“This way,” Irena said. Her words, coming so quickly after the booming bass, were overly loud, but I didn’t mind that, or the sudden cool. I ran the side of my hand against my hairline to brush away lingering clamminess.
Irena didn’t hesitate. She made straight for a stairway on the right and started up immediately, one long-fingered hand on its blue neon handrail. Turning, she said, “We’ll be fine, Angelo. You can wait here.”
The big man grunted, but continued to follow.
I closed the distance between me and Irena. “I thought Angelo didn’t understand English.”
“Yeah.” She gave a soft, peppermint-infused laugh. “That’s what he wants us to believe.”
A maître d’ met us at the top of the stairs, recognizing Irena immediately. They conversed genially in Italian for a moment before he led us into a cozy, candlelit room with warm-hued stone walls, deep-purple linens, and a view through a wall of glass of the busy dance floor below. We could see the band members working their instruments with pounding drive, but it was like watching high-energy, silent marionettes. Up here, the entertainment was provided by a quartet of musicians doing a fair rendition of a Beatles’ ballad.
Our fellow patrons took advantage of the quiet. Most of them were deep in conversation, and all were dressed in what we Americans refer to as “business casual.” I sighed with relieved pleasure as we made our way to one of the empty tables up against the wall window. This was a far cry from the noisy dance floor we’d just passed through.
The maître d’ held the chair for Irena. Angelo, as though the thought hadn’t occurred to him before, hurried to hold a chair out for me. My backside had barely touched the soft seat when he stepped away from the table, careful not to make eye contact. Nico Pezzati had obviously had that talk with him about leaving me alone.
“That will be all, Angelo,” Irena said.
The big man tilted his head as though he didn’t understand. She repeated it in Italian. He nodded and left, taking up a position at the shiny bar across the room, watching us.
“What’s his story?” I asked. “Do his emotions ever range beyond bored and angry?”
Irena giggled, covering her mouth with her hand as though she didn’t want Angelo to see her laughing. “You picked up on his personality pretty quickly, didn’t you? I think Father keeps him around because he does what he’s told without question.” She flicked a glance sideways. He was still watching. He had to know we were talking about him. “Mostly.”
Thinking about the argument Bennett and I had observed when we first walked in on Nico and Angelo, I had to ask, “Does he give your father a hard time?”
She gave a little hand flip-flop. “It’s nothing. Angelo is just so—”
Irena didn’t get to finish her thought. Her hand gesture must have looked like a signal to the waiter. The lanky older man sprang to our table, abandoning a young couple at the room’s center where he’d been taking an order. The woman turned around to face us as the waiter left them, giving me a full view of her surprised frown. A moment later, she’d returned to her conversation with nothing more than a resigned shrug and shake of her curly head.
“And what would you prefer this evening, Signorina Pezzati?” the waiter asked in smooth English. Before she could respond, he began sizing me up. “We are honored to have a guest of our most favorite customer here with us tonight. You are American?”
How everyone in Europe always knew, I couldn’t fathom. Bennett and I had been automatically handed menus printed in English just about everywhere we’d dined, here and in France, even before we’d spoken a word. “You’re right,” I said with polite admiration. “Excellent observation.”