He nods. “Last week.”
I hold my arms out, and he passes the little hot dog to me. Right away, the sweetie starts licking. “Oh, how sweet. You are so soft…” I stroke his doggy head and ears and smile back up at Luca. “Where’d you find him?”
“Cargo crate.” He arches a brow. “Lots of pets come in illegally. Whenever we see them, if the papers aren’t good, we route them other ways. So whoever ordered them for puppy farms or that shit doesn’t get them.”
I cuddle the little red-brown darling and he walks all over me, licking my hand and then my arm and finally my neck. “That tickles.”
Luca slips out, returning a few minutes later with a glass of water and some toast, plus Advil.
“Thank you so much,” I say as he sets the tray beside me on the nightstand. “What’s this baby’s name?”
He smirks. “Oscar.”
I laugh. “Like Oscar Mayer.”
Luca grins. He rubs the puppy’s ears, and then he scoops him back up. “I should take him outside.”
“Bye, darling.” I kiss his head and flutter my lashes at Luca. “You too,” I tease.
I sink back into sleep without touching the toast. Sometime later, Luca’s sitting by me, bathing my forehead with a cool cloth. I look up into his blue eyes.
“That feel okay?” he asks.
“Yes,” I whisper.
He surprises me by leaning down, pressing his cheek against mine. “How’d you pick it up?” His hand strokes my hair.
“Could be from anywhere, I guess.”
He lies on his back beside me, then lifts up the duvet, sliding under with me. “I hate that anywhere gets you when I don’t.” He scoots closer.
We turn toward each other at the same time. He kisses my hair, and I kiss his throat. Then I run my hand down his chest.
“There’s no way you feel up to this again.” He chuckles. He drops another kiss on my forehead and gets quickly out of the bed.
“You’re avoiding me,” I pout.
“I don’t want to take advantage of you being here.”
“Please take advantage.” Unexpected tears clog my throat. “It could be the last time.”
He steps back to my side of the bed, running his hand over my body through the duvet. He leans closer, kissing my eyes, and when I pull him down onto the mattress with me, he gathers me against his chest.
“We don’t have to,” I whisper.
But we do. He’s slow and careful, harder when I cry out for it. Afterward, he wraps me in his robe and lets me slide my feet into a pair of his socks.
“Turn around with your back to me,” I whisper from where I’m perched on the bed. He does, and I climb on his back, wrapping my legs around his waist and my arms around his neck.
“Does this hurt?” I laugh as he stands.
“Hell no.”
And so he carries me into the kitchen. I cuddle Oscar in my lap while Luca makes waffles in a waffle iron. Once, he glances at me, frowns, and asks if I want to get back in his bed.
“I don’t want to miss this.”
“What’s this?” he teases, guiding a waffle onto a plate.
“You and Oscar and the waffles. You in lounge pants with your hair all rumpled like that.”
He rubs a hand over a spot that’s sticking up. “It’s not.” But he’s smirking.
“I love seeing you here, in your habitat,” I tell him as he brings two heaping plates of waffles and a pitcher of syrup to the table.
Instead of setting mine before me, he asks how much syrup I want and whether I want fruit or whipped cream. When the waffle’s piled with fresh strawberries and whipped cream, sprinkled with cinnamon and drizzled with butter and maple syrup, he slides it to me.
“And a napkin,” he says, setting one on my lap.27Luca“I want to ask you about all sorts of things…so I can know you more. But I’m not sure if I should,” she murmurs, between bites of whipped-cream-coated waffle fragments.
“Shoot.”
“How about you maybe just give one-word answers? That way, there’s no pressure.”
Pressure to lie to her? Pressure to incriminate myself? I muster a smile.
“Okay,” I say.
“Are you sure?”
I nod. “Of course.”
She takes a bite of waffle, frowning as she chews. Then she sets her fork down. “Does it bother you? The drugs?”
“It does.” I chew a bite of waffle, trying not to look at her. “Most people in my shoes” —I mean someone who’s distributing product the way I am, the way people under me are— “they think everybody makes their choices, and an addict makes his or hers, too. But I don’t think so.”
“You don’t?” She looks puzzled. “What do you think?”
“My father…” I set my fork down, thinking of how to explain. “It’s not as if he wanted to become an addict. He had problems. A health problem. So does it bother me, that people get this stuff via a channel that’s perpetuated by my actions? Yeah, it does.” I have a swallow of my water, to buy myself another moment. When I set the glass back down, I brave a glance in her direction. “Now you’re gonna ask why do I do it.”