To Sabina’s surprise, Annabelle didn’t mind the new living arrangements. She drew Carly into her orbit, treating her like some combination of personal assistant and makeover project. No one had ever coddled Carly before, bought her lip gloss and cute bras. Carly tolerated it, though she drew the line at mascara.
“I’m an athlete,” she informed Annabelle. “Pitchers don’t wear mascara.”
“They do if they’re on the Olympic softball team and doing a spread for Sports Illustrated.”
“Semi good point,” Carly conceded. She allowed one swipe of mascara, no more.
Sabina wondered if Carly was better off with her binge-drinking mother, but on the other hand, it was fun to see her scoff while Annabelle pored over People magazine and told her embarrassing secrets about all the stars.
It gave Sabina time to think about everything Roman had said to her.
For a while she felt nothing but fury. Roman had no business meddling in her life. Acting as if she’d done her mother wrong. Annabelle was the one with something to answer for, not her. And yet he talked as if Sabina was heartlessly pushing her mother away.
As if she pushed everyone away. She didn’t do any such thing, did she?
On Christmas Eve she got a phone message from Roman. “Luke and I are headed to New York for Christmas. I hope you . . . well, season’s greetings.”
Season’s greetings? What kind of thing was that to say after he’d declared his love both with words and physical demonstrations of the most unforgettable sort?
It’s more than you said to him, her conscience whispered.
Christmas passed in a blur. In San Gabriel the holiday always had a goofy, surreal quality. The next-door neighbor put up a plastic snowman surfing on the green lawn. Reindeer pranced across a roof with no hint of a chimney—wearing hot-pink boas around their necks.
Sabina got gift certificates for everyone. Annabelle ordered a decadent spread from her favorite restaurant in Los Angeles. Sabina could barely enjoy the chestnut-stuffed pork medallions and chocolate terrine, though Carly’s suspicious prodding of the unfamiliar dishes offered some entertainment.
What if Roman’s right? Would it kill you to give Annabelle a chance? But after so many years of putting everyone at arm’s length, anything else felt nearly impossible.
You shove people away and keep them there.
No, I don’t. Do I?
She went to bed early, while Annabelle and Carly played a late-night game of Monopoly. Don’t let Carly become a distraction, Roman had said. But what did he know? What gave him the right to lecture her?
Because he cares, that annoying voice in her head pointed out. She pulled a pillow over her head with a hopeless groan. Pillows were no use at all, since they reminded her of Roman. Roman, propping her foot on a pillow . . . Roman, nestling her into a pile of them at the Bannon Motel 6 . . . Roman, smiling into her eyes from the next pillow over in his heavenly king-size bed.
The week between Christmas and New Year’s passed with the jerky dissonance of a very long hangover. Sabina knew she had to do something. Things couldn’t go on as they were. But a sort of paralysis gripped her, as if she was still trapped under that pile of marble inside a burning house.
On New Year’s Day, Channel Six aired a You and Me marathon. Annabelle popped the cork off a bottle of champagne and settled into the armchair, curling her legs under her. Carly’s teammates had called an impromptu practice in the park. She’d ridden off on Sabina’s mountain bike, her glove stashed in her backpack. For the first time since the big prison adventure, Annabelle and Sabina were alone together.
Well, Annabelle, Sabina, Taffy, and Peg.
From her usual position on the couch, Sabina took a sip of champagne and squinted at the TV. The familiar opening credits played across the screen, the theme song giving her nostalgic little palpitations. “This may require a drinking game of some sort. Take a drink every time Peg says, ‘Why Taffy Bannister McGee, what were you thinking’?”
“I said that about six times an episode.”
“Sounds about right to me. Or maybe a drink every time Taffy slams the door. Remember how that picture kept falling off? It fell on my toe once.”
“I believe it was helped along by the art director.”
“What?”
“You drove him crazy. He had to keep coming up with new paintings.” Annabelle reached for a truffle from a box spread open on the coffee table.
“I had to slam the door. It was in the script.”
“But that hard?”
“Yes. It was the only fun I ever had on that set.” Although she’d started that statement lightheartedly, by the end it had taken on a woebegone wobble. Quickly she hid behind her champagne flute.
Annabelle rolled her eyes as she bit into her truffle. “Always with the exaggerating.”
Sabina gulped a mouthful of champagne, the bubbles prickling her throat. Let it be. What was the point of getting into another fight after all these years? But maybe . . . well, what the hell? Annabelle was here, and what if she never got another chance? “I’m not exaggerating. Being on that show was incredibly boring for me. We kept having to do the same things over and over again.”
“But that’s how it’s done. We shot on film, not live.”
“I know. That doesn’t it make it fun.”
“But—” Annabelle scraped a polished fingernail along her champagne flute. “It is fun. I can’t imagine anything more fun. All those people, everyone coming together to create something, everyone looking at you, listening to you. Applauding when it’s a wrap.”
“That was definitely my favorite part. It’s a wrap.”
Annabelle set her champagne flute on the coffee table with a sharp click. She gazed at the TV, where Taffy was climbing up a ladder to the roof. “You always looked like you were having fun,” she said wistfully. “I suppose you’re a good actress. You should consider—”
“No.”
“Pardon?”
“I’m not going to consider anything having to do with acting. I don’t like it. I never want to do it again.”
Annabelle shot her a dry look. “I’ve picked up on that by now.”
Sabina swallowed another overlarge gulp of champagne. Maybe it was the alcohol, but she was starting to feel a little like a passenger on a listing cruise ship. “I’m never going to do that reunion show.”
“I know. That’s what I told Max.”
“But . . . I thought you wanted to do it. Desperately. That’s why you came here. You destroyed my privacy with all those ridiculous interviews. Ruined my life.”
“For goodness’ sakes, Sabina, you’re blowing it all out of proportion! I didn’t ruin anything. You were hiding out like a . . . a criminal on the run.”
“Well . . . maybe I was. But that’s how I wanted it! My choice. My life.”
“You want to live your life all alone with no one knowing who you are?”
The ship was seriously tilting now. Sabina held on to the cushions of the couch as though she might slide off. Was her mother actually making some good points? “This isn’t about me. It’s about you and how ruthless you are. Are you denying you came to San Gabriel to get me to do the show?”
“Well, of course not. At first, anyway. But after all that media attention, people started sending me scripts. Decent ones. A good script means a lot more to me than money.” She poured herself more champagne and toasted the TV screen. “Rest in peace, Peg McGee.”
Sabina wanted to slap the champagne flute from her mother’s hands. “So that’s it? As long as you’re getting good scripts, everything’s cool? I was just a means to an end for you, wasn’t I? When I left the show, you had no more use for me. See ya!” She mimed a wave. “Wouldn’t want to be ya!”
Annabelle went white. “How dare you?”
Sabina got up from the couch, grabbing her crutches for support. “You never once tried to reach me after I left.”
“Max told me not to. He said you wanted all communication to go through him.”
“What?”
“Besides, I was furious with you. The tabloids ate me alive. ‘TV mom’s daughter files for emancipation.’ Do you have any idea what I went through?”
Sabina winced. She’d managed to block that part out—she’d had to, in order to keep going. Still . . . “Why is it always about you, Annabelle?” Her voice rose; she couldn’t help it. “What about me, stuck at the stupid show for my entire fucking childhood? I was just a prop to you. A royalty machine.”
Quick as a spitting cat, Annabelle jumped to her feet. Her red hair crackled around her head like firecrackers going off. She stood toe to toe with Sabina. “Well, excuse me for giving you the chance to become a star. You could be rich and famous by now. A millionaire.”
“Sure, if I hadn’t given you all my money!”
“What are you talking about?”
“The money I gave you! From the show!”
“You never gave me any money! I had to sell the Brentwood house after the show ended. I lived off residuals and voiceover work.”
Sabina shook her head, utterly bewildered. “Annabelle, I signed all my earnings over to you. Every single cent. I sold those diamond earrings you gave me and lived off them until I did Zombie Nights. I wanted you to be okay financially after the show ended. Max said he’d take care of it.”
“Oh my God.”
They stared at each other, realization dawning. Sabina slammed her crutch against the couch. “That weaselly little rat bastard.”
Into the stunned silence filtered dialogue from You and Me, voices from mother and daughter, circa a lifetime ago.
I told you not to touch that stove!
But I wanted to roast marshmallows and you said not to make a campfire.
Why, Taffy Bannister McGee, what were you thinking?
Annabelle grabbed the remote and turned off the TV. “When’s the last time you heard from Max?”
Sabina tried to focus her whirling brain. “It’s been a while. Not since the fire. Not since you took me home from the hospital.”
Annabelle snatched up her cell phone and began scrolling through her contacts. “I’m calling him. And a lawyer. And maybe a hit man.”
Sabina sank back onto the couch while her mother dialed. After a minute, Annabelle tossed the phone aside. It landed on the coffee table with a clatter. “His cell’s been disconnected.”
“He doesn’t have access to any of your money, does he?”
“I don’t think so. Good Lord.” Annabelle sank into the armchair with a lack of grace she’d never have allowed if she weren’t so upset. “This explains so much. When you left with no word, I thought you hated me.”
“I didn’t hate you. I hated my life.”
Annabelle rubbed her forehead, as if trying to chase away frown lines. “I know. I knew you hated it.”
“Then why did you make me—”
Impatient, Annabelle waved off the question, her rings sending sparkles through the room. “Obviously, I didn’t think I could do it without you. I thought my career would be over. I’d only gotten the tiniest roles before I brought you in for that audition.”
The familiar, sickening guilt slammed Sabina in the chest. “I’m sorry,” she said through dry lips. “I didn’t mean to—”
“Oh stop. I’m a grown-up.” A self-mocking smile quirked one corner of her mouth. “I admit it took me a while.” She smoothed down a stray lock of hair and drew a deep breath. “I don’t do this often, so savor it, kiddo. I should have listened to you. You were outgrowing the show in any case. I shouldn’t have fought it so hard. And I shouldn’t have outted you at the station, even though it was bound to happen sooner or later. But how do you think I got from nowhere land to TV star? I’m one stubborn bi—broad.”
Sabina blinked at her mother. Her image wavered, then came clear. Hardheaded, electrifying, driven Annabelle. A woman who would always surprise.
Annabelle gave her old snorty laugh, and it felt like a fist squeezing Sabina’s heart. “Here.” She stood up, picked up her glass of champagne, and toasted Sabina. “To my stubborn only daughter, who’s more like me than she would ever want to admit.”
Sabina took in those eyes, so much like hers, the color of the stormy Caribbean, and that full Merlot-tinted mouth. She raised her glass. “To my only mother, who’s pretty freaking amazing.”
“I’ll drink to that.”
They clinked glasses.
“And to making Max pay,” Sabina added.
“Oh hell.” Annabelle drained her champagne. “You can count on that. No one messes with my kiddo and gets away with it.”
Sabina’s throat went so tight, she couldn’t have said anything with a gun to her head.
Annabelle put down her champagne. “But maybe I ought to thank him. I got a real-life reunion with my daughter the firefighter.” She pulled Sabina into a hug, the first they’d shared in about a million years.
“No,” her mother said in Sabina’s ear. “I’ll make him pay first. Then maybe I’ll thank him.”
Maybe it took a return to New York for Roman to finally figure things out. It felt like a trip back in time, as if he were a visitor from the future who couldn’t quite communicate with the people he knew. Even his parents could tell something was different.
“You did the right thing, moving to California,” his father said as they walked down the block toward the church on the corner. “It did you good. Same for Lucio.” He refused to call Luke the Americanized version of his name.
“The bagels in San Gabriel are a disgrace. And their idea of Italian cooking is spaghetti mixed with clam chowder. Olive oil’s not bad, though.”
“You teaching those West Coast boys how we fight fires in New York?”
“They know what they’re doing.”
“I heard they’re under a curse.”
“You watch too much TV.”
His father leaned in close, reaching a big-knuckled hand to cover his. “Son, it never pays to ignore a curse. Have you been having trouble in the love department?”
“Babbo, please.” He and his father never discussed such things.
“I’ll light some candles at the church. If you’re fighting a curse, you need all the help you can get.”
“I can handle it without help from above, thank you.”
“Foolish boy.”
Roman chuckled. Only his father, Brooklyn firefighting legend, could get away with calling his six-foot-five-inch battalion chief son a foolish boy.
“I saw her on TV. Bella ragazza.”
“Let’s not talk about this. Not right now.” They had reached Saint Ambrose’s, a small church built of soft gray stone and adorned with simple scrolls and a lovely Madonna. Roman had grown up attending this church; Maureen had loved it.
“You can make it home okay?” Roman asked his father.
“I do this walk twice a day, son. Take your time. I’ll have some prosciutto e melone waiting for you.”
Roman kissed his father on the cheek and opened the side gate of the tiny churchyard. A sense of tranquillity enveloped him as soon as he stepped onto the lovingly tended path that hugged the side of the church. The sounds of Brooklyn faded, honking horns replaced by cheerful birdsong.
After Maureen had died, once the uncomprehending grief had faded, he’d gone to Ground Zero, to the site of her last moments, but the place had stirred up too many terrible emotions. So he’d come here instead, and begged for help from the priest.
Now, in the tiny cemetery, he knelt down next to an exquisite headstone with the name Maureen O’Keefe Roman carved in bold strokes. Bold suited her, as did the rest of the words. Wife. Mother. Firefighter. Hero. He put his hand on the stone. Its rough surface, warmed by the sun, tickled his palm. A peaceful calm settled over him.
“Luke is doing great,” he murmured. He looked around, feeling silly, but saw no one else. He had the place to himself. “There’s someone I need to tell you about. Someone who’s come into my life.”
As soon as he said the words, he knew they weren’t needed. Wherever Maureen was, he had her blessing. “I think you’d like her, Maureen. I know you would.”
The thought of Maureen and Sabina hanging out together made him smile. Two kickass, gutsy, firefighting babes. Though they might not appreciate that description.
“The problem is, well, there’s a couple problems. I may have pissed her off. I know that doesn’t surprise you. I’m pretty sure I can make that right. But the other . . . We worked it out pretty well, both of us on the force. Two-firefighter family. But I don’t know if I want to put Luke into that situation again.”
And maybe that was the purpose of saying things out loud, of speaking them in words, rather than confused thoughts that bubbled beneath the surface. Because as soon as he said them, something fell into place.
“Oh,” he said to the headstone. “Oh.”
Tenderly, he traced the letters of Maureen’s name, then sat back on his heels. “Now why didn’t I think of that?”
Roman and Luke headed back to California fully stocked with certain essential items such as black olives and his favorite brand of Parmesan. When they stepped off the plane, the warm, smoggy air embraced him like a long-lost friend. The snowless streets, inhabited by smiling passersby who weren’t wearing winter coats and elbowing each other out of the way, welcomed him kindly.
Surprise, surprise, San Gabriel had become home.
They barely made it back in time for Luke’s first day of school and Roman’s first shift. He swung by Sabina’s house before his shift started, but it was far too early to knock on the door. He’d have to wait, which seemed impossible. The need to see Sabina drummed in his blood. But maybe it was better. He had something to do at work first.
At the firehouse, the early relief guys were reminiscing about the Christmas ski trip to Big Bear and boasting about the record-breaking sales of Cooking with Heat. They weren’t the only ones talking about it. Chief Renteria had left a message on his voice mail.
“Every time I turn on the TV, I see another story about those cookbooks. Good job, Roman.”
“Hear that, Stan,” he said to the dog, who’d been flatteringly glad to see him. “I finally did something right. Even though I had nothing to do with it.” Stan wagged his tail and held his Christmas present, a ball in the shape of a cartoon bomb, between his jaws.
At lineup, Roman dropped his own bombshell. “Where are we on the dinner rotation?”
“Stud’s up.”
“Stud, mind if I fill in?”
Everyone’s jaws dropped.
“You, Chief? I mean, sure, of course,” said Stud.
“Good.”
“Chief, if you need ideas about what to cook, we have some copies of Cooking with Heat left. Only a few, though, we’re practically sold out, if you can believe it.”
“I’m good. I have cooked before, you know.”
No one seemed convinced, and he got a lot of funny looks throughout the day as he did his prep work in between calls. It was an unusually busy day at Fire Station 1. Usually they fielded an average of three to five calls per twenty-four-hour shift. This time, they got called out eight times before dinner. The cannellini soaked a little too long thanks to an electrical fire at a local hardware store. His Parmesan cheese grating got interrupted by a San Gabriel High linebacker’s broken leg. Then there were the mushrooms to soak in white wine, which meant bending the rules against alcohol in the firehouse just a tad.
Stan kept him company the whole time. Roman convinced himself it was out of love and not the bits of pancetta he occasionally dropped in the dog’s vicinity. Stan had good taste, he figured, until he saw the mutt get equally excited about a bit of Styrofoam packaging.
Finally, it was time for dinner. First, he set out plates of bruschetta made with Italian bread he’d brought back from New York. The guys had never tasted anything like it.
“Dude, how can bread, garlic, and tomato taste so freaking good?”
“Where’d you learn to do this?”
“We gotta reprint the cookbook, man. Special edition.”
Stan didn’t care for it, but then he’d never been a big fan of garlic.
“Now for the soup course,” said Roman with a flourish. He unveiled the magnificent pot of pasta e fagioli con rosmarino that had been simmering most of the day.
“I had to turn it off during that car fire. Hope it’s okay.”
“That wasn’t a car fire,” said Vader. “That was a Mustang fire. Had to have been the ex-girlfriend. Who else would set fire to a 1978 Mustang convertible? Hell, this is great, Chief.” He slurped a big spoonful. “What are you, like the Iron Chef or something?”
“That’s it!” Fred pounded his fist on the table, making the plates rattle. “The chief’s nickname. Iron Chef.”
“Finish the meal first,” said Roman. “Tonno con caponata.”
“Con who?”
“Just try it.”
A reverent silence descended as the firefighters dug into their tuna steaks with caper-garlic-vegetable sauce.
“Good golly, Miss Molly,” said Double D, who seemed to be forgetting all about his new diet.
“Holy Mother of God,” breathed Psycho. “Who are you? How did you make this? This is—”
“Un-fucking-believable,” said Vader. “And I don’t even like French food.”
“It’s Italian,” corrected Roman, who was otherwise completely enjoying the crew’s reaction. “This recipe is from Southern Italy, as a matter of fact.”
“Is that where you learned it?”
“It’s a family recipe, mostly. I changed a few things. Little less olive oil, little more capers.”
“What the hell are capers?” Vader frowned at his fork.
“Little fish,” said Fred.
“No, they’re flower buds,” Roman corrected again. “Pickled flower buds from the caper shrub. Did you guys really put out a cookbook?”
“Yeah, but our hardest recipe was fish tacos. How come you been holding out on us, dude?” Psycho took another bite and moaned with appreciation.
“Well, that’s a good question.” Why had he kept his tenderhearted side to himself? Maybe he’d been waiting for this moment. Roman took a deep breath, the kind required when one is about to jump off a cliff, and rose to his feet. “I’m leaving the station.”