Dark, low-ceilinged, and dingy, it was not a place Sabina would ever have gone into had she not been invited there. It seemed uniquely designed for men—and men of a certain type. All over the walls were framed photographs of boxers and race car drivers and boxers and more boxers. Lots of old fight posters, too. There were three large televisions anchored near the ceiling in corners of the room. All were muted and each was playing a different sporting event.
At this hour on a Sunday, before dusk, there were a few people there, enough to fill about a quarter of the booths and low tables, and three people at the bar. The old jukebox—the kind with the colored liquid bubbling through it—played a song she knew, and she tried to place it. She’d liked it when she was young. By Bon Jovi, maybe? She listened more closely and made out a few lines and thought yes, that was Bon Jovi. The song had been popular the summer she’d been brought to the States to live with Tia Valeria. She’d been eight years old. Mother Mary, she hadn’t thought of music like this in forever. Or anything else about those years.
Sabina scanned the bar but did not see Carlo. She felt awkward and out of place here, and it was making her anxious. However, the bartender, a brawny man about forty years old, with brown hair, a full beard, and tattoos covering his arms, waved her to the bar.
“You’re too damn beautiful to be in here without a good reason, darlin’. You looking for Carlo?”
Sabina nodded. “Yes. Yes, please.”
“He’s out back—down that little hall and through the door at the end. Past the johns. I’m Hugh. You need a drink to take back with you?”
“No, thank you…Hugh.” She smiled.
He slapped his hand, its knuckles big and scarred, over his heart. “Damn. An accent, too. You need anything, you let me know.”
She nodded and followed his directions out to the patio.
The patio was much nicer than the bar. The seating was picnic tables painted a bright, cheery green and topped with assorted sun umbrellas advertising beer and liquor. White mini-lights were strung all along the tall wood fence that made the perimeter. They glowed weakly in the waning daylight.
A few of the tables were occupied. Sitting alone at one of them was Carlo.
When he saw her, he stood. This evening, he was dressed in jeans and a white button-down shirt, its tails left loose. The top two buttons were undone, and she could see dark hair on his chest. She’d noticed that last night, too—not too much hair, but not scraggly, either. The right amount. His hair had that same wild, swept-back look; it was becoming obvious that there was nothing more to be done with that mop. But she liked it. Neither too long nor too short, not so wild as to appear unkempt, it suited him. He smiled broadly as she approached. That suited him, too. He smiled all the way to his light brown eyes.
But then he took her appearance in, and the smile faded when he got to her legs. “Bina. You’re so hurt.”
“No. Not so much hurt. May we sit?”
“Yes. Of course.” He turned and gestured to the seat opposite where he’d been sitting. After she sat, he did. There was a half-finished beer in a glass near his place. “I’m sorry. I needed a drink. I would have ordered you something, but I wasn’t sure…”
Sabina didn’t drink. James did not allow her to take anything that might alter her mind in any way. When she’d had surgery, he’d taken her pain meds away at his earliest opportunity.
“That is beer?”
He smiled. “Yes.”
“I will take one. Thank you.”
With a series of gestures made to someone behind Sabina’s back, Carlo conveyed that she would like one of what he was having, and that he would like another. Then he focused on her. “What did you need to talk about?”
How did she explain to him that he might be in trouble, perhaps even danger, because he had been kind to her? How to make him understand? She had no idea.
Sabina had not had a confidant since she was eighteen years old, when her aunt died. But all she could think now was to confide in Carlo. A little bit. Enough so he would know to stay away, and that she was sorry.
A cute waitress in a small denim skirt and a tight, red t-shirt with the name QUINN’S in bold yellow letters across the chest brought her a beer and Carlo another. Carlo nodded his thanks, and she left.
“Bina?”
To hear him use that name did something strange inside her chest. She’d told him to call her that, of course. Last night. She didn’t know why. Only one other person in the world had ever called her Bina. James. She’d hated it when he’d first started, and she’d even, very early on, asked him not to. He’d only smiled and said he enjoyed having a name for her that was his only. At the time, she’d found it romantically possessive. She’d quickly, but yet too late, learned better.