Deep (Pagano Family #4)(70)

She didn’t feel very sunny. She dropped her head, but his hand came under her chin and lifted. “There are some clouds now, true. But you are the brightest part of my life. You found something light in me—I think maybe you made whatever’s light in me. So I’m not impatient with you.”

Feeling shaky with emotion, Bev took his hand and brought it to her lips. That kiss wasn’t enough, though. She leaned in and put her hand on the back of his neck. Surprise and concern furrowed his brow, but he leaned down with her pressure, and she kissed him.

It was their first real kiss since that night. Bev’s heart was pounding—not for fear of him, but for fear that the terrible images of that night would fill her head. They didn’t. It was okay. It was good.

She kept it light, a simple press of lips to lips, and Nick didn’t take over or deepen the kiss at all. Bev thought it might have been the best kiss of her whole life.



oOo



They had dinner at Nick’s uncle’s house. Since she’d spent a few weeks with them, recovering after that night in the diner, she’d grown deeply fond of Nick’s family—those she’d met, at least. There were a bunch of cousins and another uncle and aunt, too, but so far, they were only rumors. But Ben, Angie, and Betty had quickly become the closest family Bev had, too. In the few weeks that she’d been back in her own apartment, they’d established a routine of weekly dinners. And Angie and Betty had taken her out weekly for a ‘girls’ lunch’ as well. She felt surrounded and supported.

When you went to dinner at Ben Pagano’s home, you dressed for the occasion. Though none of Bev’s clothes fit her very well, she’d managed to put together what she thought was a fairly decent outfit of a simple, dark blue sleeveless sheath with a grey crocheted cardigan over it. The sheath had once hugged her curves, but now it hung more straight—the style worked either way, she thought.

But when Nick came back, dressed in another of his invariably navy suits, this one without pinstripes, he frowned.

Bev stopped in the process of stepping into her grey pumps and looked at her dress. “Is this wrong to wear?”

He shook his head like his was shaking off a thought. “No.” He came to her and pulled her pendant out from under her dress, laying it over the fabric. “You’re beautiful as always. Are you ready?”

There had been something in that look, but she decided not to push the question. She picked up her grey clutch. “I am.”



oOo



Fred Naldi and his wife, Monica, joined them this time. Bev had met Fred a couple of times, but she and Monica had never met before. Usually, Bev enjoyed meeting new people, but this time, she felt awkward and shy—all the more strange because Monica was a quiet, mouse-like woman, and usually Bev went out of her way to make shy people feel comfortable.

Maybe it was that she hadn’t been expecting the Naldis to be joining them. Their quiet dinners with family felt intruded upon. But that wasn’t like Bev, either. All through the evening—cocktails, helping in the kitchen, setting the table, the meal itself—Bev found herself fighting off a kind of petulant resentment. It made no sense at all to her.

Angie and Betty had both fussed, as they always did, about her weight. Angie poked at her collarbone where it showed at her neckline. Betty kept putting bread on her plate and was gravely disappointed when she turned down a slice of cheesecake.

It wasn’t that she was trying not to eat. It wasn’t even that she wasn’t hungry. It was that food tasted different, less appealing. Like her eyesight, her taste buds seemed to have dimmed.

Nick had said his share, too, but on this night, he called his mother and aunt off—and that was good, because Bev had felt strangely shaky and defensive all night.

By the time they got back home, that petulance and defensiveness she’d felt all night had flowered into something like anger. Gone was the flutter of happiness she’d felt at their kiss. She’d kept quiet on the ride—it turned out, though she hadn’t seen him do it until recently, Nick could drive, and when they went out, it was just the two of them now—but by the time they were at her door, she just wanted to be alone.

Nick had spent every night with her since the night at the diner. Since they’d been back home, he’d stayed at her apartment, going to his own place only when she was out, or to shower and dress, or sometimes to deal with business.

Tonight she turned and put her hand on his chest. “I want to sleep alone tonight.”

“No.”

“Excuse me?”

“You don’t just push me away, Beverly. If there’s something we need to talk about, then we’ll talk. But I won’t let you just push.”

“I don’t want to talk. I want to be alone.”

As an answer, he took her keys out of her hand, unlocked her door, and strode into her apartment, propelling her forward with his body. “First, we talk.”

Mad as she was, she didn’t fight him. But she didn’t want to talk. She didn’t know what was wrong. Or there was so much that was wrong that she didn’t know what was causing her current stress.

He led her to the sofa and sat her down, then sat next to her. “What is it? You’ve been sullen all night. I would never have thought to use the word ‘sullen’ to describe you.”