Page 8 of Edge of Whispers

I watched him run lightly down the walk and concluded that his ass was as fine as his quadriceps had suggested that it might be. “You could both come in,” I called.

“No, he’s shy. He’ll be fine in the truck.” Knightly jerked open the driver’s side door and exchanged a few words with whoever sat on the passenger side. A few long, loping strides brought him back up to the porch.

It took me forever to get the locks open. My hands felt clumsy and thick. When the door finally swung wide, the smell of the funeral flowers was intensely strong.

Knightly followed me through the house. His footsteps were weirdly quiet for such a big man walking on such old, creaky floors. I snapped on the kitchen light and had a bad moment when I remembered how we’d trashed the place last night. Every surface was covered with spilled flour, shreds of dough, and the odd grape here and there, squished on the floor and the countertop. The scorched crusts of the schiacciata looked sad and unkempt on the fine china serving plate. Sticky port bottles lay empty and forlorn, both on and under the table.

He must think I was a total lush. A slob, too.

“We had a wake for her last night,” I felt compelled to explain. “Me and my sisters. Up all night with port wine and Tuscan pastry.”

Knightly nodded. “Sounds like an appropriate thing to do.”

I touched my aching head with my fingertips. “It seemed that way at the time,” I said dully. “So what was I... oh, yes. Coffee. Or tea.” I started rummaging in the kitchen drawers, feeling shaky and rattled. “Which do you prefer?”

“Tea, please. If Lucia has it. Had it.”

“I thought you’d pick tea,” I told him. “What kind? Green? Herbal?”

“Black tea if you have it,” he said. “With sugar. And milk if possible. I’m Irish. I get the tea thing from my folks.”

“I’m Irish, too,” I confessed.

His eyebrows lifted. “Really? With a name like D’Onofrio? Wasn’t Lucia ...”

“Italian? God, yes. Down to her toenails.” Nancy yanked a green canister of Irish Breakfast tea out of the drawer. “Will this do?”

“That’ll be fine.”

“She adopted us,” I went on, rummaging for the teakettle. “She took us in when we were foster kids. I was the first one she found. I was thirteen. Nell and Vivi came later. My name was O’Sullivan, then.” Pans rattled and clanked as I shoved them around. “O’Sullivan was my mother’s name. I don’t know about my father. He could have been Italian, for all I know. The way things went, I was lucky to have a surname at all.”

“Hey,” he said gently. “You seem upset. You don’t have to tell me all this?—”

“I was so glad when Lucia finally adopted me.” I couldn’t stop talking, although there was a tight quaver in my voice. “It was a dream come true. I was so proud she wanted me. I’ve been a D’Onofrio for more than half my life now, so I guess that means I’m Italian now too, whether the Italians want to claim me or not.” I yanked out a kettle that was nested in some other pans and ended up pulling the whole cluster out of the cupboard. They hit the floor with an ear-splitting clatter.

I stared down, the kettle clutched in my hand. I felt Liam Knightly’s big, warm hand at my elbow, gently steering me toward a kitchen chair, turning me around, then nudging me steadily backward until I lost my balance and was forced to sit down on it.

“Let me.” He took the kettle from my numb fingers.

I just sat there, speechless, and let him do it. He ran water into the kettle, set it on the stove, lit the gas. He gathered the pans and slid them back into the cupboard without so much as a sound. Without seeming to search for anything, he assembled sugar, mugs, spoons, milk. Damn, he was smooth.

He gently pushed the clutter aside on the table and draped a tea bag in each mug. Hot water gurgled pleasantly as he filled them. Steam rose.

Knightly put the kettle down and sat, waiting patiently. I was so embarrassed at my little freak-out. When I made no move to drink, he finally stirred some sugar and milk into both cups and nudged one toward me.

“Go on,” he urged. “Tea helps with everything. My mom always used to say that.”

I tried to smile. Took a cautious sip. It must have been the hot steam against my face, but suddenly tears were slipping down. They tickled my face, dangled from my chin, filled my nose. Damn that nose. Already puffy and red from yesterday’s tears.

“She was a wonderful lady,” Knightly said. “Pure quality.”

Right then, I wished desperately that I’d left my hair down, unwashed or not. I would have loved to tilt my head forward and have curtain of hair to hide behind.

But it was not to be. My hair was slicked back cruelly tight, every wisp smoothed, with my pale, wet face naked and exposed in the cold, gray light of morning.

“Yes,” I said. “She was. The best. In every way.”

The sounds of the morning smoothly shifted into the foreground as the silence lengthened—cars passing by, rain sluicing down the window glass. Steam curled up from the two cups.

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