“Yeah. Friends,” she said, her voice softer than those pretty eyes. Both punched him right below the belt. Figuratively.
He whistled, and Zena bounded around the porch and lurched inside, sliding into a box. She fell back onto her butt and then panted, her tail wagging across the wooden floor. “Down girl,” he murmured.
She flopped down, sighed, and put her nose on her paws.
Heather chuckled. “She is so well trained.”
“She’d better be,” he allowed. They trained all the time, so the canine had better behave. Not that he didn’t adore her, and she knew it. After rescuing Heather the night before, he’d played with the dog as a reward for an hour before making them both go to sleep.
Heather’s phone buzzed from her backpack, and he reached in without thinking and turned to hand it to her. She’d gone pale.
He paused. “You okay?”
“Yeah.” She visibly shook herself out of it. “Seriously. I’m fine.” She reached for the phone, glanced at the screen, and frowned.
“Does an ‘unknown caller’ concern you?” he asked. Yeah, he’d taken a look at the screen.
Her laugh was off key, and her hands shaky. “No. I’m sure it’s just a telemarketer. It’s a new number, so almost nobody knows it.” She clicked the phone off. “So. Pizza?”
“Sure.” His mind was already ticking. Who was she afraid of?
Heather pattedher stomach after eating truly delicious pizza. Her brain was a little fuzzy from the wine, but her ankle no longer hurt, so there was a bright side. “Make sure you thank your grandmother for the pizza.” She couldn’t help but stare a little at Quint across the table. In the soft light as the storm strengthened outside, he looked large and formidable in her kitchen. Strong and protective. “Quintino.”
He grinned. “She tried to call me Tino when I was younger, and my dad quickly nicknamed me Quint.”
“Do you have siblings?” she asked.
“Yeah. I have five brothers.” He reached and poured them both more wine. “I also have many, many, many cousins, and we’re all close.”
She sipped the rich Cabernet and let the warmth spread throughout her body. “Like Anna and Donna.”
“Yes,” he said, taking another drink.
“Are those Italian names?” Not that it mattered, but now her curiosity had arisen.
He chuckled, and the sound wandered along her nerve endings, electrifying the sensation. “Yes and no. Their dad married a full-on Irish woman, and the compromise was that each of the girls got an Irish and an Italian name. So we have Donatella Tiffany, Contessa Carmelina, and Annabella Fiona Albertini in that family. We’re all close, and I’m sure you’ll meet them if you stay in town.”
How freaking charming. She loved that story. How she wished she had cousins like that. “They live here?”
“No. All three live over the pass in Timber City, but they come home a lot.”
Timber City was about fifty minutes through a mountain pass, and Heather had already headed over to do some shopping. It was a quaint touristy type town with lakes, rivers, and many golf courses, from what she’d seen. “I take it they attend this already famous family barbecue every Sunday?”
“They’d better,” he said, his grin boyish. “How can Nonna work on matchmaking them if they’re never around? She’s been on a tear with Tessa lately, and I think it’s because Anna put her up to it, but I can’t prove that fact. It has been nice for her to concentrate on poor Tessa and Nick Basanelli and leave me alone for a while.”
Speaking of which. Heather had no right to ask. “What about Jolene?” Yeah, she’d asked. Must be the wine taking effect.
Quint sighed. “Jolene was a mistake. Way back when, she was older in high school, and I didn’t really know her. This August, I returned home from a job that was pretty rough. I got home, got drunk, and ended up in Jolene’s bed.” He held up a hand. “Not an excuse, I know. But then she wanted to date, and we went on a few dates, and then I found out she was dogging Anna and writing crappy articles for the paper about my cousins. So I ended it.”
“Were the articles factual?” Heather took another drink of the deep wine.
“Maybe factual but with a definite slant that made Anna and Donna look bad,” he said. “Jolene has a mean streak, and I didn’t know about it until they found out I was dating her.” He grimaced. “They made sure I knew it all, and I still gave her the benefit of the doubt, which she exploited.” He finished his drink, and his masculine neck moved as he swallowed. “We all make mistakes, and that was mine for the decade.”
Her phone buzzed, and she reached for it from the counter. It was another unknown caller. It had to be a telemarketer.
“Why don’t you answer it?” Quint asked, his body still.
Yeah. Why didn’t she? There was no way Jack had tracked down her new number. “Hello?”
