She walked out of the schoolroom. “Didn’t know you’d be here today.”
“Neither did I. Not my idea of how to have a good time on Sunday afternoon, but I guess the old folks are creatures of habit.”
“Yes, we’re all seriously flawed and terribly boring. You’re right.” She walked past him.
“Hey,” he said, and grabbed hold of her arm.
Steve turned the corner and walked into the hallway. “What’s going on?” he asked with a frown.
“Eric was just sharing how quaint he finds us all.” She faced him. “Please, let go of my arm.”
He released her arm. “I wasn’t trying to put you down, Victoria.”
“Yeah, right,” Steve said, coming to Victoria’s side like he was planning to protect her from Satan. “You come back here acting
too good to watch soccer with us, too American to have a glass of wine, and pushing yourself on the women. I think you’d better
step back and leave Victoria alone.”
“He wasn’t—,” Victoria started to say.
“I’ll take care of this, Victoria.” Steve stepped between them.
“You’re a jerk, Steve. See what I mean, things never do change around here.” Eric smiled, refusing to get into an argument
about how he lacked Argentine sensibilities. He didn’t. He didn’t always see the point in creating a minicommunity within
their American world, true. At least not for himself. But he understood that for his parents it was a connection to their
past, and he was okay with this.
Steve frowned and pushed on Eric’s shoulder enough to give a small shove and make his point. “Head on back to the main hall.”
Was this guy for real? “Who the fuck are you?” Eric laughed. “Security?” He stepped around Steve, hoping he would go back
to the big screen and mind his own business.
“I’m not kidding, man,” Steve said, shoving Eric again and standing between him and Victoria.
“Steve,” Victoria said. “Cut it out.”
This time Eric didn’t smile or laugh. If this guy had a screw loose, Eric was willing to tighten it for him. He shoved Steve
right back. Without warning, Steve pulled his arm back and popped Eric right in the face, knocking him onto his back. Victoria’s
jaw dropped as she gasped. He himself lay stunned on the floor, and Steve shook his hand and cursed. The women ran out of
the classroom, gasping and talking all at once. Susana hurried the children back to their seats and closed the door.
Eric stumbled to his feet and glared at Steve. “Are you crazy?” he shouted. He wanted to pound Steve into the ground but restrained
himself for the sake of the women watching.
The older women from the kitchen ran into the hallway. Lucia brought a hand to her chest. “Oh, my, what happened?”
“This idiot hit me.” Eric found it unbelievable. The last time he’d been in a fight, he was probably eighteen. He was no wimp,
but he wasn’t into acting like a macho idiot to prove he was a man. He scowled at Steve. What the hell was wrong with this
guy?
“What?
Why?
” Lucia asked.
“He was harassing Victoria,” Steve defended.
The older women looked at Victoria, and she turned twenty shades of red. She glanced at him, and his jaw tightened when she
didn’t speak up right away. He wasn’t harassing her and she knew it.
“You need ice,” Lucia said, cutting past the tense silence.
“I’ll get it,” Victoria said, and left the room.
“You men should be ashamed of yourself. Fighting in front of the kids,” Mrs. Apolonia said. “We won’t have this here. You
both understand?”
Steve placed a hand on her shoulder. “Si, Doña. I’m sorry. I lost my temper. It won’t happen again.”
Lucia patted Eric’s face. “You want to apologize too, don’t you, Eric?”
He
wanted to apologize
?
Was she kidding?
But from the look on her worried face, he could see she wasn’t kidding. She wanted him to make nice. “Yes, I’m sorry, too,
Mrs. Apolonia.” He didn’t look at Steve.
Victoria came back with the ice. “Here,” she said.
“I’m leaving.” He stepped back. “I don’t need that.”
“No, you’re not leaving,” Lucia said firmly. “Not with your eye like that. Go eat,” she ordered everyone else and waved her
arms. “Victoria, bring the ice.” She made him sit down in a small office to the side of the schoolroom. “Now get that ice
on his eye before it swells shut,” she told Victoria. “I’m going to find a small bandage. He’s bleeding from that cut by his
eyebrow.”
Victoria came to his side. “Tilt your head back.”
“Just give it to me.”
“Shut up and tilt your head back.”
He drew a breath and did as she asked. She gently put the plastic bag, covered by a towel, on his eye. He flinched. Damn it.
It hurt.
“Sorry,” she said, softly easing hair off his forehead with her spare hand.
“You should be. I wasn’t bothering you.”
“
I
didn’t hit you.”
“You might as well have.”
She stared down at him and held the ice to his eye. A pink flush made her cheekbones more prominent and her creamy skin glow.
Here was a girl that needed very little makeup. Huge, dark, almost black eyes. Absolutely luscious red lips.
Hmm, very pretty face,
he decided. “Are you dating him or something?” Eric asked.
“God, no. You’re right, he’s a jerk.”
“Don’t let him hear you say that, or you might be the next one he punches out.” Eric began to feel his temper subside. No
point in letting one loser ruin the rest of his day.
“I’ll take my chances. You okay?”
“I’ll live.”
“Okay, I’m going to go, then. Hold the ice to your eye.”
He reached up and held the ice bag in place. “Thanks. And Victoria, I wasn’t trying to insult you or the club. Seriously.”
“Fine.”
He closed his eyes, letting the ice fall to the side of his face. “Tell you the truth, I don’t know what the hell I’m doing
here.”
She placed her hand over his, shifting the clumps of ice directly over his eye.
He opened the good eye and gazed at her, finding the feel of her hand over his oddly comforting. And the heat of her body
beside his again—it was nice enough for him to allow her to take care of him. “Life sometimes gets complicated. What you think
you know, you don’t,” he said.
She watched him with an adorable, perplexed frown. “What did you think you knew?”
He pulled the ice bag away from his frozen eyeball. “What I wanted, what I didn’t want. I thought I knew all the answers.
But I’m finding I don’t know much of anything.” He sighed. “I’m not making any sense. Forget it.”
“Probably realizing that you don’t know everything is a good thing.”
He gazed at her, feeling like Quasimodo. “Yeah? I subscribe to the idea that what you don’t know can hurt you. And it did.”
He tried to smile, but it didn’t work too well.
“Okay, here we go,” Lucia said, hurrying back into the room.
Victoria turned to face Lucia. He let the gaze of his good eye travel down to her jean-covered butt. He probably shouldn’t
be looking. But he couldn’t help himself. Interest in the female shape was written into men’s DNA, wasn’t it? And hers was
nice and curvy.
“Sorry about this, Mrs. Ortelli. What happened was Steve’s and my fault. Eric didn’t do anything wrong.”
She nodded. “Esteban is a troublemaker. Stay away from him, Victoria.”
“I do. We never even talk. He just wanted to find a reason to show Eric who’s boss. You know how he is. The other guys humor
him, because they know he’s a pitiful loser with no balls. Excuse me,” she said.
Lucia smiled. “What? You think the truth offends me?”
Victoria blushed again. “I’ll see you later,” she said, then she glanced his way one more time. “Sorry, Eric,” she said, and
left.
Eric sat up as Victoria walked out.
Lucia noticed that her son seemed particularly interested in watching Victoria disappear down the hall. “Why did he hit you?”
As if distracted, he forced his attention back to the two of them. “Hell if I know. They all hate me here, as if they take
it personally that I left or something. Steve said I think I’m too good for them. Why would he think that?”
“Probably because I always told them how good you were doing. How you were traveling and didn’t miss home at all. That you
were happy to leave behind this ordinary life.” She shrugged, full of guilt. “That’s what I always told myself.”
He gazed at her with sadness and an eye that was red and puffy. “Truth is, I
was
happy not to have to hang out here every Sunday once I left. But, I was just out of my teens. Not exactly the place a young
man wants to spend his free time. But that was years ago. They have a problem with that?”
“They’ll come around. Give them a chance. And Victoria’s right. Esteban acts like he’s very tough. Brags to all the men about
the women he… entertains, gets into fights with neighbors, and is always involved in one legal dispute or another. He has
no friends except the men from this club, and they only put up with him because he’s Argentine.”
“Bull. It’s because his dad donates thousands every year to this club. Always has.”
“That, too.” Lucia smiled. “Anyway, relax and just be yourself. Like any dysfunctional family we’re a strange mix, but this
is the only family we have, Eric.”
“Yeah. I know.”
She reached across and caressed his hair like she used to when he was a little boy. “Maybe next week we’ll have a barbecue
at home.”
Eric smiled. “Thanks, Mom.”
Eric and Antonio got to the auction early. The convention center buzzed with excitement. Eric wrote a check for the deposit
that every bidder was obligated to pay in order to bid, and got his paddle. Antonio waited in the hall while Eric took care
of the pre-auction business. Once he finished, he got a cup of coffee for himself and one for Antonio. Eric found him chatting
with a guy in a tan sport coat and blue pants and passed him the hot Styrofoam cup.
“Hey, this is my son,” Antonio said as Eric stood beside him.
The man shook his hand. “I’m Jim. Your father tells me you’re a pro at this.”
“I’m okay.”
Antonio smiled. “Jim does tax lien certificates as well as real estate.”
“Yeah?” Eric said. “Great. Nice to meet you, Jim. We should get in there, Dad.”
“Oh, okay.” He gave Jim a business card from the auto dealership where he worked. “Give me a call, Jim, and we’ll talk.”
“You bet.”
Eric frowned. “Talk about what?”
“The tax lien certificates. What a good deal. Do you know he made—?”
“I know about those.” An investor would pay a property owner’s back taxes and make a hefty hunk of change when the home owner
got current, or end up owning the home if the taxes were not paid and the government seized the property. “But each state
and each county has different rules, Dad. It’s a pain in the ass. Plus you have to tie up your money for too long. Not a good
deal.”
“But he’s gotten thousands of dollars and two properties by buying those certificates and waiting. And he didn’t have to remodel
any houses.”
They found a seat. “Like I said, it takes a lot of homework. And you don’t get a return on your investment for months, sometimes
years.”
Antonio shrugged. “Aren’t you being a little close-minded?”
“I do what I do best. And I do it again and again and again. And I don’t do anything else.” Unlike his father, who was always
trying something new.
“But you could be missing out on some great opportunities.”
“Dad.” Eric put an arm around his father. “I make my own great opportunities.”
And by the end of the day, Eric owned a new house. At least for the couple of months it would take him to flip it.
Antonio watched Eric work, bidding, getting outbid, and bidding again. The fast-talking auctioneer and the general excitement
of the speedy process held a definite appeal, and he could see how a young man would enjoy the game and final win. There was
no denying that Eric was a serious investor, and Antonio’s heart filled with pride. He regretted that he’d wasted so many
years being angry with him. So the boy didn’t finish college. So he didn’t follow the plan Antonio had for him from the day
he was born. So what? He was a good man. And in the end each man had to decide his own future and create his own destiny.
As they left the bidding hall to fill out the paperwork for the property in another room, Antonio patted Eric on the back.
“Let’s go celebrate.”
Eric grinned. “What did you have in mind?”
He looked so much like an all-American boy that it made Antonio’s heart ache. He’d so wanted the Argentine son that would
share soccer scores and speak perfect Castilian, but it was time to begin accepting who Eric truly was, not who he had wished
him to be. “How about we head out to Angel Stadium? They’re playing at home tonight, and I bet we can get tickets. How many
hot dogs can you eat?”
“More than you,” he said, obviously pleased with the idea. “Let me finish up here and you’ve got a deal.”
Antonio headed to the lobby and pulled out his cell to call Lucia.
“Lucia, habla Antonio, mi amor.”
“Hi, how did the auction go, querido? Is it over?”
“It’s over. He bought a house.”
“Oh, I’m
so
happy,” she said, because no doubt she viewed this as another step Eric was taking to return home.
“He’s going to fix this place up and sell it, Lucia. Remember that.”
“Well, it takes time to fix and sell a home, doesn’t it? That’s time he’s going to spend close to us. And I’m thrilled.”
He chuckled. “Listen, we’re going to celebrate his successful bid. Go to a ball game. So we won’t be home for dinner. I’m
sorry, but—”
“Don’t be sorry. I love that you and Eric are spending time together. Don’t worry about me. I’m too tired to cook tonight,
anyway.”
“All right, amorcito. We’ll see you tonight.” He ended the call.
She was a good woman. A great woman. By being a pigheaded idiot and alienating Eric, he’d hurt his wife unintentionally. And
for that he’d never forgive himself. But from the second Eric had walked into that club and stepped back into their lives,
he decided he’d do whatever he had to in order to make it up to both of them.