“Buongiorno.” Angelo stretched.
Great. That body stretching, that mouth speaking Italian, and the contours of a morning erection under the blanket greeted me. I averted my gaze and hurried to the other side of the accordion.
I took another quick shower, alternating between cold and lukewarm water. That man gave me the female equivalent of blue balls.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
My seaweed lemon water tasted foul in comparison to the smell of the freshly brewed coffee. Angelo must have bought some after yesterday’s chicory. He made himself a cup using something that looked like a moka pot while I gulped down my drink.
“Macchinetta,” he said in his panty-melting accent, probably noticing me side-glancing him. “Same day delivery from Amazon.”
“Oh.”
He raised his cup in salute.
I only rarely allowed myself coffee for its antioxidants. More than that, and I’d be addicted to it, as I used to be back in college, before I knew better to not get attached to anything, including beverages.
The fact that something tasted good didn’t mean it was good for you.
Remember this, June.
Taking the back staircase, I passed through the workshop he had set up. The room smelled of wood and looked smaller with the two large tables. One seemed to serve as a sanding or polishing station, and on the other rested another guitar that looked like it was having open-heart surgery. The wooden stool I had seen in Angelo’s apartment with an Italian string maker brand printed on it stood in the middle with black boxes and amplifiers on the floor next to it. Colorful buttons, switches, and cables came out of them, looking like the life support the guitar on the operating table needed.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I spent the entire day with Adam in Wayford and compared sales stats on my way home with Rio, who had Dharma working with her in Riviera View. We had decided to post a wanted ad on social media. I needed at least one more person in Wayford urgently.
The Riviera shop was already closed when I circled the building and parked at the back.
My heart thumped when I climbed the stairs. It’d been a million years since I’d felt that mix of wanting and dreading to see someone. It’d been lightyears since anyone had affected me this way; a way I couldn’t reason with.
What have I done?Just two days ago, I hadn’t cared if I’d ever lay eyes on him again. In fact, I’d hoped I wouldn’t. I still hoped for the same now.
Kind of.
Despite the cool breeze that welcomed me as I opened the door that Angelo had left unlocked again, the heavy, oily smell of fried beef dominated the air.
Angelo sat on the sofa in stonewashed jeans, a chain hanging from its pocket, looking like some rockstar model out of aRolling Stonemagazine. His burgundy shirt, with a deep and wide V-neck, would have looked trashy on another man. It showed off the chest hair that ran between his pecs, a part of the tattoo, and his silver chain; only stars and Italian metrosexuals could probably wear that right. Is metrosexual still a thing?I made a note to self to ask Lennox; he’d know.
The smell of beef and that clothing style served as the reminders I needed as to why this man was everything I never wanted.
An additional memo was Angelo’s manspread—though it might have been a guitar-spread—that had his right knee bent up, supporting the curved waist of his guitar while he multitasked playing unplugged and talking on his cell phone.
In Italian.
He glimpsed up and gave me a nod and a smile while continuing the barrage of words that sounded like music.Sta, ero, lavoro, ancora, perché, punctuated the flow. I could kind of decipher a few phrases that caught my attention, like, “Non la verità,” and “Felicità.” He laughed at something that was said on the other end of the line. Even his laughter was sexy—husky, confident, the type you hear from men who become the center of attention and own a room full of people just by entering it.
Definitely not my type.
I made myself a quick lentil flour wrap while listening to the music of the words and the occasional chords on the guitar. When he wasn’t strumming the strings, he was caressing the wood, chafing his hand up and down along the neck, sometimes twisting a knob to tune a string.
Why did my unruly mind translate the image into feeling it like a phantom touch on my body?
“What’scazzo?” I asked when he finally ended the call and looked at me. It was a word that had kept repeating.
He huffed a chuckle and got up. Leaving the guitar on the sofa, he approached the other side of the breakfast bar and settled himself across from me. “It’s the most useful word in Italian. It means everything fromdamntowhat the helltowho do you think you aretowowtofuck, fucking, andfuck it.”
“Useful.” I took the last bite. “Hungry?”
