I sit down and Eddies sees that I'm flustered.

“What's eating you?” he smirks – but I'm too nervous to play along. I scan the horizon for a sign of Rosa and whisper

“I think she saw us.”

“Who, Rosa?”

“Yes, she was behind the bar when you were under here. She must have seen my...my face...”

“The dirty cow.” he laughs.

“It's not funny. She hasn't asked us to leave, has she?”

“Er, no.”

“So she's probably rung the police.”

Eddie slaps his hands together and laughs hard.

“Eddie, I don't think this is funny.”

“I'm sorry, but you really have nothing to worry about. The last thing Rosa would do is ring the old bill. For a start, there's her kinky boudoir upstairs.”

“Kinky boudoir?”

“Yes, very kinky so I hear. But, besides that, she's hardly going to ring the police on her boss, is she?”

“What you're the boss? You own this place?”

“Yeah, it's part of the family business.”

“Oh, I didn't realise.”

“No reason you should. My dad bought it decades back when he was going through his Godfather period. It's never made a profit. Just about breaks even. Rosa makes her money upstairs but we keep it going, cos when she's not too busy with that, she makes the best spaghetti and meatballs in this city.”

I feel so much relief but I'm confused.

“That's good to hear, but I didn't think you were in the family business?”

“Well, I'm not. None of the real business, but I have a stake in this and the chauffeur business. They both date back to when my mum and dad were still together. My brother runs all the other stuff. Is that how you know him, through one of his businesses?”

Before I can answer Rosa appears with two plates heaped high with spaghetti and meatballs.

“Enjoy! Enjoy!” she almost shouts. It gives me time to avoid a confession.

“I've known Tony since school. He's always been around and about. But, I never knew he had a brother, let alone a twin.”

“Well, we're not that close.”

I twirl spaghetti onto my fork and I place it on my tongue and it melts and tastes so good.

“Oh my God! This is amazing. I've never tasted anything like it, what's in this sauce?”

“Asking that question is the one thing that could get us kicked out of here. No-one knows, no-one asks.”

We both tuck into our food and I feel like I'm both the lady and the tramp. I wish I could be more dainty, but the meatballs are so mouthwatering, I'm all but shoveling it in.

As I keep my mouth full, Eddie tells me his family's history. His dad was already a legend on the doors when he met Eddie's mother, an art school student.

“They were both still in their teens and it was only a couple of weeks before the unexpected, but inevitable happened. Double trouble was on its way and they got married and moved in together. Seven months later we were a family of four.”

When the twins turned three his mum set up the chauffeur service in the hope of keeping her husband out of trouble and earning during the day and home at night.

“It didn't work out quite like that as he ended up spending the early hours waiting outside casinos and nightclubs. But at least it kept him away from the fights that had made his name. Of course, he made a lot of contacts and it was the way he started to earn during the day that brought us equal measures of wealth and grief.”

“That was what the arguments would be about. My mother would scream and my dad would rage. There was never any violence, but it was frightening. In the end, my mum made a final ultimatum for him to go legit, and when that failed she took me and Tony and left.”

I finish my plate and my heart begins to melt like the spaghetti and Eddie is piercing my soul with every word that he speaks.

In their new home, Tony had very soon taken over his father's position seeing himself as the man of the house.

He was always in trouble and shouting the odds whenever my mum found out about it. Six months after we'd left, Tony returned to live with my father. It all sorted itself out after that.”

I can hear a sadness entering his voice.

“We'd always been very competitive, but once we had that separation we got to be more our own individuals and we developed our own strengths. Tony became the better boxer because he was training daily with my dad. I only joined them at the weekends. During the week I was hanging around with all me mum's bohemian friends and I started getting into my art.”

I pop the last meatball into my mouth as he pauses. I've been hanging on his every word.

“My dad died while I was away doing my foundation course. They'd kept it from me, how ill he was. I should have guessed from how much time my mum had been spending with him. Stupidly, I'd thought they were going to get back together. I didn't make it back before he passed.”

I can feel the tears forming in my eyes and Eddie notices.

“Anyway, most my father's businesses were turned over to Tony – after all, Tony pretty much was the business. He supported me until I graduated and since then I've been able to pay my own way. Since I've been back we haven't seen too much of each other. Different social circles and that. It's mainly down to mum that we see each other at all, really.”

Eddie finishes his plate as he finishes the story.

“So, have I put you off?” he asks.

For the first time, I get to see him looking embarrassed.

“Put me off what?”

“Put you off of me. I've spent the whole time going on about myself and I haven't asked a single thing about you. Sorry about that.”

I feel my love for him growing stronger.

“That's nothing for you to be sorry about.”

“I'm normally the one asking the questions. Honestly, I can be a great listener. It's just with you I feel I can tell you anything. I feel I can trust you in a way I can't explain. I've fallen for you hard, I guess.”

He smiles and it's a different kind of smile. It's honest and true.

It's the way I've always wanted a man to smile at me. I can hardly hold it together as I'm torn about inside. All my lies are flooding back into my consciousness. How did I end up here? I've spent the evening transfixed in his gaze and now I can't look him in the eye. I can't think of anything to say to put this right so I excuse myself and head back to the bathroom.