nodded at that, making me like him even more that he didn’t have something negative to say about the genre I mostly worked in.
“Never listened to an audiobook.”
“Honestly, me either. Until people started suggesting I get a job narrating them. Now I’m pretty obsessed, though. It’s so hard to find time to actually sit down and read. But I can pop on an audiobook when I’m shopping, cleaning, taking a walk, whatever.”
“Maybe I should give one a try. What’s the ‘steamiest’ one you’ve narrated?” he asked, pinning me with those cool eyes of his and making my mind go completely blank for a moment.
“Oh, um, there was one calledDancing with the Devilthat was really steamy.”
“What’s it about?”
I mean, it was incredibly thin on the plot and heavy on the steam. “It’s about a sweet, innocent woman and the dirty-talking mob boss she ends up with.”
“Mob boss, huh?” he asked, shooting me a strange, bemused smile that I didn’t know him well enough to place. “Maybe I’ll check that one out,” he said, wiping his hands of pizza grease, then getting back to rolling coins.
The conversation came in small bursts after that with us mostly just being comfortable in each other’s company as we rolled coins and counted bills until we had a tally.
“That’s depressing as fuck,” he decided, echoing the thoughts that had been in my mind.
“A couple more toys!” I said, forcing more enthusiasm into my voice than I felt as I brought everything into the safe hidden in the back. It was too late to go to the bank now, and I really didn’t feel like carrying heavy coins all the way back to my apartment.
“How do you do that?” Venezio asked when I made my way back out.
“Do what?” I asked, taking the last swig of my beer.
“Stay positive when shit is looking bleak?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “I guess it’s from my mom. She somehow managed to do it even when we were living in shelters on and off for years. I mean, I know it was for my sake. But I think it helped her cope with the whole situation too. It seems healthier to focus on the good than wallow in the bad.”
“Yeah, probably,” Venezio agreed, cleaning up our dinner mess. “You heading out?”
“I have to get some work done before bed.” And maybe get more serious about finding a good gown, now that I knew I had a date.
“I got forty minutes still. I’ll walk you to the subway.”
“You don’t need to do that.”
“Still gonna do it,” he said, stopping to grab his coat and still somehow beating me to the door so he could pull it open.
“Are you going to bully someone into letting me sit down again?”
“If I need to.”
I turned and locked the door, knowing he had his own key, then fell into step with him as we walked through the city, trying to avoid the patches of black ice hiding in the shadows of the streetlights.
We’d done spectacularly well until, as I’d been admiring an intricate Santa’s Workshop window display, my foot caught a slippery spot, and I was sliding.
I swear my belly flew out ahead of me as my arms and legs flailed for purchase.
There was one dizzying moment when I was sure I was going to crash down onto the filthy sidewalk.
Then strong arms slid around me, yanking me forward, pulling me up against a solid chest.
“You’re alright,” Venezio said, his voice making his chest vibrate, which in turn, rumbled into my own. I sucked in a steadying breath, only managing to catch that coffee scent that seemed to cling to him.
