“Everybody here?” she asked, following his gaze.
“Everybody but—” The scream of an engine that needed to be thrown into the next gear broke through the silence of Sudbury, pulling a startled gasp from Sam as a streak of cherry and chrome sailed into the driveway. “Chessie, who never met a speed limit she couldn’t annihilate or a computer she couldn’t hack.”
He guided Sam to the front door, knowing who would answer it and what he would say to Zach. The question was, what would Uncle Nino say to Sam? Was Zach going to regret the honesty he’d shared with his great-uncle?
He reached up to the brass knocker with a stylized R.
“You knock at your own house?” Sam asked.
“I don’t live here anymore.” The gleaming Revolutionary War red door opened, filled by the human fireplug that was Nino, his barrel chest popping out of the top of a white apron that matched thinning silver hair, a mile-wide smile, and mirth-filled black eyes.
He extended his arms straight out, pulling both of them into his circle, his grasp tight and solid and strong.
“Zaccaria,” he whispered, pronouncing the name exactly as he’d heard it for the first ten years of his life, a name too feminine sounding for Americans, but so natural to his ear. He was Zaccaria long before he was Zach. Long before he became an orphan, shipped to America with his sister. “Benvenuto a casa,” Nino said. Always, always, welcome to the home. Nino’d tried so hard for this to be Zach’s home.
“Grazie, pro zio.”
He eased back from the three-way hug as Nino took Sam’s face in his big hands, denying her the chance to look at anyone or anything but him. Obviously, no reintroduction was necessary. Nino searched her face as though he were memorizing every angle and shape.
“Samantha.” It sounded like a long sigh of relief.
Nino looked up and put a knotted, knuckly hand right on Zach’s scar and held it there, one hand touching Zach, one touching Samantha, like he was joining them.
“I told you she’d be back,” Uncle Nino said to him. “Didn’t I tell you?”
“You told me.”
Next to him, he felt Sam stiffen and Zach laughed. “He just wants you to make that pesto again, Sam.”
“Jesus Christ, the swine must all be airborne at Logan.” The loud, crass voice could only belong to one person. Before Zach was in the door, JP had started.
“JP Rossi!” Aunt Fran’s voice carried back even in a hush. “I don’t care how old you are, you don’t speak that way in my house.”
“Ma. I just heard Zach laughing. Which means pigs can fly.”
Zach’s fist curled, but Nino slid his calming hand from cheek to shoulder, adding a squeeze. “Come and drink wine.”
Wine wouldn’t help. Wanting to punch JP in the face was a sensation so familiar, it was not too different from breathing. The last time Zach’s fist had made contact with that smartass mouth was about eighteen years ago, on Zach’s thirteenth birthday.
The satisfaction had been worth being grounded for a week.
In the center hall, Sam paused on the way back to take in the jigsaw puzzle of portraits and family photos that rose along with the stairway, but Zach barely spared them a glance.
Of course, he made plenty of appearances on the family wall. His picture, and Vivi’s, were right alongside the others at Christmas and on family vacations. She’d instantly blended into this family, never letting their unorthodox arrival color her relationships with them.
Unlike Zach, who never forgot it.
“Well, who do we have here?” JP’s greeting sounded smarmy, buried, as always, in a Kennedy-quality Boston accent. Zach held back in the hall, not quite ready for the confrontation yet, letting Nino take Sam into the family room adjacent to the oversize kitchen, both forming a great room that had always been the heart of the house.
“This is Samantha Fairchild,” Uncle Nino said. “Zach’s friend.”
“Hello, Samantha.” Why did that prick always have to be here to ruin what could have been a passably pleasant way to spend the day? “Aren’t you Vivi’s friend?”
A prick with an excellent memory.
“I used to live in the same apartment building where Vivi lives,” she said noncommittally. “And I was here once for your father’s birthday.”
“But that was quite a while ago. I’ve seen you since then; I’m certain of it.”
Zach came up behind her, flanking her on the right. “Don’t grill her, JP. The woman just walked in the door.”
“I’m not grilling. I just am trying to figure out the timeline here.” He smiled at Sam. “I guess it’s just the police detective in me.”
“You’ve seen her with me,” Zach said. “Before my last tour, Sam and I went out.”
“That’s right. You’re the ad agency girl.”
“Well, I’m—”
“About to be the Harvard Law woman,” Zach interjected. “Maybe you’ve heard of it?” Then he turned her right toward the kitchen and away from JP. “Come on, Sammi. It smells better in here.”
“Oh, it certainly does.” She took a long, slow inhale, her arm still firmly around his waist. All part of the charade, but he didn’t mind. It had been a long, long time since a woman touched him like that.
A long time since this woman had touched him like that.
“It smells delicious, Mr. Rossi,” she said.
“Uncle Nino,” the older man corrected.
“I’m coming, Zach!” A woman’s voice rose from the dining room, followed by the sound of silverware being abandoned on china.
“Aunt Fran,” Zach whispered. “Brace for hug.”
In a minute, she ambled around the corner from the dining room, her chubby arms outstretched. “It’s been so many Sundays without you.”
How many? Only Fran could count with two parts guilt and one part love. “Hey, Aunt Fran. I brought a friend to make up for it.”
She pulled back, turning to Sam. “Oh, I remember you!”
“Sam Fairchild,” Sam said, accepting Fran’s embrace. “It’s nice to be back here.”
JP slipped out the French doors to the backyard, and Zach relaxed a little. “Where’s Marc?” he asked, leaning against the granite-topped bar that surrounded the kitchen.
“Down fishing with Uncle Jim at the lake,” Fran said. “Sam, can I get you something to drink? Tea or soda? Uncle Nino’s wine?”
A female shriek answered from outside. “No, JP, don’t you dare tell him! You don’t have to be such a freaking cop all the time. Stop it!”
At Chessie’s outburst, Zach exchanged a look with Nino, who glanced skyward. “I know,” Zach mumbled. “He’s really lookin’ for it today.”
“Well, don’t give it to him, Zaccaria. That’s what he wants.”
The youngest Rossi marched in, hands plastered on her curvy hips, black hair wild over her shoulders, her crystalline blue eyes sparking with anger. “JP’s a prick, you know that?”
“I know that,” Zach said, approaching her, ready to get between Chessie and JP as he had a thousand times in his life.
“Francesca!” Aunt Fran knuckled the counter. “Not the girls in the family, too, talking like that.”
“He is, Ma.” She spat the words and stared daggers at JP as he cruised in, his face even more smug than it had been ten minutes earlier.
“Three weeks. She’s had the stupid car three weeks and…” He punched his fist into his palm. “Bam.”
“Fu—”
Zach stopped Chessie’s F-bomb with a grip of her upper arm, giving JP a lethal stare. “Get off her case.”
“Thank you, Zach,” Chessie said, tilting her head onto his shoulder for a second before she headed through the family room toward the kitchen, to the person who really protected her. “I don’t see any reason to upset Dad, do you, Ma? It’s just a scratch.”
Aunt Fran had Chessie in her arms in an instant. “I’ll tell him, JP,” Aunt Fran said, her look over her baby’s shoulder fierce on her oldest son. “I
t’s my job to break bad news to him, not yours.”
JP shook his head and headed out. Behind Zach, the women’s chatter rose. It was as good a time as any to go find Marc and do the handoff. “I’ll be back,” he said to Sam.
“Wait for me,” Nino called from the stove, tapping a wooden spoon and gathering a dark red glass of wine. “I’ll walk with you.”
Zach glanced at Sam. “I’ll be fine,” she mouthed to him, waving him to the door. “Talk to Marc.”
In other words, she was anxious to make the shift to a new protector. At least they both agreed it was a smart move. Not that he expected her to make a case to keep him as her bodyguard. It was obvious he made her skin crawl.
While he waited for Nino, he watched Fran and Chessie gather around Sam, circling her with warmth, generosity, and noise, like Rossis did. Sam laughed at something Aunt Fran said, and Chessie settled onto the next bar stool like she was all ready for girl talk.
Something inside him slipped a little, just looking at Sam in his family’s kitchen, calm despite the chaos around her. She’d fit in, he realized with a start. Better than he ever had, ironically.
Nino shuffled over, his blue knit pullover already dotted with red sauce.
“Grazie, ragazzino,” he muttered as Zach held the door. No one in the Rossi house spoke a word of Italian; they were as American as the Andersons on one side and the Thompsons on the other. But Uncle Nino knew plenty of words and phrases, and he used them only with Zach, hoping the younger man wouldn’t lose the language. Even if it was just ragazzino, a nickname for a young boy.
Zach had lost the language anyway. He’d been a foreigner in this country, but lost all connections with the one he came from, leaving him firmly in no man’s land between two homes.
Zach kept the old man’s pace down the patio stairs, and that pace was slower than the last time he’d visited. The realization made his heart heavy.
“How ya feelin’?” Nino asked, looking directly at Zach’s scar. He never beat around the proverbial bush, this old man. Right to the heart of the matter, every time.
“Fine.”
“Still burning?”
He brushed his cheek. “Always, Nino. Like a hot poker.”
“No relief?”
“Certain things relieve it.” Sam’s cheek and hair. Sam’s skin. Sam’s palm. Then why did the pain seem worse since Sam showed up? “What’s on your mind?” Zach asked, hating the subject of his injury.
“Where’s JP?” Nino asked.
“Probably taking pictures of Chessie’s dented car so he can blackmail her.”
Nino snorted. “He’s just pissed off because you have a pretty girlfriend and he doesn’t.”
“She’s not my girlfriend.” Lying to Nino was pretty much out of the question, but telling him the truth wasn’t an option either.
“But you managed to get her back.” He gave a knowing smile. “I don’t know what makes me happier. Seeing you with her again or the fact that you actually listened to me and took my advice.”
“Don’t get excited about either one. I didn’t take your advice and I didn’t get her back.” He put his hand on Nino’s mottled arm. “She dropped into my lap, and she’s about to drop right out of it again.”
“But she forgives you, right?”
“Doubtful.”
Nino frowned. “If you think that little scratch on your face is gonna lose her, I’ll have to give you a matching one on the right side.”
“It’s way more complicated than that.”
His uncle turned and cupped Zach’s face in his beefy fingers. “How many times I gotta tell you? If she loves you, she won’t see your flaws.”
“There’s no love involved,” he said. “And calling a scar of mutilated flesh where there once was an eye a ‘flaw’ is like…” He just shook his head out of the grip, not even able to think of an analogy. “Forget it, Nino.”
“That’s all it is,” Nino insisted. “A flaw. So what? I got big ears and hands the size of dinner plates. You think that kept your great-aunt Monica from jumping my ugly bones? And that woman, she could jump with the best.”
“I think big extremities are generally a plus.” Zach was losing his patience, wanting to get Marc alone, who was deep in conversation with Uncle Jim. “Is this what you wanted to talk about?”
“One of the things. What did I tell you when you got back from that war?” It was always “that war” with Nino. “What did I tell you before you left?”
“I don’t remember,” he lied. “You plied me with homemade wine and I said things I didn’t mean.”
“Ehh!” Nino waved a hand in Italian disdain. “You said the truth and we both know it.”
“Come on, Nino. I was drunk, about to deploy, and deep into it with the sexiest woman I’d met in forever. Don’t hold me to what I said that night. Everything changed in Iraq.” Why had he confessed so much to Nino that night? He wasn’t in love with Sam. It had been… good, satisfying sex. That’s all. She knew it; he knew it. Nino lived in dreamland thinking it was more.
“Oh, it’s more than that,” Nino said, confirming Zach’s suspicions. “I can tell by the way she looks at you.”
“Then your vision’s worse than mine.” He hesitated a beat, the impact of how it would feel to lie to this man hitting him hard. He’d trust Nino with his life, and Sam’s. Still, he’d promised her that no one in the family would know. “It’s just temporary.”
“What is it with you and the backing off?” Nino’s voice was surprisingly strong, his face reddened with emotion. “You love a woman, you tell her. No, not Zaccaria. He loves a woman, he ignores her.” He slugged some wine, scowling over the thick-rimmed glass. “Now she’s giving you a second chance and you’re wallowing in self-pity like a chickenshit.”
He knew better than to argue. “What else is on your mind, Nino?”
They were still out of earshot of Uncle Jim and Marc, but Nino lowered his voice anyway. “It’s about Gabriel.”
“Have you heard from him?”
“He might be back in the country soon.” Like Zach, Gabe trusted Uncle Nino with information no one else could have.
“Oh, man. That’s great.” He could use a shot of his favorite cousin. “When?”
“You know Gabriel. Everything in gray, nothing black, nothing white. But he’s still not able to come up for air, if you know what I mean.”
He meant Gabe was still dark, still working for a very shadowy division of the CIA, as he had been for almost as long as Zach had been in the Army. In September 2001, they’d each had their own way of reacting to what happened in the world. Zach had dropped out of college and joined the Army; Gabe had parlayed a low-level position in the State Department into a job as a spook.
“You mean even when he’s on U.S. soil, no one can see him or know what he’s doing.”
“Exactly,” Nino confirmed. “So he won’t be able to come home, and he has to have a nice, safe place to live.” Nino reached into his pocket and pulled out a key. “He asked me to do him a favor and rent something safe and clean.”
Meaning CIA-approved.
“It’s in Jamaica Plain,” Nino said. “And since you two are so close and he trusts you, I thought maybe you could head on over there and, you know, mop it up a bit.” In other words, sweep for bugs. “Then you could stay there, instead of on your sister’s office floor.”
His temporary state of living drove Nino crazy, but it wasn’t the living arrangement for Zach that suddenly made him smile. “It’s totally safe?”
“Gabe had to get his higher-ups to do the usual wrangling, but the address doesn’t show up on any GPS systems, and the owners don’t really exist, if you know what I mean.”
Nino didn’t realize it, but he was handing him a safe house for Sam. “And no one cares if I stay there… or if anyone visits?”
“Visits? I’d be very careful with that. But I wouldn’t give you this key if I thought it was a problem, Zaccaria.” He put a single key in Zach
’s palm. “And if your friend Sam is truly trustworthy and you don’t tell her much in the way of details, then you may have company.”
“What about Marc?” He’d have to know why Zach had this hideaway house.
“Just you, Zaccaria.”
Another reason not to give Marc the job.
“Hey!” The bark came from out of the woods, so sharp, Zach pivoted in one second, his hands fisted, his body poised for attack.
JP came walking out from between the trees, a cell phone to his ear.
“Now what?” Zach muttered, dropping his hands but not the urge to use them.
“Is it possible there’s something you’re not telling us about your girlfriend?” JP kept walking, purpose powering a cocky stride. “Is there?” he demanded.
JP came to a stop and punched his phone, sliding it into his pocket. “Because that was a friend of mine in Boston PD,” he said. “You’ll never guess what he told me.”
“You ran a background check on her?” Nino asked.
JP looked hard at Zach. “We gotta talk, man.”
Instead of slamming JP’s face, he slipped his hand into his pocket and dropped the key into it. “I already know everything you’re about to tell me.”
“Not everything.”
CHAPTER 8
Taylor Sly had money, and a lot of it. Vivi glanced at the ostentatious gold sign hanging outside the brand-new brick monster on Dartmouth Street, imagining the kind of woman who would frequent a private health club like Equinox. No woman Vivi would hang with.
Climbing the stairs, she was greeted by a receptionist with wild blond hair and bony shoulders, seated at a see-through acrylic desk that, oddly, distorted her perfect body and made her look chubby.
That had to be some kind of criminal offense at Equinox, where health was considered a mind-set, not a lifestyle. It said so on the door. Whatever it was, membership was steep.
“Welcome to Equinox,” she said, a porcelain-perfect smile wavering as her gaze drifted from Vivi’s head to her toes, the receptionist’s lip practically curling as she eyed Vivi’s black and white checked Vans. “How can I help you?”
“I have an appointment with Jagger Musenda.”