In a Heartbeat - Elizabeth Adler [72]
“And you can’t afford champagne driving a moving van.”
They laughed together, and once again she reached over and took his hand. “Y’know what? I really like you,” she said. “I mean, I hated you at first, I thought that you thought you were Al Pacino in a cop movie and I was the blonde suspect who you just knew had done the dirty deed.”
“Oh?” He grinned. “And what do you think now?”
“I think . . .” She contemplated him, taking in his jutting cheekbones, his firm jaw, the severe lines of his mouth, and ending up at his eyes. Deep, dark, soft brown eyes that were gazing into hers with a slightly bemused expression. “I think that you are my hero,” she whispered. “You are the man who is going to find Ed’s shooter. I owe you an enormous debt of gratitude, Marco Camelia.”
He shook his head. “Not yet, you don’t, Zelda—Melba Merrydew. I haven’t found him yet. Besides,” he shrugged, “I’m only a cop doing his job. I’m nobody’s hero.”
“Oh yes you are,” she said. And she got up, walked around the table, and planted a kiss full on his mouth.
It was, Camelia decided shakily, more potent than the bottle of champagne. “Jesus, what d’ya have to go and do that for?” He put a hand to his lips, stunned. “You were all over me, like kudzu.”
She plunked back down in the chair opposite, laughing. “Because, my dear Marco, I love you. I love you for being an honest man, for being a dedicated man, for being a tenderhearted man. And for being my friend.”
The waiter poured the champagne and Camelia picked up his glass. “I’ll drink to that,” he said, shaken. But there was no way he could tell her what he felt about her.
“Friends.” Mel lifted her glass, touched his, and they drank. She sighed happily, secure in the knowledge that Ed, though still in a coma, seemed to be holding his own. “No better, no worse” was what the doctor had told her.
“And here’s to Ed,” Camelia said, and again they clinked glasses. “To his speedy recovery. And,” he added, “may all your dreams come true.”
Mel’s eyes filmed with tears that she would not allow to spill over. “Thank you,” she said simply. And then she went ahead and ordered she-crab soup laced with sherry, and barbecued shrimp, and grits dappled with cheddar cheese and scallions. She persuaded him to try the oysters stuffed with crab and the grilled Georgia lamb chops served with a golden pear chutney.
“So I can taste yours, too,” she added hungrily. Then, “Oh, bother,” she remembered, “I can’t eat in this dress.”
“I thought it expanded.” He eyed her curves doubtfully.
“Well, maybe it does.” She beamed at him again. “Gosh darn it, I’m surely gonna give it a try.”
He hadn’t realized she was a foodie. All he had ever seen her eat—and that reluctantly—were bacon and eggs and bagels. But when it came to real food, this girl could tuck it away. He grinned at her enthusiasm as she ooh’d and ahh’d her way through the soup, stealing a couple of his oysters, just to taste, and rolling her eyes to heaven.
“I thought you lived on Power Bars and Diet Coke.” He was laughing at her, but she didn’t seem to mind.
“So I do. But not when somebody else is doing the cooking. And this, Camelia my man, is good cooking.” She glanced up. “So, tell me more about yourself.”
“All I can tell you is, my story is not nearly as romantic as Ed’s.”
She shuddered. “His sounded like a version of hell, to me.”
“It was, but it’s the stuff of romance novels. Poor guy makes good against all odds. I never thought it really worked out like that in real life. My grandfather wasn’t so lucky. He came to the U.S. from Sicily, got a job in a hat factory— everyone wore hats in those days. He shared a room with another Sicilian, saved what he could. Then his roommate said he had a family emergency. My grandfather lent him all he had. Every cent. He never saw him again. And he never trusted another Sicilian.
“It took a few years, but eventually he was able to send for my grandmother. They lived in a one-room