This wasn’t happening to me right now. This couldn’t be happening to me right now. Massimo Mancini, the man whose profile I had currently been intensely staring at for the past five minutes couldn’t be standing in front of me right now.
He just couldn’t.
Why did I always do this to myself?
“Cara?” Massimo chuckled as he waved a hand in front of my face in hopes of snapping me out of whatever daze I was currently lost in. “Can you hear me, Cara?”
“I can hear you,” I murmured in a low whisper, my eyes still wide with the shock of him walking in on me stalking him online. “Fuck! I’m so embarrassed right now,” I groaned, quick to close my laptop screen so I wouldn’t embarrass myself further.
“There’s nothing to be embarrassed about, Cara,” Massimo chuckled, looking awfully happy for a man that wasn’t otherwise very facially expressive. “I’ll admit that I tried to look you up on Instagram as well but unfortunately, I don’t know your last name so didn’t have much luck.”
“Wait, what? You looked me up on Insta as well?”
“Of course, I did,” he nodded and shrugged, as if it wasn’t a big deal. And somehow, his nonchalant attitude was making me feel less embarrassed about being caught out like that. If it was anyone else, I would crave nothing more than to spend the rest of my life hiding under a rock to escape the embarrassment but somehow, Massimo made me feel like it wasn’t a big deal at all. Perhaps it had something to do with his confession that he had done some Insta stalking of himself. “So, can I get it?”
“Get what?” I asked, having to clear my throat beforehand. My mind was far too dirty to take his words as innocent.
“That follow request you’ve been mulling over.”
“No. I wasn’t–” I tried to deny but then very quickly realised that there was no point. He had already caught me in the act. I couldn’t possibly deny it now. “Your name has been all over the news today. You can’t blame me for being curious about the man I served coffee to yesterday.”
“It truly was the best coffee I ever had. As you can see, I even took a picture of it,” Massimo smiled a small smile. “And no, I can’t blame you for being curious. I’ve seen my face on TV and all over social media enough today to last me a whole life time. In fact, my profile was public until I woke up later and found my follower count up by nearly a hundred thousand.”
“An overnight influencer,” I joked.
“My fears exactly,” Massimo agreed, his lips twitching slightly at the corners. “I had to put my profile on private and I’ve currently got some members going through my follower list. Anyone I don’t know needs to be kicked out.”
“Including me?” I joked again, and my hear sped up when he reached into his pocket for his phone.
“No, of course, not Cara,” he chuckled. “Now send me that request so I can follow you back.”
A part of me wanted to resist, to say no, but I couldn’t think of a good reason why. Moments before Massimo had turned up, I was disappointed that his profile was private, and I couldn’t see any of his pictures. Now, he had repeatedly requested that we follow each other, so why was I hesitating? There was no good reason for me to do so.
Immediately after I sent him a request, I put my phone away. I would take my mind trifling through his pictures later, and definitely not something I wanted to be caught doing in front of him. Not when he had already caught me all but stalking him online.
“Yasemin Turgenev,” Massimo murmured as he stared down at his phone screen for another moment before putting it away. “Is that Russian?”
“Yes,” I nodded, “Good guess.”
“I’m Italian.”
“I sort of guessed.”
“Mafia stereotype, yes.”
“Not just that,” I chuckled. “Massimo Mancini is a very Italian name. If I’m not mistaken, you’re from a long line of Mancini’s.”
“I am,” he nodded. “You sound like you’ve done your research.”
“I study Media and Journalism, remember?” I reminded him, but he didn’t look like he needed to be reminded.
“I remember,” he told me. “Does that mean you were discussing us in class.”
“Something like that,” I shrugged, not wanting to go into the specifics. It was very apparent to me that Massimo valued his privacy, and I was sure that hearing that my newest assignment consisted of getting an exclusive piece of information from one of the Mancini’s was not something that he would be all that happy to hear about, but I made a mental note to revisit this later. After all, I had promised Rizwan that we would work on this together so it wasn’t just my final that lay in question, but Rizwan’s too.
“I actually dropped by to speak to you about something,” Massimo told me, suddenly sounding gravely serious. Well, more serious than his usual serous self.
“What did you want to talk about?” I asked, curious.
“Yes,” he told me, and paused to clear his throat, as if he was trying hard to get the correct words out. “I wanted to speak to you about yesterday. I know that you’ve seen the news, but I wanted to clarify why I was looking for that woman.”
“Natalya?” I guessed, reminded of the name from the news.
“Yes,” Massimo confirmed with a nod. “I’m sure you know that I didn’t believe you yesterday. I knew that you had seen Natalya and you were lying to me about it which I don’t blame you for. But my intention was never to hurt her. It was only to force her to stay in the country and attend court tomorrow so my brother’s name can be cleared.”
I nodded in understanding, his words aligning with what I had discovered from watching various clips of the news all throughout the day, as well as some of the articles I had read in my research of the Mancini family.
“I know that now,” I told him.
“If you don’t mind me asking, what did Natalya say for you to want to conceal the truth from me?”
“She told me she was leaving for Italy to escape her abusive fiancé. At least for some time.”
“And you thought that I was the abusive fiancé?”
“Yes,” I nodded. “I was able to connect all the dots today and figure out that Natalya had lied to me.”
“I’m relieved to hear that,” Massimo exhaled. “It didn’t sit right with me knowing that you probably thought that I wanted to harm Natalya or an actual innocent person, so I felt the need to come down here and tell you that.”
“Thank you for clarifying the situation,” I couldn’t help but smile at him, especially when we very quickly fell into a comfortable silence, just staring at each other.
We both knew that Massimo didn’t come all the way to the airport just to tell me the truth about Natalya. He was smart enough to know that I would have seen the news and been able to connect the dots which led to the treat about Natalya and what he could only assume that she had told me last night.
Massimo Mancini was the mafia boss of the Mancini mafia. We both knew he had far better and more important things to do than my possible skewed judgement of him.
Whether either of us were willing to admit it or not just yet, Massimo was here for one reason and one reason only.
To see me.
“Can I get you anything to eat or drink?” I asked, suddenly remembering that I was at work, and it was literally my job to serve customers.
“A vanilla latte would be great,” he smiled a barely-there smile.
“Almond milk?”
“Yes, please,” he nodded and reached for his wallet. “You remembered.”
“I won’t be forgetting my highest tipper any time soon,” I chuckled and accepted the payment for him.
I scribbled his name and order on the side of the cup before moving behind the counter to get started on his drink. When I spied some strange movement from him out of the corner of my eye.
“What are you doing?” I asked, whipping my head up to catch him with his hand in the cookie jar. Literally.
Massimo was still stood near the till and currently, his hand was in the tip jar. I watched as he chuckled and dropped a few notes into it before he put his wallet away and walked around the counter to the till collection counter.
“Tipping you,” he shrugged, but I already knew that he had done a whole lot more than tip me a few measly dollars. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was another hundred and while the gesture was appreciated as I relied heavily on tips to boost up my otherwise minimum wage, I couldn’t help but feel like I was being rewarded far too much for a simple drink.
“You really need to stop tipping me so much. You’re spoiling me.”
“You deserve to be spoiled, Cara,” he flashed me a barely-there smile before taking a few steps back and taking a seat at the closest table to the collection area. He turned the chair around and away from the table, so he was still facing me.
My heart fluttered at his words, and I kept my head down as I worked on his drink. The five minutes that it took me to pour the milk and espresso coffee into the cup, and top it with some vanilla foam, Massimo kept quiet and just watched me.
He did that yesterday, and he was doing it today. Lost in his thoughts as he watched me. I couldn’t imagine what he was thinking as I wasn’t remotely interested enough to stare at so endlessly, but it was a silent compliment nonetheless.
“I added a little vanilla foam at the top,” I told him as I slid the drink across the counter for him to take.
“Thank you,” Massimo murmured as he accepted and returned to his seat, the chair still faced in my direction. The way he was sat with one leg propped on his knee, leisurely sat as he held his drink, waiting for it to cool, it didn’t look like he was in any sort of rush unlike yesterday.
“Don’t you have any witnesses to chase down today and stop from leaving the country?” I joked, casually crossing my arms over my chest as I remained standing behind the counter.
“Luckily, no,” Massimo chuckled. “I cleared out my whole day for my brother’s court case this morning, in case anything popped up, but thankfully things went so much easier than I could have imagined, and I suddenly have a lot of free time on my hands.”
“And you didn’t think to head to bed?” I quirked a questioning brow at him.
“I have to admit, my sleeping schedule is a little fucked,” a ghost of a smile played on his lips.
“How fucked?” I asked, intrigued.
“Six am to noon kind of fucked,” he chuckled. “Though in my defence, hardly anything happens in the mafia before lunch.”
“Well, that makes sense,” I chuckled. “Your sleeping schedule sounds a lot like mine when I work night shifts here.”
“Tell me.”
“By the time I get back to my apartment, it’s nearly seven. Those days that I have a morning class, I’ll get about two hours of sleep, and I’ll just have to nap in the afternoon after class. If my class is in the afternoon that day, I’ll be lucky enough to get a good seven or eight hours of sleep.”
“That sounds tough. You shouldn’t work so many night shifts, Cara.”
“That’s what my mama says,” I joked, chuckling.
“Mamas are always right.”
“You sound a lot like her,” I rolled my eyes, my tone playful.
“I wouldn’t know,” Massimo murmured after a few moments. “My mama passed away when I was a toddler.”
“I’m sorry, Massimo. I can’t begin to think how difficult that must be for you.”
“Oh no, I didn’t tell you that to feel sorry for me, Cara,” Massimo was quick to deny, shaking his head. “I just wanted to be honest with you. Don’t worry about me. I may be without a mama, but I have my papa and more brothers than I probably need, but I love them all. They don’t fill the void completely, but they do a very good job.”
“I have two brothers myself,” I told him, still feeling bad about his mama even though he tried to assure me not to. “Alexey and Ruslan. They’re the typical overbearing brothers who drive me crazy, but I love them.”
“I could say the same about my brothers even though I’m the oldest,” Massimo chuckled.
“How many brothers do you have? Five?”
“Six,” he corrected me. "I’m the oldest and the youngest is Cesare who is still in high school. He’s a junior this year and frankly, probably the most annoying of them all.”
“I’m sure my oldest brother feels the same about me,” I chuckled.
Massimo hummed and nodded, a small, fond smile on his face.
“Somehow, you’ve managed to top yesterday’s drink,” Massimo complimented me, and I couldn’t help but smile brightly in response. There was something special about this man, and not how his face was almost always stoic and he barely smiled – and I meant proper smiles, not half-assed ones his lips twitched up into when he was the least bit amused.
It felt like I already knew him. Like we had some sort of unexplainable connection despite still being strangers.
“I’m glad you like it,” I smiled. “It means I’m good at my job.”
“What do you want to do after college?” Massimo asked, looking as relaxed as ever as he watched me, patiently awaiting my answer.
“Honestly, I’m not completely sure,” I sighed.
“Tell me what you’re not sure about,” he prompted me in a quiet, gentle tone.
“I have an internship lined up for the summer and if that goes according to plan, I’ll have a month or two off before I start my full-time role with them…” my voice trailed off.
“But?”
“But I’m not sure if I’m ready to start working just yet,” I sighed, pursing my lips.
“What else do you have in mind?”
“I’ve been contemplating doing a masters, but I haven’t made my mind up yet.”
“If you did, what would you do a masters in?” Massimo asked, looking genuinely interested which made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. That had been a permanent feeling for me pretty much since the moment I realised he was in the store with me.
“NYU offers an English Literature and Journalism degree which I’ve been contemplating over.”
“It sounds right up your street,” he murmured.
“It really is,” I nodded eagerly. “I want to write for the newspaper.”
“Write what?”
“Anything interesting,” I shrugged. “I want to be the kind of journalist and writer that you can’t predict what their next article is going to be about. One could be about a serial killer and the next about the injustice of the class system. I just want to write and poke my nose in other people’s business.”
“It’s refreshing to see you know so clearly what you want to do with your life.”
“Except I don’t’,” I sighed, my lips tugging down at the corners.
“It sounds like you are to me.”
“What do you mean?”
“If you don’t feel like you’re ready to step out there and commit to a job, then you’re clearly not ready. The fact that you’ve been doing your research and found something that you’d like to study makes me think that getting a masters is something that you’re interested in. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have looked around to see what else is out there.”
“I never thought of it like that,” I murmured, my voice trailing off. When Massimo said it, breaking it down simply like that, everything made sense and I suddenly found my thoughts regarding the future start to clear up.
Massimo was right. I did want to do my masters and it appeared that I needed someone to side with me to finally make a decision. And at the right time too as I would need to send in my application in the next month or so.
Somehow, an hour disappeared as I talked about literally every single aspect of my life, and Massimo listened attentively as he sipped at his latte. He wanted to know everything, from my family and friends, to my school life, and I found myself opening up in a way that I had never opened up to anyone before.
Even though we had only known each for a day now – probably not even a full twenty-four hours yet – it felt like I had known Massimo for much longer. Like he was an old friend, and we knew each other our whole lives.
Except, I certainly wasn’t feeling friendship kind of feelings for him.
I had never met a person so good at listening before. Perhaps that was because Massimo was a very private person and simply didn’t trust me yet, or perhaps he was not as big of a talker as me but either way, it felt nice to just talk and know that he was listening. That he was really listening.
He was nothing like the guys I had dated in the past. Nothing like them at all. For one, they were all boys while Massimo was very clearly a man.
“You don’t have anywhere to be today?” I asked in a quiet voice, unable to bring myself to look away from him.
He sure was a fine specimen of a man. The finest specimen I had ever had the pleasure of laying my eyes on, and to think he had been sitting with me for over an hour now in the middle of the night, just talking to me over a coffee.
Massimo Mancini sure knew how to make a girl feel special.
“No,” Massimo denied, shaking his head. “I’m where I want to be,” he spoke with the utmost seriousness, and his dark eyes locked with mine on a deep level, as if he was looking into my soul. Making me feel things I had never felt before.
There wasn’t long until my shift was finished and until then, I doubted anyone else would walk into the store. That left Massimo and I alone and uninterrupted for more time than I think we needed.
I wasn’t sure if this was one of those things that I would regret later, but I couldn’t deny my urges. Not when the centre of all my desires sat in front of me, looking as if he was thinking what I was thinking right now.
“If you’re up for it, what do you say for a quick fuck in the back?”
-
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Layla Knight
23.01.2022
