I guess not.
Daniel lights up at his question, waggling his eyebrows and giving me anare you hearing this?expression. Giovanni observes the two of us with a small frown on his face, noticing our obvious silent conversation.
“I’m in town for a work event,” Daniel tells him carefully.
Giovanni nods. “What is it that you do?”
“Right now, I run a charity. But the event is related to my old job in New York.”
“You worked in New York? Where?”
“I used to be a wide receiver on the Mustangs football team.”
Silence. So much quiet fills the space, I think I hear one of Giovanni’s literal pins drop.
He coughs. “That’s, ah, a very interesting career. Tessa’s never told me about you. Hm, I mean she never told me aboutwhatyou do.”
Why would I tell him anything?
Daniel snorts. “Don’t lie on my account. Tessie never talks about me to anyone. She acts like I don’t exist. I’m pretty sure she’s embarrassed of me.”
“You exist in my heart, Thompson; that’s not enough for you?” I playfully ask, as he gently shoves my shoulder.
Giovanni hasn’t blinked once since we sat down, probably absorbing our interactions and saving them for analysis later. I watch him watching us and try to estimate how long it’ll take him to put all the pieces together.
“Thompson… You’re DT. I’ve seen you on a billboard, I think.”
Two minutes, twenty-two seconds.
Daniel grimaces. “Fuck. I hated that thing. I lost a stupid bet to my agent and had to do an advertisement as punishment.”
Giovanni taps his pencil on his desk. “But Tessa’s not…”
My skin heats, and I shrink in my seat, the soft Italian leather cool against my back.
He furrows his brows. “Oh.Cohenis a fake last name, then. Obviously.”
I feel a rush of air on my face from my brother’s neck swiveling toward me at lightning speed. “Tess. Tell me you didn’t.”
“Stop it,” I hiss, begging him not to embarrass me further in front of Giovanni.
“Is Cohen a family name? A maiden name, maybe?”
Daniel stifles a laugh. “Shewishesit was a family name.”
Giovanni looks baffled. “I’m sorry, I’m not following.”
My brother opens his mouth to speak, and I pinch the skin on his arm with a vengeance only a sibling could inflict. He flicks me off, undeterred.
“SethCohenfrom The O.C. was Tessie’s childhood crush growing up. It’s hilarious that she pretended to fictionally marry him as an adult.” Looking distressingly gleeful at this revelation, he asks, “Does Mom know?”
“It’s a basic last name! That’s the only reason I picked it!”
“What is The O.C.? A place? Where is it?” Giovanni fires off rapid questions like he’s going to time travel and physically visit the set of the Y2K TV show.
“It’s an American show about teens with poor judgement,” Daniel explains, his lips curling into a mischievous grin. He chokes as the laughter he was holding back comes tumbling out all at once.
Giovanni, on the other hand, appears to be angrily scribbling something down in his notebook. I crane my neck, trying to see what it is that has him so bothered.
