“Pretty Pastel,” he murmurs, his deep voice and his damn seductive scent suffusing the tight glass-encased space, making it a hothouse.
“What?” My mind blanks because he couldn’t be saying . . .
“You still use the same dryer sheets.” He leans forward and sniffs my shoulder.
“Stop that.” I bat him away, conscious of the fact I didn’t take the shower I had planned.
“Are they or are they not called Pretty Pastel?” he asks.
His self-satisfied look darkens and intensifies the longer we stand transfixed in this glass box of boiling air.
“You don’t want to know all the things I remember, Ban,” he says, his laugh husky. “Or maybe you do.”
“I do not.” Our words, our breath, whatever is condensating in this partition between us, is literally fogging the glass. “Let me out.”
A woman enters on the other side, bewildered that the revolving door isn’t revolving, that we aren’t moving. Jared flashes her one of those smiles, and she blushes and bats her damn eyelashes. We can only get out of this if he steps forward and I step back. Even for just the few seconds it takes to free us, it feels like he’s advancing on me.
“I’ll be seeing you, Banner,” he calls from inside as I walk to the parking lot.
“Not if I see you first,” I mutter.
I click my car open and climb in, slamming the door with unnecessary roughness. I don’t even make it to the interstate before the phone rings in my car, my mother’s name displaying on the screen.
“Hola, Mama.”
“Hola, Bannini.”
When Mama’s family first moved here from Mexico, she spoke no English. One teacher in the overcrowded San Diego public school took extra time and care to make sure Mama learned English and helped her adjust to her new circumstances, her new country. That teacher was Ms. Banner Johnson. My namesake, but my family calls me Bannini. How that started, no one remembers, but it stuck.
“How are you?” I continue in Spanish. “How’s Papa?”
“Ehh. We are fine. Always fine.”
“Papa’s taking his medication?”
Considering what Mama cooks every day, diabetes was practically an inevitability. I’m constantly after Mama to adjust their diets. Between what he eats and how hard he works running the construction business he built from the ground up, I have reason to worry.
“Yes, yes,” Mama replies with a touch of impatience. “How are you? Are you eating? You were wasting away last time I saw you.”
Only my mother would accuse me of wasting away at a size ten.
“I’m eating. Promise, Mama.”
“How is my boy?” Mama’s voice goes soft and sweet with the question, and there’s no doubt who she’s asking about.
“Zo is fine.” I laugh and take the exit to my house. “He’s at my place. Still sleeping when I left.”
“Tell him I’m mad he was in San Diego and I didn’t get to see him,” Mama says. She’s actually chastising me for not bringing Zo to the house.
“Scheduling was tight,” I say by way of apology. “I’ll make sure you get to see him soon.”
“He’s coming to Anna’s quinceañera, yeah?”
My niece, Anna, turns fifteen this year. The quinceañera is like our blowout sweet sixteen party . . . but at fifteen. Our bat mitzvah. Our rite of passage making the transition from girl to woman, and the perfect excuse to throw a massive party.
“That’s months away, Mama, but, yes. Zo is planning to be there.”
“Good. He’s family.”
Even before we started dating, Zo was considered family. That first Christmas after his family died, I invited him to spend it with us. He’s been adopted into my family and spends every holiday with us. They dropped hints about a romantic relationship between us years before Zo expressed interest. Once they found out he wanted more, the teasing, the pressure only intensified. It was just a matter of time. We’ve only been dating six months, but talk of a wedding and little bebes for Mama to spoil has already begun.
“Camilla knows I’m paying for the venue, right?” I ask. My sister is a single mother, doing so much on her own and always refusing my help.
“She didn’t like it,” Mama admits, “but she has agreed.”
“Why is it so hard for her to let me help, Mama? We are sisters.”
“She is your older sister, Bannini,” Mama says softly. “All the things you both dreamed about, you’ve actually done. Your sister made different choices. She wouldn’t trade Anna for the world, but hers was a different path. She’s been slowed down. Maybe sometimes it’s hard for her to see you running so far ahead.”
That renders me speechless. It never occurred to me that Camilla, gorgeous, perfectly formed Camilla, could ever envy me. My sister does not have a weight problem. Never has. She’s beautiful, and with that beauty came many temptations. While I was studying and wondering why no one else wanted to spend their weekends learning Italian, she yielded to every temptation, the greatest of which was Anna’s father, who is now nowhere to be found. I suck my teeth and shake my head, exasperated.
“Well, this is Anna’s big day, and I will help make it as special as it can possibly be,” I say. “Like Camilla and I had.”
My quinceañera wasn’t in a beautiful villa like the one I’m reserving for Anna. It was in a small salon near the church where Mass was held. My aunts all prepared the food and the entire family was involved. My damas and I worked for months on the carefully choreographed dance. I bonded with all fourteen girls and did the same for them when it was their turn.
“I still have my first heels I received that night,” I tell Mama, smiling, reminiscing.
“Your Uncle Javier picked those out, believe it or not,” Mama says, her deep chuckle making me miss her smile.
“Yes, but he could barely stand up to help put them on when the time came,” I say, my words touched with affection for one of my favorite godparents.
“Yes, well, Javier loves his tequila almost as much as he loves you.”
We laugh together as I pull into the short, pebbled driveway of my pride and joy, the mid-century modern post and beam house I purchased when I relocated. Though only three bedrooms and two baths, the tongue-and-groove ceilings, clerestory windows, walls of glass, and cool concrete floors create an open, airy tone that I appreciate after apartment living in New York for years. And the view through all that glass offers me the Hollywood Hills on nature’s platter.
I let myself into the house through the garage, still listening to Mama, and smile at Zo over his bare, muscled chest and bowl of cereal.
“Mama, let’s talk later,” I say. “There’s someone here who wants to speak to you.”
I hand the phone to Zo.
“Hola, Mama,” he says, trying to pull me onto his lap. I avoid his hands and laugh over my shoulder, leaving him and my mother chatting in rapid Spanish and laughing like the old friends they are. Probably plotting our engagement. I leave them to it so I can shower and get to work.
I’m drying off when the bathroom door opens letting steam out and my boyfriend in. Irrationally self-conscious, I grip the towel tighter around my breasts. Silly. He’s seen me naked many times during our relationship, but I’m not used to sharing my space and my privacy. His big hands grip me by the hips as he pulls me close and kisses me thoroughly. I’m breathless and reassured by the time he’s done. This can work. This should and will work. There’s no reason it shouldn’t.
“How was the gym?” he asks, stepping away to shuck off his boxers, revealing his beautiful, well-conditioned athlete’s body.
“It was great.” I go into my walk-in closet, pulling out a summer pantsuit to put on once I’m done with my hair and makeup. “Quinn had no mercy, as usual.”
“I wish I’d gotten to spend more time with her.” He raises his voice over the shower. “I wish I had more time with you for that matter.”
“I know. This trip was much too quick,” I yell back. “And next week I’m in Denver for that convention.”
I head back into the bathroom to grab my hair dryer. There’s a snow globe on the counter beside it. It’s heavy when I pick it up. The base is marble with Vancouver, British Columbia etched into the stone. A winter sunset fills the glass arch, a gold and scarlet sky vivid against the snowy ground and the drift of powdery flakes when I shake it.
I walk over to the shower, globe in hand, delighted grin on my face.
“And what is this?” I ask.
A pleased smile creases Zo’s handsome face. “Just a little something I picked up for you.”
“It’s beautiful.” I lean my head in to kiss him lightly on the lips, but his soapy hands slide down my arms and bring me under the spray.
“Zo!” I laugh and grab at the towel slipping from my breasts and the globe slipping from my hand.
“Thank me properly,” he says, his voice husky, his eyes hot on my wet, bare skin.
I tip up on my toes to kiss him, taking his tongue into my mouth and allowing the towel to fall. I press my body into his and slide my fingers into the thick, wet curls at his neck. He groans, cups my ass, and pushes into the V of my naked thighs.
“I can’t. I’m already late.” I giggle into the watery kiss, pick up the now sodden towel, and step out of the shower. “But consider yourself properly thanked.”
His laughter follows me to the linen closet where I find a fresh towel to dry off and wrap around myself again.
“You got a full day?” Zo asks, his voice still slightly raised over the shower.
“Very.” I run a hand through the hair hanging past my shoulders and pick up the dryer. “Isn’t every day?”
“When do you meet with Lowell?”
Even with my back turned, I know Zo well enough to hear concern in his voice.