Page 13 of Better Left Unsaid

“Uncle Dom?” Isabella asked, pulling on my hand as we walked into the elevator, and I pressed the button to Maria’s floor in theBellissimaoffices.

“Yeah, Peanut?” I let go of her hand since no one else was in the elevator with us and leaned against the railing in the back, watching as she spun around to face me.

She played with the bottom of her pink skirt, letting it breeze this way and that way. This was her favorite skirt, and I’d seen it more times than I could count. When Maria had first gotten it for her, Isabella had refused to take it off for a week, wanting to do everything in it—including sleep. Finally, Isabella had taken it off and let Maria wash it.

Isabella swayed her head back and forth, her head of brown curls moving every which way, and gave me a full-on smile. “I made you and Mommy friendship bracelets.” She pulled her princess backpack to the front of her, unzipped a pocket, and took out two woven bracelets.

“They’re beautiful,” I said, reaching out to take the blue and black one she was handing me. “I’m guessing the pink and orange is for Mommy?”

She shook her head, looking extremely confused as to why I’d think that. “Nooo,” she insisted. “Those are my favorite colors, Uncle Dom. That one’s mine. This one is for Mommy,” she explained, holding up a pink and brown one.

I nodded. “Of course. That makes more sense.” I showed her my wrist that I put the bracelet on and asked, “Good?”

“Good,” she agreed, smiling again. “Now we just have to give Mommy hers.”

I placed a hand on her back as she fixed the backpack on herself and the elevator doors opened, letting us out on Maria’s floor. “She’s going to feel very special. Lunch and a bracelet.”

She turned around and looked at me over her shoulder as I continued guiding her through the building. “Can I give it to her?”

I looked at her big, brown, doe eyes and grinned. Perhaps I was biased, but I always thought she was the cutest kid. “You want to give her lunch to her?”

She nodded profusely. “Mmhmm.”

“All right,” I said, handing her the bag, which she took without a second thought. “It’s all yours.”

With her usual, happy-go-lucky attitude, she practically skipped the rest of the way to Maria’s office. I stopped at her assistant’s desk first, and she told us to go right in, that Maria didn’t have a meeting to get to for another half hour. “Thank you,” I told Daphne, as Isabella didn’t hesitate, only made a beeline straight to her office and knocked on the glass.

I stood behind her, holding back laughter, as Maria peered up. As soon as she caught sight of us—particularly, Isabella—her face lit up. She got up so fast, her chair swiveled in her absence, and she opened the door for us. “What are you guys doing here?” she asked, bending down and giving Isabella a kiss on the forehead.

“We brought you lunch,” Isabella replied, passing her the bag, “and a friendship bracelet.”

Maria took both, walking over to her desk and putting the bag down, and wrapping the bracelet around her wrist. “Thank you, that was very sweet. And this bracelet is so pretty. I feel like a princess.”

Isabella rocked on the balls of her feet. “Uncle Dom has one, too, so now we all have them. That means we’ll be friends forever. At least, that’s what Chloe says.”

I shrugged when Maria glanced at me. “Just so you know,” Maria said, tapping the tip of Isabella’s nose, “with or without these bracelets, we would have been friends forever anyway.”

“Exactly.” I backed Maria on this one. “Your mom’s never made me a bracelet and we’ve been friends for a very long time.”

Maria snorted and placed a hand on her hip. “Nice,” she murmured as she moved around and stood beside me while Isabella walked behind Maria’s desk. Clearly, Isabella was over the friendship bracelet conversation.

Isabella tossed her backpack on the floor and hopped into Maria’s chair, spinning in it and yelling, “Look, Mommy!”

“I see,” she responded, the corners of her lips turning up.

“I’ve been thinking,” Isabella started, sounding precocious for her age, “and I think I’m going to be a model and work atBellissima. I want to be like both of you.”

I raked a hand through my hair. “Are you sure you don’t want to be a dancer?” There were many things Isabella wanted to be, but one thing that had never changed was that she wanted to be a model like me. She’d been saying it for as far back as I could remember. She’d even shadowed me going into hair and makeup one day, wanting to know more about what I did for work. I loved this little girl as though she were my own.

She pursed her lips and shook her head. “No. Maybe I’ll do that, too.”

Maria and I laughed. “You can do anything you want, sweetheart. The world is your oyster,” Maria encouraged her.

“What does that mean?” Isabella asked, scrunching her nose up.

I chuckled. “It means you can do anything you want to do.” Hopefully that made more sense to her.

It must have, because she nodded and jumped off the chair, coming to stand next to us. “Uncle Dom is taking me to Central Park.”

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