Chapter 28

TWENTY-EIGHT

T wo days later, I stood on the front porch of Nonna’s house, bouncing slightly from foot to foot while I waited for Xavier to arrive. I dressed up even more than usual for a Sunday in my favorite green polka-dotted wrap dress that flounced around my knees and matched my eyes. The sun was shining, matching the bright yellow gerbera daisies blooming on the porch. A few blocks away, Arthur Avenue was a hub of tourists and locals alike enjoying the weather with a la fresca lunch, but I barely noticed anything other than the fact that every car that drove past for the last thirty minutes was not the big black Mercedes.

To put it lightly, I was a ball of nerves.

Because Xavier was late. A last-minute emergency at the restaurant had prevented him from coming to Mass. Our revised plan was to take Sofia to a park as soon as he arrived, tell her the truth about Xavier, and then take her for gelato before bringing him home to meet the rest of the family.

But the May weather cooperated a little too well, and so when another text from Xavier informed me that traffic was delaying him even more, I couldn’t for the life of me come up with a reasonable excuse to keep Sofia from joining her cousins at the park without letting the cat out of the bag. And so here I was, wondering what the hell I was supposed to say to my sisters when Sofia’s genetic code walked through the door without a word of warning.

Finally, a familiar Mercedes pulled up to the house and Xavier jumped out of the back and practically ran up the porch steps. Clearly, he was stressed too, if the way his hair was pulled in odd directions was any indicator. His collar was also standing up on one side, and his tie, a pretty blue thing that matched his eyes and stood out from the otherwise classic white shirt and black suit he was wearing for the occasion, was yanked loose and into a horribly tight knot.

“She’s still at the park?” He looked up at the house from the third step.

“Yes,” I said as I strode to meet him. “Come here. You’re a mess.”

He waited patiently while I straightened his tie and collar, then smoothed back his hair. Our eyes met as I pushed back that errant lock.

“Thanks,” he said softly.

I pressed my lips together, resisting the urge to look at his. We hadn’t been this close in months, but I hadn’t forgotten that salty-sweet scent of his. The one that made me want to throw my arms around his neck and kiss him until I forgot his name.

Stop it , I told myself . You’re mad at him, remember? Focus .

I stepped back. “Look, I know we were going to find her and tell her first, but my family already knows something’s up because I’ve been out here for the last fifteen minutes. I guarantee at least four of Nonna’s friends have already spotted us, and if you don’t come in soon, the whole neighborhood will be calling to ask who Frankie is talking to on the front step.”

Xavier smiled grimly, reaching up to yank at his collar before I batted his hand away. “Basically, I’m fucked either way, is what you’re saying.”

I shrugged. “Yes. But I wouldn’t use that language around Nonna if I were you.”

That just earned me an eye roll. “She has a swear jar too? Ces, I’m not here for them. I’m here for Sof. Let’s just go get her. Fuck the neighbors.”

Above us, the second-floor curtains twitched—a telltale sign that at least one of my sisters had already spotted who was here.

I turned back to Xavier. “Look at it this way—at least if she freaks out on us, she’ll have six other shoulders to cry on. Just come in and get it over with. We’ll find Sofia and get us all some gelato to numb the shock.”

The thought did not seem to comfort him, but he followed me inside, nonetheless, with the posture of a pirate being led to walk the plank.

Well, it wasn’t far off.

“Frankie!”

The hammering of two pairs of feet down Nonna’s old creaky stairs greeted us, followed by Joni and Marie toppling into the foyer, one after the other. Ah, the spies.

“Helloooo, Mr. Blue Eyes,” Joni greeted Xavier with her patented flirtatious smile. “First Mattie, then you? What is in the water in Brooklyn, huh?”

“Pleasure to meet you,” Xavier said stiffly, offering a hand.

“Oh my God, that voice !” squealed Joni, clutching her shirt with glee. “You sound just like Tom Hiddleston! Frankie, where did you meet this one, and does he have a brother?”

“Joni, can you take it down a notch or ten?” I asked, although I was a little relieved. At least she wasn’t giving him the third degree.

Marie, however, wasn’t so easily distracted.

“You look familiar,” she said, pushing her glasses up her nose as she peered up at Xavier. “Have we met before?”

“Er, I don’t think so,” Xavier said, looking slightly uncomfortable with her sudden close proximity.

“Maybe from the papers?” Marie pushed. “Or do you know the Lyons from Westchester? Carmichael and Kathleen?”

“Marie,” I said, pulling her off him. “Give the man some space.”

“Frankie? Are you back?” Kate wandered down the hall to see what was going on, took one look at me and Xavier, and her jaw dropped to the floor. “Holy shit,” she said, then immediately pivoted and marched back to the dining room.

I sighed. “Come on.”

Xavier frowned. “What just happened?”

“You’ve been found out,” I said. “Time to come in and meet everyone else.”

“I don’t get it,” Joni said behind me. “What secret?”

“You never do,” Marie told her.

“Oh, please. Like you do?”

We entered the dining room at the back of the house, stopping near a hutch to take in the scene while Marie and Joni slipped around us to find seats at the table and avail themselves of the plate of fresh berries in the center.

Xavier paused in the doorway to take in the humble space. I found myself shrinking, just like I did when he first came to the house in Red Hook. Following his gaze, I noticed all the little things that always faded into the normalcy of the place whenever I was here—the scuffs on Nonna’s Queen Anne-style table, the hand-crocheted doilies stacked on the hutch, the tiny stains on the knock-off Persian rug. Everything was neat and clean, just like Nonna, but a little shabby, as a house might be after having been lived in by three straight generations.

I frowned and forced myself to stand up straight again. Maybe this wasn’t what Xavier was used to. It wasn’t a manor or whatever fancy place he had in London. But it was the place I had called home for most of my life—a place that, on some level, would always be home. My grandparents had worked hard to carve out this small bit of the Bronx for themselves and share it with the six of us. I could never be less than proud of that.

When he finally turned all the way back to the dining table, Xavier found my five siblings all staring at him openly. Nonna walked into the room carrying a pitcher of iced tea, took one look at Xavier, and immediately placed the pitcher on the table so she could cross herself and mutter, “ Mammamà ” under her breath.

“Apparently, it’s not just me who sees the resemblance,” I murmured.

“It’s—you are—” Nonna looked around me, then at Xavier, then back at me. “Where is Sofia?”

“She’s at the park, Nonna,” Lea said. “I guess now we know why.”

I swallowed. “Yeah. Um. It’s time you met Sofia’s dad. Everyone, this is Xavier Parker.”

I waited for a response, the immediate clamor that only my family could produce. But instead, what I got was a silence so thick you could hear the screechy brakes of the Bx17 bus four blocks away.

Holy crap. Had I done the impossible? Had I stunned the Zola family into submission?

“Excuse me.”

My brother’s voice broke the silence at last, and I exhaled with relief. Matthew would know what to say here to make things right. I watched, grateful, as my brother rose from the other end of the table, then strode around meaningfully to where we stood.

“Hey, mate. I’m Xavier. It’s great to finally meet you.” Xavier held out a hand to Matthew.

My brother looked down at it, then back up at its owner. Then he pulled back his fist and punched Xavier straight in the jaw.

“What the fuck!” Xavier exclaimed, clutching his cheek.

He had been forced a few steps back, but not much more. That alone was impressive. My brother knew how to fight dirty. In his younger days, I’d seen him lay out a man with a lot less than that sort of punch, so the fact that Xavier took it cleanly was no small feat.

Even so, I was appalled.

“Mattie!” I shouted as I jumped between them. “What the hell was that?”

Matthew stood there, shaking out his quivering hand, but still keeping his gaze lasered on Xavier. “ That was for leaving Frankie and Sofia high and dry for the last few years, mate . I should give you a lot worse for being engaged to another woman while you were treating my sister like your own fuckin’ play toy, but there are ladies present.”

“I’d like to see you try,” Xavier growled, though he was smart enough not to push Matthew further.

“Oh my God .” Kate rolled her eyes. “Could you be any more nineteen fifties, Matthew? Who else’s delicate sensibilities are you going to protect today?”

“I wasn’t talking about you , Katie,” he snarled over his shoulder. “I was talking about Nonna.”

We all quieted. Maybe none of us could be (or wanted to be) classified as “ladies,” but Nonna certainly did. And where she stood clutching the edge of the hutch, she looked awfully pale.

Matthew turned back to Xavier.

“Part of me would like nothing more than to give you the beating you deserve for what you did to my sister and my niece,” he informed him. “But my grandmother likes a clean floor, and I doubt she’d appreciate it painted with your blood. So here’s the deal. One wrong move—just one —and I’ll haul your ass outside and continue this lesson for the whole neighborhood to see. We clear?”

Xavier just stared down at Matthew with a murderous blue glare, but wisely remained where he was behind me, rubbing the side of his mouth. I had a feeling that if he wanted, he’d be able to give Matthew just as good as he got, and the tic in his jaw told me he was dying to try.

But this wasn’t about the two of them. There were bigger fish to fry.

“Come here,” I told him. “I promise my brother will behave. Won’t you?” I said sharply.

Matthew just flexed his hand. “Him first.”

“I have apologies to make,” Xavier said. “To all of you. I know that. But in my defense, I did only just learn I had a daughter about five months ago. Maybe almost six now.”

Around the table, there was a collective gasp. Matthew took a step back like he was the one who’d been punched.

“Six months ago,” he muttered before his eyes opened wide and turned to me. “The Christmas party. When you saw him again…that’s when you told him, didn’t you?”

The others’ heads swiveled toward me.

I swallowed, nodded, and absorbed their incriminating stares. I had nothing to justify here. I had done what I thought was best for Sofia, yes. But I was wrong. I knew it, and I wouldn’t deny it.

“And since then…” Matthew shook his head. “It’s been a hell of a lot more than a couple of emails and some flowers, hasn’t it?”

I flapped my hands nervously. “I—yeah. He’s been coming around a bit for the last few months. He and Sofia have been getting to know each other without all the pressure of…” I drifted off with a toss of my hand.

Matthew shook his head, then flopped backward into one of the empty chairs at the table.

“If it’s any consolation, I didn’t know either,” Joni told him as she rubbed his shoulder.

Behind her, Marie snorted.

“You’re damn right, we didn’t,” said Lea as she got up and went to guide Nonna to a chair. Nonna just batted her away, content to remain where she was at the hutch, like a cat keeping its exit at the ready.

Matthew kept running a hand through his hair, staring at the wall like he was seeing a ghost.

“I had no idea,” he said, more to himself than to anyone. “All that time—right under my nose. You—Jesus, Frankie, you never said a word. Not about him. Or that you didn’t tell him. Or that he’s been around…Christ.”

The guilt that had been cramped in my gut for months bloomed into a full-on knot. I knew he wasn’t saying anything more because of the secrets he had kept about his own personal life. But that didn’t mean it was okay. We were supposed to be family. Family didn’t lie like this.

“How about Sofia?” Kate wondered. “Does she know now?”

I shook my head. “Not yet. We planned to tell her today. But Xavier arrived before they got back from the park, and you know how the neighbors would gossip if he just sat there…”

Immediately, all my sisters nodded their heads. We’d all been victims of the neighborhood gossip chain from time to time.

“I’m confused,” Lea said sharply. “Why haven’t you told Sofia before us? Don’t you think that she , of all people, deserves to know she has a dad?”

“Of course she does,” I said. “And we were going to, until, well, she went to the park, and Xavi’s here, and what else were we supposed to do? Go for a walk?”

Everyone seemed to think that would have been exactly the right thing to do.

I pouted. “Well, we didn’t. And now you know. So when she gets back from the park, Xavi and I are going to take her out for gelato and tell her honestly, all right? And none of you are going to get in the way of that. Do you understand?”

“Oh,” Lea said. “ You’re Xavi. You know, when I heard her telling the boys about her new friend Xavi the other week, I thought she meant someone from school. Not a full-grown man who looks like David Gandy.”

“Oh my God, he does ,” Joni tittered, though she only received a dirty look from Marie for her efforts.

“So what now?” Matthew asked sharply, cutting through the entertainment once again. “Now you know. But you’re what, a duke or earl or something on top of being a hot shot restaurant owner or whatever? You don’t live here. So are you going back to England all over again? Break your kid’s heart alongside my sister’s this time?”

Beside me, Xavier’s hands balled into fists, and he started to chew his bottom lip. The rest of him was a statue. Matthew couldn’t know the effect that such an accusation would have, but I did.

What I didn’t know, however, was the answer to his questions. What would he do once Sofia found out?

“As it happens,” Xavier said through his teeth, trying to be civil the same way a lion might try to charm a mouse. “I have plans to move to New York while I expand the Parker Group in America. The first restaurant opens next week in Soho. It’s called Chie. That’s Japanese for wisdom.”

“Sofia means wisdom too.”

We all turned to Nonna, who had spoken.

“It’s my name too, you see,” she finished. “And my great-granddaughter’s.”

Everyone pivoted immediately back to Xavier.

“I know,” Xavier said, meeting my grandmother’s sharp gaze straight on. “That’s why I chose it. I wanted the first step in this country to remind me every day of why I’m really here. It’s not for a business. It’s for my daughter.” He swallowed, taking on a more genial tone. “And you’re all welcome to attend the grand opening, by the way. As family, of course.”

He couldn’t have picked a better thing to say. The entire room sprang into excitement, the invitation eliciting eager smiles and jabber from Joni and Marie, tentative nods of approval from Kate and Lea, and even a look of mild respect from Matthew.

“I just want to know one thing.”

Nonna’s voice shut down the commotion once again. She might have been the smallest in the room, but she was undeniably the matriarch of the Zola clan. Even Matthew would have given her the shirt off his back if she asked for it.

Nonna took a few steps forward until she was less than a foot from Xavier, forcing him to hunch slightly so she didn’t have to stare so far up. “Who are you really?” she asked.

Xavier looked like he was waiting for more, and when it didn’t come, glanced at me as if for answers. I just shrugged. It was a simple question. How to answer it was much more complicated.

He swallowed. “They call me a lot of things back home. Some call me duke, but only if they don’t know me. Others say I’m a rude offspring, a rebel heir, or maybe just a bastard, and for a long time, I believed them.” He shook each of the words away like a dog shaking water off its back, then rotated slightly so he was facing everyone, not just Nonna. “But in the last six months, I’ve learned who I really am. I’m that little girl’s father. I’m the man responsible for showing her what’s right and wrong in the world, how to be treated and how to treat others, how to respect people and how to respect herself. That’s all that matters to me anymore. Not my estate or business or restaurants or anything else. Just her. Just being Sofia’s dad.”

“You’re my dad?”

Everyone in the room froze, this time including me. At my side, Xavier’s eyes grew approximately the size of Nonna’s dinner plates. I, for one, couldn’t feel my legs. I glanced at Kate, who only just managed to give me a weak smile as all the other heads in the room began to turn one by one, mine the last, toward where Sofia stood on the stair at the entry of the room, tiny hand tucked into Nonna’s skirt while her great-grandmother stroked her hair.

Sofia, however, only had eyes for Xavier, who slowly turned and found the girl who looked so much like him. If he was conscious of the seven pairs of eyes glued to him, he showed no sign of it. His attention was focused purely on Sofia as he made his way to her, then folded his legs into a squat so that he was at her level.

“That’s right,” he told her solemnly. “Got a bit delayed there, but yes. I’m your daddy, sweet girl. And I always will be. I promise.”

His deep voice was shaking by the time he finished, though no other part of him betrayed what I knew had to be excruciating nerves. I knew because I was feeling them myself.

Sofia’s eyes found me over Xavier’s shoulder. “Mama?”

Silently, I nodded. “It’s true, Sof.”

For a split second, I wondered if she would be angry. If she would ask versions of the same questions we’d just suffered from my siblings. Why I hadn’t told her? Why I’d held onto such a secret? Why I had kept him from her for so long?

But instead, my daughter turned back to the man whose eyes matched hers, gave him a grin that was brighter than any star in the universe, and launched herself at him so hard that her tiny body managed to knock his enormous one over with the force of her embrace.

“Daddy,” she whispered before burying her face in his neck. “I knew it. I prayed and prayed for it. I did.”

“That’s right,” Xavier whispered. “I’m your daddy. And I—” He took a deep breath. “I love you.”

No one spoke. No one dared. Sofia and Xavier rocked slowly in each other’s arms, whispering tiny secrets between themselves while the rest of us witnessed a solemn, if unspoken, bond that had been months in the making. Years, really. Or maybe it had been there from the start.

“Here.” Kate materialized next to me with a tissue floating in her hand.

I took it, only to realize that tears were streaming down my face, just like every other person in the room, my brother and Xavier included.

“Well, fuck,” Xavier laughed through his own tears, swiping them with the back of his broad hand. “I guess we’ve got another reason to celebrate Friday, don’t we?”

“Swear jar, Daddy,” Sofia said, opening up her palm expectantly.

“Ha,” Matthew said even as he dabbed with his handkerchief. “At least now I won’t be the only one getting that treatment.”

At the casual use of “Daddy,” Xavier grinned, yanked a bill from his wallet, and popped it into her hand with a kiss to her cheek.

“No, a real one, Dad,” Sofia said.

Xavier just rolled his eyes, and I couldn’t help but giggle.

“On Friday, yes,” Nonna piped up, reaching down to clasp Xavi’s face between her palms. “But Katie, go get the limoncello . In this house, we can celebrate more than once.”