“But none of that helps when it comes to the recipe,” Gio says. “I know the general idea—sugar, milk, cream—no eggs, of course—but as for how to balance things or any other ingredients, I’m in the dark.”
I look over at the industrial gelato machines, thinking. “If we’re going to experiment, there’s no point loading up big machines, it’s a waste,” I say. “Have you got anything smaller?”
Gio frowns. “Smaller?”
I swallow my smile. “You know, like people use in their own home, a domestic maker. No? I can see from your face that you haven’t,” I say hurriedly, because he looks mildly offended at the idea of people making gelato in their own kitchens rather than buying it from Belotti’s. “I’ve got one, I can bring it with me tomorrow.”
“I’ll come by and fetch it if you like, save you hiking it around,” he offers.
“It’s no problem.” I close his offer down, instinct making me keep myself to myself.
“You’ll come again tomorrow, though?” he says, holding my gaze.
“Same time, if you’ll have me,” I say, swallowing hard.
“I’ll be here,” he says, same as yesterday.
I think about what he’s told me about Santo’s steadfastness, and I wonder if he realizes how much he exudes that same thing.
Sophia looks up from her magazine when I snag my jacket on the way out.
“Any luck?” She places a half-eaten apple down.
“Early days,” I say.
She pushes her curls behind her ears, leaning forward to peer into the kitchen and make sure Gio is out of earshot.
“He is my brother, really. I mean, he isn’t, but he is, in here.” She rolls her eyes as she taps her heart, making light of her own sentimentality. “And he probably seems dull to you, but he isn’t, he’s just running scared. He spends too much of his time in here and not enough out there.” She inclines her head toward the street.
I glance around the quiet gelateria. “Not a bad place to spend your time,” I say. I don’t add that dull isn’t a word that springs to mind about Gio, but then she doesn’t know about our disastrous bookstore run-in.
“Oh, I love it,” she says, that same protective gleam in her eyes as Gio when she speaks of Belotti’s. “I just think we could get with the times a bit. Shake things up, you know?”
Gio appears from the kitchen and shoots her a long, knowing look, then opens that beautiful painted door for me.
“Tomorrow,” he says.
I pull my striped bobble hat on and button my jacket. “Tomorrow.”
6.
I KICK OFF MY BOOTS AND head straight for my bedroom when I’m home again, throwing off my coat and hat and dragging the quilt over my head as I flop into bed. There’s so much about this morning to process, my guts feel like a pressure cooker of anxiety. I curl up into as small a ball as possible, warm and safe and alone. I guess it’s one of the side effects of being an only child—I crave solitude when the world overloads me, and head first under the quilt has been my preferred place since I was a small child.
So, Gio Belotti is the guy from the bookstore. The guy who got under my skin on Valentine’s Day. I don’t know how I didn’t make the connection straightaway. We were bundled in hats and scarves that day, maybe, distracted by all the Valentine’s guff around us, possibly, our attention concentrated on getting our hands on the book. And, of course, I’ve worked hard to scour the incident from my memory banks. Too hard, as it turned out. I should have realized—objectively speaking, Gio’s a handsome guy. Tall, definitely over six foot, and rangy, the kind of loose limbed you see on jeans campaigns. Sophia might not be his blood sibling but she definitely had her sister-goggles on when she called him dull, because he’s a striking man. I haven’t seen him laugh yet; I find myself wondering how joy might change his face. Maybe by dull Sophia meant serious—I definitely get that vibe, but then he’s a dad. Don’t all parents lose their silliness veneer in the face of nappies and sleepless nights and algebra and report cards and Easter bonnet competitions? Not that I have much experience of most of those things. My mother home-schooled me by necessity as we spent most of my younger years traveling wherever her backing-singer career took us. I’m not complaining—she had a way of making all of our lessons seem magical, even if they were mostly held in the cold back-seat classroom of our battered Vauxhall Viva.
Gio, though, he seems to be a person who does things by the book, someone who navigates life by trying to step carefully inside Santo’s footsteps and a whole line of Belottis who came before him. I remember the ache on his face when he talked about his late wife, and I tuck my knees tighter into my chest and screw my eyes closed, full of dread.
He’s a widower, and he remembers what I said on Valentine’s Day about Adam. Knowing I blurted that horrible lie to Gio Belotti of all people makes me deeply, mortally ashamed. I don’t know him well, but even so it wouldn’t surprise me if honesty was his middle name. I absolutely cannot tell him that I lied about Adam, the thought makes my skin crawl. God, I hate that even now, nearly a year later and thousands of miles away, Adam still has the capacity to screw with my life. I force myself to breathe slowly, intentionally, counting my breaths in and slowly out again until my racing heart calms. It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay. Except it isn’t. I’ve told Gio one lie on top of another. I went to the gelateria to try to help, but right now it feels as if I’m in danger of doing the exact opposite.
* * *
—
“SORRY, BOBBY,” I SAY, when he lands beside me on my sofa after midnight. “Gelato’s off the menu, I’ve packed up my machine to take to Belotti’s tomorrow.”
He looks aghast. “Surely they have their own? How can they need ours?”
I lean against him and close my eyes, exhausted. “I’ve made such a massive mess of everything, Bob.”
He puts his arm around my shoulders and tucks me into his body. “Come here,” he says. “Tell your Uncle Bobby all about it.”
I half laugh. “You know how creepy that sounds, right?”
He squeezes my shoulders. “Spill.”
I couldn’t have this conversation with anyone else, but over the months since I arrived here I’ve slowly shared some of the hideous details with Bobby about my past. He refers to Adam exclusively as “the asshole,” and has made it very clear that should said asshole ever set foot in New York, he’ll bust out his inner Liam Neeson, use his very particular set of skills to find him and, well…I don’t think he’d kill him, exactly, but the intention to protect me is there and I love him for it.
Even so, I’ve kept what happened in the bookstore on Valentine’s Day to myself, because I don’t want him to think badly of me for it. I close my eyes as I tell him now, not wanting to see his face. I don’t miss the way he mutters “if only” when I tell him I lied about Adam’s death, nor his sharp intake of breath when I say that Gio Belotti has turned out to be none other than bookstore guy. When I go on to say that Gio is genuinely widowed, he twists to face me on the sofa with both hands clamped against his mouth, his dark eyes mortified on my behalf.