Bianca doesn’t look away. “And if they don’t?”
“Then we keep doing what we’ve been doing,” I say. “You pay. I leave you alone.”
I don’t look at her mouth again. It’s work to keep my eyes where they belong. Attraction doesn’t belong in this room. That fact doesn’t make it disappear. It’s inconvenient.
It surprised me when I saw her in the kitchen the other night. It surprises me now, stronger. The way she sits. The way she doesn’t fidget. The way she fills a silence without talking.
“Through when?” Bianca asks.
“Bi—” Francesca hisses.
Bianca simply stares at me.
“Through done,” I answer.
“Dates matter,” she says. “I’m not playing games. I just have to plan a kitchen, and a life.” A beat. “Two kitchens. Maybe two lives.”
Francesca makes a broken sound that she kills fast. I give Bianca a nod for being direct without throwing her mother under the bus.
I can respect that.
“We can put a date on it, if you want,” I say. “You may beat it. You were ahead before last week.”
Francesca doesn’t react, but I see her shoulders go down half an inch. Bianca clocks it too.
“Okay,” Bianca says. “Weekly stands. Same number. We don’t need to renegotiate?” There’s a set to her jaw that tells me exactly how much she hates asking that question.
“No,” I say.
“Then why are you here?” she asks, not rudely. Honest.
“Because things changed,” I say. “And when some things change, it might lead to other things changing. I’m here to make sure that doesn’t happen.”
Bianca nods once. “Okay.”
Francesca exhales, looks down at the ledger, up at me. “That it?”
“It could be,” I say, and I feel Roberto in my ear telling me to keep it simple.
But Roberto isn’t here. I am. And I haven’t been able to stop thinking about the way this kitchen ran the last time I was in it. People were loud, and grief clouded the kitchen. Still, the food came. Everything ran. And I saw Bianca not touching anything, yet running things without a word.”
I take a breath. “I have a proposal.”
Do not continue. Stop now.
Francesca’s eyes flash no. Bianca’s go wary, not scared. I raise a hand before Francesca speaks.
“It’s simple,” I say. “It doesn’t change the number. Just the speed.”
“Speed,” Bianca says, frowning over the word.
“Speed,” I say. “Francesca, you’ve been paying on schedule. I respect that. But you’re killing yourself to do it. You don’t have to say yes to this. You can tell me to get out and keep it all the same. But I think there’s a better way. Months.”
“Months?” Francesca repeats.
“Not years,” I say.
“How?” Bianca asks.
