Aliyana sucked in a breath. “Neither do I. I can only think of one place.”

“Is it private, you know, not busy with a shitload of folk?”

“It’s small.”

Switching on the ignition, I stubbed out my Marlboro cherry, lit another smoke, and let it sit on my bottom lip.

“Direct me.”

Chapter Eight

Axel

The longer we drove, the more I knew I shouldn’t be here with this woman. But I was, and honestly, I wasn’t gonna be going anywhere. I was going to breakfast with Aliyana for no other reason than I couldn’t go anywhere else. She’d asked, and I’d agreed. There was no other choice.

“It’s just over there,” Aliyana said, pointing to a small café tucked away on the waterfront. I laughed to myself. It was just three blocks from my studio.

In minutes, I’d parked the El Camino and we got out, the sunrise starting to break. No one was around except the market workers setting up for the day and early buyers waiting for the fresh fish to come in from the boats.

Aliyana and I entered the café overlooking the Sound, where we were told to pick wherever we wanted to sit. The guys who ran the place were still setting up, so I walked ahead of Aliyana to the farthest corner and sat down. The place was full of Italian flags, the servers Latino in their features and clearly Italian too.

I wondered if she’d picked this place because she’d worked out my heritage or whether it was because she just liked the coffee.

As I dropped to the seat, Aliyana sat down opposite me and took another glance around the empty café. We were alone. Good.

“This okay for you? This empty café?” she asked with a teasing smile.

“Yeah,” I replied, and she smiled wider at my curt response.

And there she went again, amused at my attitude. Most people would have given up on trying to talk to me by now, but it was like she didn’t get that I liked to be left alone. That I didn’t want people round me… I wanted to just fucking be.

“You’re not one for small talk, are you?”

Aliyana’s eyes looked tired. Fuck, I knew mine did too, but hers didn’t lose their playful glint as she stared at me, awaiting my answer.

“Not really.”

She laughed again.

A server came to us then, calling back to a server in the kitchen to set up the patio. He’d spoken in perfect Italian. The waiter arrived at our table, his eyes flaring as they fell on Aliyana.

The guy flushed bright red and fumbled his notepad and pen in his hand. Something tightened in my stomach as Aliyana smiled up at him and the fucker flashed her a toothy smile.

Feeling fucked off that this asshole was hovering, I sat back in my chair and glared. He soon met my eyes, and when he did, his eyes immediately dropped to the notepad and he nervously asked us what we wanted.

“Caffè doppio e una brioche alla crema,” I ordered.

The server looked up and, although his expression was still guarded, he asked, “Tu parli Italiano?”

“Si,” I replied.

“Da dove vieni?” he asked, wanting to know where I was from.

“No, sono Americano. I miei genitori loro sono Italiani,” I said, telling him my mamma and papa were Italian, not me.

Fuck, I’d barely spoken Italian in years. Couldn’t bring myself to. I only ever spoke Italian to Mamma and my brothers. But since getting out of prison, it hadn’t felt right. Mamma was gone. I couldn’t bring myself to speak her mother tongue for more than a few sentences without it gutting me inside.

The server must have seen my body stiffen and my eyes drop to the table as he moved on to talk to Aliyana. I didn’t even hear what she ordered, too busy trying to breathe through the pain ripping me apart.

The feel of Aliyana’s warm hand placed over mine had my eyes darting up to clash with hers.

“Are you okay? You went real quiet on me just now. I was calling your name, but you were lost in your thoughts.”

“I’m good.”

We sat in silence while the server brought our coffees. Once he’d left us alone, Aliyana took a packet of sugar, poured it into her coffee, then fiddled with the packet.

“So.” She broke the silence. “You speak fluent Italian?”

“Yes.”

“I’ve been told Elpidio is an old Italian name.” She lifted her latte to her lips, but her eyes never left mine, imploring me to answer her question.

“My folks were Italian, so I speak it. Bilingual,” I replied evasively, throwing my double espresso down my throat and signaling to the server to bring me another.

“Yo también,” Ally said, and I swear my dick hardened in response to her purring that fucking Spanish my way.

Her face lit up, and she added, “Hablo español, no italiano, aunque puedo entender algo de lo que dijiste.”

Fuck porn. A chick as hot as Aliyana Lucia sitting in front of me, hair ruffled in a messy knot and shirt gaping, talking to me in Spanish was the hottest thing I’d ever fucking seen.

I figured out from certain words in that sentence that she spoke Spanish and not Italian, though she could understand a lot of what I’d said. I couldn’t help but flick my chin in appreciation. I could kind of get what she was saying to me too. At least a little.

She laughed at me, and it hit me that she’d pulled me away from drowning in dark thoughts about my mamma. She’d pulled me through… again.

The server stood beside our table with a tray full of pastries and coffee. “You can put that down, ragazzo,” I said, and the server dropped the tray in front of us.