When It Falls Apart (The D'Angelos, #1)(50)

“I’m good.” And she was. “Hard-ass day.”

Luca reached across the center console, and Brooke took the invitation and placed her hand in his.

“Thank you.”

“You’ve already said that.”

“I still feel it.”

It was just after seven. They jumped on the freeway only to find traffic.

“This drive home will explain all my crankiness by the time we get there,” she told him when they reached the first red taillights on the 10 freeway.

“When were you cranky?” he asked.

She squeezed his hand. “The night I moved in. I all but bit your head off for offering to help move boxes upstairs.”

“Oh, yeah. You were cranky.”

Brooke fake gasped. “Ah! You could sugarcoat that a little.”

“Spunky. Feisty. Someone I hated to admit that I wanted to get to know better.”

“Hated?”

Traffic completely stopped in front of them.

As in zero miles per hour.

Luca turned to her.

“I did not want to rent the apartment.”

“Right.” She tried to pull her hand away.

He held on.

“Because doing so felt like a failure.”

Brooke paused.

“When my father died, Francesca was an infant. I knew my marriage wasn’t good. My father knew, but he pretended not to know. I promised to take care of our family. To be there in his absence.”

“That had to be hard.”

Luca paused. “Renting a part of our family home was a failure to that promise. It wasn’t you.”

His fingers twitched, and then squeezed.

“That seems deeply personal. Why did you choose to tell me that?” she asked.

Traffic started to move.

“God, cara, after all I’ve seen today, how can you ask that?”

“I don’t understand the comparison.”

Luca brought their joined hands to his lips and kissed the back of her hand. “And that, my dear, is what makes you so very beautiful.”



They didn’t pull into the drive until nearly midnight.

Everything was quiet.

The restaurant long since closed and the staff gone home.

What should have been a two-hour drive turned into four because of three separate accidents and a detour that took them off the freeway.

Luca thought for sure Brooke would fall asleep, but she didn’t.

They talked about everything.

Family. The state of the country. Politics.

He talked about Franny and the absolute joy she brought to his life.

It was when they were pulling into the drive, both of them ravenous after skipping dinner thinking they’d be home in time for a late meal, that they were talking of Francesca’s desire to have a puppy.

“Every kid needs a pet at some point.”

“I gave her a hamster. It died in a month.”

“Ouch.” They decided to leave the belongings in the car until morning and went straight to the restaurant kitchen.

“Hamsters are sensitive to heat. She placed the cage next to the window, couple of days later the thing was belly-up.”

“She must have been devastated.”

Luca opened one of the kitchen’s refrigerators and removed several bins of cut-up vegetables. “You toss us a salad. I’ll whip something up.”

“You’re going to cook? I thought we’d just throw something in a microwave.”

He removed a chicken breast. “We’ve eaten nothing but garbage all day.”

“I’m sure there is nothing in this kitchen that you could classify as garbage.”

“True, very true.” Still, Luca sliced the chicken thin so it would cook a little quicker and did his thing.

Out of the corner of his eye, he watched Brooke poke around and find what she needed to make their salad. “Maybe when Franny is a little older, a dog will be okay. They at least have the good sense to move out of the sun.”

“The hamster would have if not for the cage. Luckily I found the poor thing before my daughter.”

“Yuck.”

“I felt rotten. The whole ordeal showed me that we weren’t ready for another responsibility. I depend on my family to help with Franny. I can’t ask for more. A dog would be a lot more. Besides, Giovanni will be moving soon and that’s one less pair of hands around here.”

“Did I know that about Gio?”

“No, actually. I’d appreciate if you kept that quiet. I don’t think he’s told anyone else yet.”

Luca seared the chicken, turned down the heat, and put the tomatoes, lemon, and spices into the pan to let it simmer.

“I would imagine living with your mom at his age isn’t conducive to having a personal life.”

“Exactly.”

Brooke put the lids on the containers and started moving them back to the fridge. “I suppose it’s only a matter of time before Chloe wants a place of her own for the same reasons.”

“Yeah, no. That’s not going to happen.”

Brooke giggled. “Why? Because she’s a girl.”

“Exactly.”

Brooke’s giggle turned into a full-blown laugh. “So, she lives with Mom until she gets married?”