The Suite Life (3 page)

Late on the third day after meeting him, the phone on my desk was beckoning me, but I was also a bit worried about dating someone whose world was completely foreign to me. Truth to tell, I wasn't even sure what “brunch” was. I knew it was some kind of combination of breakfast and lunch that people “went out for” on Sundays. But I'd certainly never had a brunch date in my life. What exactly did people eat for brunch? Where I came from, we didn't eat brunch. When we ate in a restaurant, which wasn't often, it was a local Chinese or Italian place, or sometimes a family-owned diner. A fancy meal was whatever the neighborhood nightclub was serving so all the young men (and the underage girls they supplied with fake IDs) would keep on dancing and buying drinks.

My courtship résumé consisted of a convicted felon who had cheated on me constantly and abused me in every other way, and a few nice guys trying to climb the ladder in the Financial District who didn't do it for me. I could already tell that Alec DeMarco wasn't like anyone else I'd ever known, much less gone out with.

So far it had always been the guys who didn't measure up to my standards, but what if this time it were different? Alec was far more sophisticated than I was or anyone else I knew for that matter. His entire demeanor exuded money and privilege.
What if this time I'm the one who doesn't measure up?

Nonsense,
I told myself.
Samantha Bonti is special, and if this guy is as special as you think, he'll know that.
So I pulled Alec's business card out of my purse and picked up the receiver.

The phone only rang once. “Hello.”

“Alec DeMarco?” I asked.

“That's me.”

“Samantha Bonti.”

“So that's your last name.” Alec chuckled. “The best day I ever had on the Street just got a whole lot better.”

“Congratulations.”

“It seems I haven't lost my touch after all, Samantha Bonti.” The way he said my name sounded like a caress. “I'm telling you, I couldn't stop thinking about you, and then you call, and to top it off, it turns out you're Italian.”

“Half.”

“Let me guess: the other half is Native American.”

“Jewish,” I replied.

“Had to be one or the other.” Alec laughed.

His easy manner made me comfortable. “You can laugh, but I promise, everything else about me won't be that easy to guess. You don't want to know how crazy my life was growing up.”

“
Au contraire,
Samantha Bonti. I want to know everything about you, and I can't wait to get started.”

Just listening to his voice sent a tingle down my spine. “Brunch this weekend would be nice,” I managed, hoping that I didn't sound too anxious.

“Hang on a sec,” Alec said, and I could hear paper rustling on his end, probably checking his calendar. “I've already got a date for Saturday. Let's do Sunday at eleven.”

He's either crazy or brutally honest.
“That's fine,” I said. “Just tell me where to meet you.”

“Not a chance,” Alec said. “Give me your address and I'll pick you up.”

“Well, actually, I live in Brooklyn,” I confessed, sure that he'd change his mind.

“No problem,” he replied without hesitation. “It's not every day a guy meets a girl worth driving to.” He took down my address and added, “See you Sunday, Samantha Bonti.”

“I'm looking forward to it, Alec,” I said, which was the understatement of the century.

My apartment buzzer rang promptly at eleven on Sunday.

No way he's seeing this place right now.
“I'll be right down, Alec!” I called out of my second-floor window, then checked myself in the mirror. The simple vintage white cotton sundress I'd chosen (not like there was a lot to choose from) was cool, crisp, and, I knew, flattered my figure. I grabbed a small teal leather purse off the counter and dashed out the door in the heels I'd dyed to match.

“Unbelievable,” Alec said, and smiled as he placed his hands on my shoulders and stepped back to get a better look, which also allowed me to get a good look at him. His blazer was no off-the-rack purchase. Looked to me like expensive Italian threads, and his tie had those tiny horses on it that I knew from the ads in fancy magazines meant it was Hermès. I vowed not to let his beautiful white teeth and wavy dark hair distract me too much. “You look great, Samantha.”

“Thanks, Alec. It's just a sundress.”

“That's exactly what it is about you. Anyone else would have got themselves all dressed up to impress me.” I blushed. “You're nothing like any other woman I've known. I saw that from a block away.”

“A girl could get hooked on that kind of flattery,” I said as he led me to a black Range Rover parked at the curb.

“Full disclosure, Samantha: I plan to hook you, period,” he said, smiling as he handed me into the passenger seat.
That's
quite a statement considering we have barely begun our first date,
I thought. The butternut-leather bucket seat swallowed me up, but Alec's bucket seat contained him perfectly. He was massive but perfectly proportioned, and he exuded a sense of power and confidence that made me feel secure in his presence—the first time I'd ever felt that way with a man. Tony's power had always felt menacing rather than comforting, and I was beginning to understand the difference.

“Nice ride,” I said with a dollop of syrup in my voice.

“Just one of my toys,” Alec said as he pulled away. “Mostly for when I go fishing and for Sunday visits with the family at our beach house.”

Please don't tell me you're springing your family on me today!

“I blew them off this morning,” Alec continued as we headed for the Brooklyn Bridge. “Just like I would have blown off my fishing trip with the guys yesterday if that were the only day this weekend I could see you.”

So that was the “date” he'd mentioned
 . . . “You go fishing often?” I asked, certain that this conversation would eventually get around to his real dates.

“Whenever I get the chance. Work is keeping me pretty busy right now.”

“Is that a good thing?”

Alec flashed a jumbo grin. “You bet it is.”

“It's nice to see someone who enjoys what he does.”

“I freakin'
love
my work, Samantha, but it doesn't mean anything unless you have someone to share the ride,” he said as we rolled onto the bridge.

Alec didn't find it necessary to keep talking, and I appreciated the few quiet moments as my mind raced with thoughts about what it would mean to share his ride. I'd vowed to myself that I would never let a man derail my future again. Not after what I'd gone through with Tony. So there was part of me that
was afraid to let my guard down with Alec. I didn't want to lose sight of my dreams of becoming a writer. I had laid my life bare in
The Blessed Bridge
because I hoped that sharing what I had gone through would help at least one other girl like me. Getting it on paper had been an emotional and sometimes excruciating experience, and the effort to get the book out there had so far been disheartening. Now, sitting next to Alec, I renewed my vow to let nothing stop me from trying.

“You seem far away,” Alec said.

“Just thinking about where I've been and where I'm going.”

“Where you've been is history I'm dying to know all about. And as far as ‘going' is concerned, you're going with me.”

I felt my face flush. Grandma flashed into my mind. I'd been a love-struck teenager standing next to her and stirring the potato and onion mixture for her famous latkes, and now her words were as clear as if she were saying them from the backseat:
It's gonna be all right, bubelah. You'll see, the right man will come along and all will be great in the world.
I missed a lot of things about Grandma, but none more than our Saturday afternoons talking and cooking together.

“Where are you taking me?” I asked.

“Just a nice little café in my neighborhood.”

“And what neighborhood would that be?”

“Tribeca.”

I knew the area—the Triangle Below Canal Street—but only from reading the society pages. The old low-rise buildings that had long housed sweatshops and starving artists' studios were now filled with trendy boutiques, art galleries, fine restaurants, and expensive condos with floor-to-ceiling windows.

“Sounds great,” I said, as Alec pulled into a garage. As soon as he'd put the car in park, he bolted around to my door before I could get it half open.

For a big guy he moves pretty well.

“The place isn't far,” Alec said as he grabbed my hand and led me up the ramp to the street. “And anyway, it's a gorgeous day for walking a couple of blocks.”

I was surprised to discover how at home I felt in a part of the city I'd never been before, and how natural it felt to be holding Alec's hand. I may have been different from any woman he'd ever known, but he was also nothing like any guy I'd ever dated, either. I'd held large hands before, but none that was callus-free and with buffed nails. His pride in walking with me was as palpable as his power had been earlier, and I felt as if I were floating a foot or two off the sidewalk.

Alec was true to his word and just a couple of blocks later he stopped before the heavy, wood-framed glass door to a café, pulled it open, and waved me inside. There were butterflies in my stomach that I attributed both to his attentiveness and to my anticipation of the meal we were about to share. I planned to take my time studying the menu and wondered how much of it would be Greek to me.

Everyone in the restaurant seemed to know Alec and they nodded or waved as a hostess right out of
Elle
magazine escorted us to a large corner booth in the rear. Most of my friends liked to sit right up front and next to a window so they could enjoy the comings and goings outside. Personally, I'd never enjoyed eating in a fishbowl, and certainly not now, when I didn't want anything to distract my attention from the food and, most of all, from the man I was with.

No sooner had we been seated than a waiter showed up at the table with a bottle of champagne in an ice bucket on a pewter stand. As he filled two crystal flutes I could see that the label read Taittinger, a name even I knew meant the best. Alec thanked him by name and raised his glass, saying, “To the most beautiful woman I've ever met.” I held my breath as he took a
healthy swig. “I never thought I would be smitten with a Brooklyn girl again,” he said, grinning.

I didn't know if I should take that as a compliment or a criticism, and I guessed it was a bit of both, but then there it was.

As if reading my mind, Alec clarified: “I come from Brooklyn, too, you know, born and raised, so I'm allowed to say that.”

I grinned at him. After all, I hadn't spent much time thinking about what it would be like to be with another Brooklyn guy, either. Yet somehow Alec was fundamentally different from all the other guys I'd known from the neighborhood. “Life is full of surprises,” I managed to say.

Alec took another swig as I let a small taste cross my lips, and he must have signaled our waiter in some way because he reappeared as if by magic.

“We'll start with some cheese bread, rigatoni pesto, and the risotto, Jason,” Alec said, grabbing a roll from the basket on the table between us.

So much for studying the menu.

“Certainly, Mr. DeMarco,” Jason said. “Do you want me to put in the other dishes now, or later?”

Other dishes? Pasta, risotto, and a loaf of bread sounds like a lot of food to me, but Alec is a big man; what do I know anyway? Maybe that's what everyone around here eats for brunch.

Alec leaned toward me as Jason refilled his glass. “You pressed for time?” he asked.

I shook my head no, and he grinned. “Great. I have all day! That will be all for now, Jason. We'll order the rest later.”

As the waiter withdrew, Alec leaned toward me again. “Try a brioche, Sam,” he said, reaching for his butter knife.
So that's what they call a roll in this place.
“They're to die for.”

The fact that he'd just called me Sam gave me chills. “Funny,” I said, “that's what my family and close friends always call me.”

Alec shrugged his shoulders. “Just seemed natural,” he said.
Like the handholding felt.
“And feeling close to you, even though I hardly know you, feels natural, too,” he added, slathering his brioche with butter from a little pot.

I took a sip of champagne and watched him from above the gold rim of my flute. There was something so refreshing about the way he wore his heart on his sleeve even though he seemed like a really tough guy—I found his confidence intoxicating.

“Getting to know you . . .” I sang softly as he took a healthy bite and swallowed it, seemingly at the same time.