Page 75 of The Mafia's Christmas Baby
Normal things that look like life going on.
When I step back into the kitchen, he is by the door with my coat in his hand.
His eyes are steady.
Mine probably are not.
I don’t know why I agreed to going away with him.
But I do know that I don’t want to be alone for the foreseeable future, and I don’t want to lose him again.
15
NICO
Elisa agrees to escape with me for the weekend.
I take her out the back stairs with the bag that looks like it belongs to a long shift.
We keep to side streets, then the bridge, then the service road that runs past the marinas.
The cabin sits where the tide forgets to make noise.
It used to belong to a fisherman who ran whiskey for the Riccaris when the law thought alcohol was a sin.
The porch sags a little.
The paint is the color of old salt.
I park under the pines and kill the lights.
Inside, the room is one long box—stove, table, two windows, a narrow hallway to a bedroom that fits a bed and not much else.
The walls look ordinary until you know where to knock.
I tap a board with my knuckle and it gives a softer note.
A panel slides with a push to reveal a compartment the size of a breadbox.
There are five like it, spaced like ribs.
Empty now.
Not always.
Elisa runs a hand over the sill and checks the lock.
She notices the second deadbolt.
I put wood in the stove, open the windows for ten minutes to clear the air, then close them tightly and set water on to boil.
If you do the simple things first, the rest comes easier.
The first night is quiet.
I cook the way I did when I had nothing but a burner and a pan that wasn’t mine.
Olive oil, garlic, a handful of tomatoes I cut with a paring knife that still remembers someone else’s kitchen.
