Page 70 of Marcus

Sighing because it had a been a long, busy day but still happy with how it turned out for Cella and Tiffany, Marcus finished that last bit of cognac in the glass. Setting it down to the desk, he picked up the remote for the television and turned the news off. With the screen blank and his home mostly quiet with Cella getting her daughter ready for bed, he tried to decompress a bit.

To put the mafia business aside.

Enjoy his last night with Cella before she went back.

You should just ask her to stay—that’s what you want, idiot.

His mind was a special brand of hell tonight.

Turning, Marcus stared out the windows. The first thing that greeted someone when they walked into his office was the large windows that dominated one entire wall of the space. An inky sky overhead twinkled with stars that he couldn’t see nearly as well in the city, which was yet another reason why he preferred staying in the suburbs more than he did elsewhere. He waited for Cella to finish up with her child’s nighttime routine before she would come to find him.

Then, regardless of what his crazy mind—or was that his heart?—wanted to do, he was going to enjoy his last night with her in Toronto without making any demands of her. He wouldn’t even speak his wants when frankly, even those could come off as him not thinking about what she might want from all of this.

Surprisingly, it wasn’t Cella who found him.

Well, no one really found him.

He heard the soft footsteps coming down the upstairs hallway first, and then the tired sniffles echoed the closer the noise came to his office. Turning on his heel, he found the source of the sadness just starting to walk past his open office door.

“Tiff?”

The little girl in her pajamas decorated in pink hearts held a pillow tight to her chest that practically swallowed her in size. It wasn’t that she was a tiny child—she was small, yes, but normal for her age and stature. The pillow was just big enough that it seemed she needed both arms to hug it in order to keep a good hold on it.

She sniffled again, tipped her head down to wipe her few tears on the top of her pillow. For a split second, he wondered if maybe she was having another one of those nights where she was afraid because it wasn’t her home and bed she had to sleep in.

“Where’s your ma?” he asked, taking a couple of steps toward her.

She still didn’t come into his office. Shrugging one shoulder, Tiffany said, “Aunt Lucia called, so she went downstairs to talk. I was supposed to be sleeping, but she forgot to get my pillow for me. I didn’t mean to rip it, Marcus.”

“Rip what, dolcezza?”

Tiffany turned the pillow around to show him whatever had her so upset. It looked like any decorative pillow with a cotton case and a design in the middle. Or rather, a logo.

There, in the middle of the pillow overtop a faded band logo that he recognized had been popular a good fifteen years ago or so, was a three-inch long rip.

“Oh,” he said, kneeling down. “Come here, let me see it. I’m sure it can be fixed.”

Tiffany held even tighter to the pillow, as though she was not going to give it up not even for the world, and didn’t move an inch. “I tried to pull it out of Ma’s suitcase, and it caught on the zipper. I’m sorry. I wasn’t careful like I promised to be.”

He didn’t understand what the big deal was.

It was just a pillow.

Right?

“Your Ma won’t be mad about that, it was just a mistake.”

Tiffany dragged in a shaky breath, hugging that pillow as hard as she could to her chest and making the tear open a little more. “Yeah?”

“Of course. Now, if you let me have the pillow, I can fix it for you.”

In fact …

He stood up, remembering the small sewing kit he kept in the top drawer of his desk just in case. One never really knew when a thread was going to let go in something, and it had been a useful skill his mother passed onto him. He could easily fix something wrong with an item of clothing, at least to a point where it wouldn’t get ruined further before he took it into his tailor.

Soon enough, he found the kit he needed exactly where he’d left it. Coming around the side of the desk again, he waved it for Tiffany to see as he explained, “It’ll be good as new for you tomorrow, I promise.”

“But …”