Glass Houses (10 page)

N
ine

“
V
anni, you big lump, out of the way and let the girl in. She’s got to be exhausted. You
come right on in here at once—
O
li
via, is it?—yes, Olivia, Vanni told me.” This small lady with gray-flecked black hair wound on top of her head had to be Mama Zanetto.

Still reeling from the angry exchange between Sam and his partner, Olivia felt disoriented by the appearance of the ebullient Mrs. Zanetto. The woman couldn’t be more than four-foot-ten, and a plump figure inside her belted black dress suggested that she ate a good deal of the excellent cooking Sam and Vanni had alluded to.

“Where you from, Olivia?” Mrs. Zanetto asked.

“England.”

“England where?”

“In and around London most of the time. My folks live in Eton.”

“You know any of the Bocellis? They live in London, too. Fine family. Eight sons. Two daughters. And they’re all in the family business.” She aimed a disapproving glare at Vanni. “Unlike some people, they know they owe it to their parents
to look after things. They’re in buttons. Biggest button-making business in London. You know them?”

“I can’t say I do,” Olivia said, but didn’t add that London was a big place.

“Next time you go there, I give you a letter to take. They’ll make you very welcome. Good people. And
mio figlio biondo.”
She crooned this last, took hold of Sam’s hands, and smiled at Olivia. “I call him my blond son. That’s what he is to me, a son I wish I had given birth to. You being a good boy?” She patted his cheek. “You stay away too long and that makes Pops angry with you. He is my father-in-law,” Mama told Olivia.

Sam smiled down on Mrs. Zanetto. “He’s angry because he misses trying to rile me.”

She shook a finger at him. “You should humor a sick old man. He has few pleasures. Watch this one, Olivia—he is a heartbreaker who doesn’t even know when he hurts you.”

“Mama,” Sam said, “you embarrass me.”

Olivia smiled, but she filed away the comment. What had Vanni meant about Sam telling Olivia the truth about himself and not being who he said he was? And what was their business? She felt sick—and very hungry, and tired.

And she felt angry, really angry, and so scared. And if what Vanni had said was supposed to be some sort of joke, he was way off base. It wasn’t funny. She stared hard at Vanni, who avoided her eyes.

“What happen to you?” Mama Zanetto asked. She inclined her head to see the side of Olivia’s skirt. The single brow she raised at Sam almost made Olivia laugh. “Hmm. Well, I get June to lend you something of hers.”

Another woman appeared, this one perhaps in her twenties, and spoke in Italian to Mama Zanetto, who said a good deal and gestured eloquently. The woman ran up the stairs.

Only moments passed before the striking, dark-haired girl trotted back down to the hall. She put one end of a blanket in Vanni’s hands and mu
ttered in Italian, the other corn
er of the blanket in Sam’s hands and said, “Hold it up. Look straight
a
head.” Over the top of the blanket, she passed a full black skirt to Olivia. “This will be nice for now. Give me your own
skirt.”

Olivia did as she was told and felt immensely grateful to be properly covered again.

“This is my younger sister, June,” Vanni said. “June, meet Olivia from England.”

June greeted Olivia briefly and slipped instantly away— after snatching the blanket from Vanni and Sam, to whom she offered angry glances.

“I guess we’ve offended June,” Sam said. His smile at Olivia was uncertain.

“That’s easy to do,” Vanni said, then suddenly added, “Prepare yourself. Canine attack on the way.”

Startled, Olivia saw the surge of heavy muscle beneath shiny black-and-brown fur. She stepped backward. The biggest, ugliest German Shepherd she’d ever seen surged from gloomy regions at the far end of the hall.

“Hiya, Boss,” Sam said, dropping to his haunches and holding out his arms. “Come here. Maybe I’ve got something for you.”

The dog stopped in flight, used his heavy legs and feet as brakes on the shiny floor. Intelligent dark eyes went from face to face and lingered on Olivia, who now felt completely unnerved. “Oh, my,” she said. “Boswell, of course. He really is quite large, isn’t he?”

“He was bred in Germany, where they concentrate on strength and performance, not how pretty they can make them,” Sam said. “Come on, old guy. Be nice. He doesn’t accept strangers very easily.”

“Thanks for the reassurance,” Olivia said. “I think I’ll go outside.”

Sam shook his head. “No need.”

Boss spared his owner the briefest of glances before he went back to staring Olivia down. He lowered his belly and took several steps closer.

Wasn’t Sam going to do something? The dog was getting ready to attack her.

Boss’s upper lip lifted. It actually curled and turned up at the co
rn
ers. The animal had vast teeth, and the fang-like eye teeth were capped with glittering metal.

Olivia stood her ground, but she longed to flee. “He’s quite a dog.” Throwing up in Mama Zanetto’s hall would be mortifying.

“One of the best the canine corps ever had. If he didn’t have a bit of arthritis, he’d still be on active duty.”

“And if they’d provide him with beds to climb on,” Vanni said. “And I don’t mean the kind they make for dogs.”

“Unfortunately, he does have a couple of idiosyncracies. Quit drooling over the lady, Boss.”

“He looks as if he’d like to have me for dinner,” Olivia said.

Aiden glanced at her, then studied Boss, and he couldn’t stop a too-wide grin. “That’s not what this is about. He likes you, the traitor. He doesn’t like many people.”

As if to prove that Aiden knew what he was talking about, Boss loped to Olivia, turned his head sideways, and rested a cheek on her legs. He sighed.

“No loyalty,” Mama Zanetto said. “I gotta get back to my gravy. You call me Mama, understand, Olivia? All my friends call me Mama. Ten minutes we eat. Maybe five. Set the table, Giovanni.”

She marched away in black shoes with crepe soles that squeaked on linoleum tiles.

Aiden punched Vanni’s arm lightly. “Better do what your mama wants, Giovanni.”

“You’d better do what I’ve told
you
to do,” Vanni said. Boss growled, deep and low, and only the glittering eye teeth showed. He took a menacing step toward Vanni.

“I guess man’s best friend is telling you to back off,” Aiden told Vanni. “He doesn’t like the way you talk to me.”

“You’re cruisin’ for trouble, buddy,” Vanni said. He left, and an atmosphere of anger hung where he’d been.

Surely Olivia was going to ask about Vanni’s comments. She’d make it easier if she did because he’d just have to tell her the truth.

“
Boswell, you’re very handsome,
”
she said softly, holding out a hand to the dog.

Aiden heard her swallow and saw the trouble—no, the frightened expression in her eyes, dammit— Aiden would have liked to take hold of that hand and pull her away somewhere completely private. If he could be completely alone with her, he’d find a way to explain what had happened without making himself sound like a snoop. But this might be his best chance at trying to put her mind at rest. He spoke very quietly, “Please trust me, Olivia. This must all seem scary and too much for you, but I promise I’ll take care of you. And you’re safe with me. Okay?”

“I don’t really know you, do I?”

She’d be a fool if she didn’t doubt every word he said. “No, you don’t. Bear with me. Once we get through dinner, I’ll make sure I explain the mixup. There isn’t time now.”

Boss had eyed Olivia’s hand for a long time; now he approached and put his wet nose in her palm. There was no missing the slight trembling in Olivia’s hand and arm. But the old canine womanizer rested his big, ugly head on the woman’s palm, showed his fearsome teeth in his version of a besotted smile, and studied her with liquid eyes.

“Oh,” Olivia said. “He’s smiling at me, Sam. No wonder he’s so special to you. He’s an absolute love.”

Boss inclined his head and proceeded to lick her forearm with a tongue large enough to make the journey from wrist to elbow in less than a second. A paw rose and hung in midair until Olivia held and shook it.

Aiden made a mental note to let Boss sleep wherever he wanted to sleep tonight. The dog deserved a medal for excellence in diversionary tactics.

“Dinner,” a voice shouted from somewhere.

“That means what it says,” Aiden told Olivia. “You don’t keep Mama and Pops waiting. By the way, don’t let Pops get to you. He’s got an evil sense of humor and a mean mouth—but he’s one of the best. Give him a chance. And give me a chance, okay?”

“We’d better go to the table,” Olivia said. She couldn’t promise him anything.

Sam nodded and ushered her ahead of him into the Zanettos’ dining room. Despite the generous size of the area, a huge table filled the space. Spread with a green-and-white cloth, every inch was all but covered with oversized dishes. The smells attacked Olivia’s taste buds and they watered. Bowls of pasta, bowls of red sauce, bowls of salad, baskets of bread, platters of meat and cheese, a block of Parmesan on a tray with a grater—she had never seen quite such a feast. In the center of the table stood an old and elaborate piece of brass with a naked boy holding up a large bowl overflowing with fresh fruit. Candle holders encircled the bowl and unlikely prisms of crystal dripped from the oddest spots. Red candles flickered in the holders. Sam put Olivia in a chair between himself and an ancient, bent, and grizzled man at the head of the table.

June, wearing an apron, waved her hands at Mama and talked volubly in Italian. A man who resembled Vanni but who was a slightly older and more heavyset version, nodded to Olivia and took a seat opposite. To his left sat a thin woman with black hair pulled severely back from a beautiful, sad-eyed face.

“Sit,” the old man said in a husky voice. He coughed and his whole, thin body shook. He waved an elegant, if gnarled hand. Nicotine stained the fingers, and the grooved nails curled like a parrot’s claws. “Show some respect for the food that is prepared.”

Sam joined Olivia at once, and Vanni sat to Sam’s right. June threw up her arms, but sat down. The stocky man took a seat between her and the lovely, quiet woman. Mama, grinning as if no gathering had ever been more perfect, took a chair facing her white-haired father-in-law.

Shouting across and around the table made conversation, or even understanding, impossible. Sam leaned toward Olivia
and said, “That’s Basilio and his wife, Pia. Basilio runs the business.”

“What are you whispering about,
Biondo
?” Mama asked. “Speak up.”

“Perhaps he is making love to his new lady,” Pops Zanetto said. “Is that what you’re doing, boy?”

“I was explaining who’s who to Olivia,” Sam said. “She’s tired, so I thought I’d make it easy on her.”

“June,” June said, shooting a hand across the table for Olivia to shake. “We’re glad Biondo has finally found a woman to bring here. We offer him good Italian girls, don’t we, Mama? He turns them all down.”

Mama nodded, her expression one of deep despondency.

“We bring wonderful Italian women,” June continued. “And we leave them alone to get to know each other. But always it is, ‘She talks too much,’ or, ‘She eats too much,’ or ‘She is too forward.’ Have you ever met a man who thought a woman was too forward? And when we tried to get him to explain what he meant, he couldn’t. So we asked the girl and she said she got a little close to him on the couch, then she put a hand on his chest, then she looked up at him, and moved her hand to his leg. Then she undid her blouse—
”

“June,” Mama snapped.

“Let the girl finish her story,” the old man said, pointing a shaky finger. “At my age, stories about other men’s good fortune are all you have. Go on, June.”

Olivia sucked in her mouth to control an urge to grin. Sam leaned forward and rested his chin on a braced hand. His expression revealed nothing of what he was thinking.

“Mange, mange,”
Mama ordered. “The food is getting cold.”

“You
mange,”
Pops said. “Tell the story, June.”

Bowls and platters began to make their way around the table, and heaping forkfuls of rich food were piled on plates.

“As I was saying,” June said, a righteous annoyance turning her lips down. “This beautiful Italian girl with big young breasts any man would be grateful to see, opens her blouse for
him. She isn’t wearing anything underneath, and she moistens her lips and closes her eyes.
And she waits. And nothing hap
pens.”

Olivia put her hands in her lap and bowed her head. She had an irresistible vision of her mother witnessing this scene. “Get on with it,” Pops ordered. “Then what?”

“When he didn’t kiss her, or touch her, she moved her hand the smallest distance, just enou
gh to touch the big salami and—”
Roars around the table drowned June out.