Page 91 of Come Take Me Now

I nod and dip my head, running my hands over the back of it as she steps upstairs. My fingers lace into my hair, loose in my usual bun. My hair is greasy, and washing it might help me feel better. A moment later, I hear her let out a gasp, and my head snaps up.

“What happened to your railing?” she calls from the stairs.

I tilt my head back and cover my face with my hands.

Tilly.

That’s what happened.

Being too sucked into her all summer to fix it.

She sits in front of me on the coffee table, folding her hands in her lap. “Vincenzo Junior, what’s going on?” she asks.

“God, I thought you were going to break out my full government just then,” I half-heartedly joke.

“Don’t make me,” she adds with a warm smile. “Really, though, are you okay?” She reaches over and pats my shoulder. “I thought Tilly might be here. It’s rude that your dad got to meet her, but I didn’t.” The protein shake churns in my gut at the mention of her.

I stare into her bright blue eyes. Only Paulie inherited them out of the three sons she had with Dad. “I fucked that up.” I pause and sigh dramatically. “I shouldn’t be that surprised.”

“I don’t know what to tell you. Other than there’ll be someone else. Your dad mentioned she was quite young…” She stops herself before she gets too judgmental.

I wipe under my nose with the back of my hand. “No, no one like her. She stood by me through a lot of shit, and I fucked everything up and got dumped again.”

Mom squints at me. “What’d you go through? You can tell me, Enzo.”

“No, not this.” My voice cracks as the emotions threaten to rise.

“Why? I may not have birthed you, but you should be able to tell me anything,” she replies.

“Because it could cost me my job,” I whisper.

She pinches her nose bridge. “Oh, God. What?”

I braid my fingers together in front of me. “Promise you won’t tell Dad?” Her nostrils flare as she exhales.

“I can’t promise that if it’s serious.”

I shift my jaw. “Look, I’m fine now. Yes, maybe a little high, but I’m clean, okay?”

“Oh, Enzo…didn’t we deal with this enough with Paulie?”

Nothing like being thirty-two and being compared to your youngest brother at eighteen.

“It was different from Paulie. The week I took off a month ago…” I trail off and release a jagged breath. “I was going through Adderall withdrawal.”

Confusion works its way down her face. “But you don’t have ADHD?”

“Nope, but I took that shit by the handful. And I’m okay. I promise. I just had a harder time adjusting to the whole manager thing more than I let on,” I explain.

She throws her arms around me and hugs me to her like I’m a kid again and not a foot taller than her. I stiffen at first, then relax my muscles. She’s the mother I deserved. “I knew it was too much for you. I should have seen the signs,” she says, keeping her arms locked around my shoulders. I breathe in her favorite perfume, which always brings a sense of nostalgia from childhood. She releases me and stands to pace in front of me. “I won’t tell your dad or uncles, but you should have told me. I have medical training. I could have done something…” She sighs again. “You put Tilly through that?”

“I snapped at her when I was on it, and seeing her so damn scared of me was the wake-up call I needed. She stayed here the whole week and took care of me. That’s when Dad met her,” I add. “I don’t even have the fucking code to my gun safe.”

“Why?”

“She changed it when I was detoxing as a precaution, but she never told me the code.”

“Smart girl…” she trails off. “You probably don’t want to hear this, but your dad told me she looks just like Allegra.” It feels like a slap at the mention of my real mother’s name. “Of course, no relation. He told me he felt like he saw a ghost.”