He looked across the table at Art and said, “Art’ll stand in.”

“Great,” Art muttered, eyes rolling to the ceiling.

Benny ignored him, got out of his seat, bent to Frankie, and said in her ear, “Wine for my woman.”

He pulled back, she gave him a big smile, and he went to the bar to tell the bartender to set the tables up with more wine.

He was heading back when he saw movement out of the corner of his eye. Asheeka was there, so he stopped.

“Yo, babe,” he greeted.

“Hey, Benny,” she replied, coming to a stop next to him. “Great pizza, as usual.”

“We kinda got practice at that here.”

She nodded her head, her lips curved up.

“Ohmigod! I love this lotion! It’s the best evah!” Frankie shrieked, and Ben and Asheeka looked her way to see she was forcing a bottle of lotion under Art’s nose.

Art’s face did not communicate he much liked the smell, but at least the guy was game and was sniffing it.

“That girl isn’t half breathin’,” Asheeka said softly, and Benny turned to look at her just as her hand caught his. “Got my gratitude, Benny.”

“Not sure what to say to that since I’m the one who gets to enjoy a Francesca Concetti who’s breathin’ easy.”

“You got it anyway.”

He tightened his hand in hers and said quietly, “Appreciated, Asheeka.”

She squeezed his hand back, let him go, and moved to the table just as Cat vacated her seat, a seat that was strategically far away from Frankie.

Art had thrown himself right in, and the way he did, it reminded Ben that he was a good guy, when he wasn’t hammered.

Cat, so far, had not thrown herself into anything. She wasn’t hanging back, sulking and making a point. She was hanging back like she wasn’t sure how to get close anymore.

Now, she was making her way toward Benny.

Shit.

“Ben,” she greeted.

“Cat, glad you came,” he replied.

“Me too,” she said. “Been so long, thought the delight of a Bianchi pie was a dream. Now I know it’s better than I remembered.”

She stopped next to him as one of the kids who worked the floor passed them with two bottles of wine in each hand.

When the server was gone, Ben, eyes to the tables, noted, “Keepin’ a distance from your sister.”

“Been a bitch,” she whispered, and Benny looked down to her, surprised again.

“Rectified that tonight, Cat,” he reminded her.

“She got shot and I did somethin’ selfish and stupid, and now I show at her birthday party for free pizza and cake?” she told the table where her eyes were aimed.

“Sortin’ out your life isn’t stupid,” he remarked.

“Doin’ it bein’ a bitch is,” she returned.

“Better late than never,” he pointed out.

“That’s bullshit and you know it,” she retorted.

“Frankie givin’ you crap?” he asked.

She turned her gaze to him because she knew the answer. Frankie was giving her sister space, mostly because Cat was taking it. But she wasn’t giving her crap.

“Trust me, she’ll take you as you come,” he said. “She’s just glad you’re here. She gives you that gift, Cat, just roll with it.”

She heaved a sigh, looked back at the table, took a few moments, then asked, “It true, Dad’s latest bitch havin’ his baby?”

“Any day now,” Ben affirmed.

“Shit,” she muttered.

“You’re gettin’ a sister,” he told her.

She kept muttering. “Jesus.”

“I’m not Enzo Senior’s biggest fan, Cat, but his woman seems solid.”

“They always are,” she said to the table, and Ben didn’t doubt that.

Another question that would go unanswered in his lifetime was how good women got hooked up with dicks all the time.

He decided not to reply and looked back at the table to see old lady Zambino sitting in his chair, leaned into Frankie’s space, and Benny couldn’t tell by his woman’s expression if she was about to laugh, cry, or shout.

“Thinkin’ I should get back,” he said.

“Yeah,” Cat replied.

Ben made a move, but stopped and turned back when she called his name.

“Thanks for havin’ the balls to come and get in my face,” she said.

“You still got her love, and you’ll always have her love. You fuck up again, I’ll do it again.”

For the first time that night, he saw her smile. “I’m thinkin’ I’ll do my best to avoid that.”

“That’d be my call.”

She rolled her eyes.

He heard Frankie burst out laughing and turned back to the table to see she had her hand wrapped around the back of Mrs. Zambino’s head, she’d pressed their foreheads together, and she was giggling herself sick, her entire body shaking with it.

Mrs. Zambino wasn’t giggling.

She was yelling. “Francesca Concetti, you’re ruining my hair!”

Frankie did not let go.

She just kept giggling.

Ben left her to it for three beats before he made his approach to unlatch his woman from his neighbor so Mrs. Zambino wouldn’t unsheathe the talons or take him off her Christmas gift list.

Frankie’s chocolate-filled snowballs were his favorite.

But Mrs. Zambino’s homemade cookies cut out like poinsettia leaves and filled with green-colored creamy frosting were a close second.

***

Ben laid in his bed, back to the headboard, sheet to his waist, and just managed to avoid a traumatic injury when Gus made to jump right on his dick. Frankie had scooped him up and put him on the bed before she skipped to the bathroom to clean up after he’d fucked her. And Benny was making a mental note to see to it that she did not do that again.

He pulled the dog up his chest and got a wet jaw for his effort. Still, he kept the dog where he was and scratched his head. This got him puppy breath right in the face because Gus started panting happily.

Ben continued to keep him where he was and give him scratches as Frankie, now in a sweet, short nightie, skipped out of the bathroom, made a beeline to the bed, and hopped in, landing on her knees. She bounced across the bed to him and tossed out a thigh, ending up straddling him.

Once positioned, she pulled Gus right out of his arms, lifted him up in front of her face, and cooed, “Who’s Mommy’s special little boy?”

She was being cute and dorky, which was also cute, but Ben had frozen.

This was because Frankie had skipped out of the bathroom, hopped into bed, and bounced across it.

Frankie, after hours with family, friends, food, presents, and unlimited wine. After digging her heels in his back hard and riding his cock harder.

And there she was.

Electric.

“Is Gus Mommy’s special little boy?” she asked, and he had to jerk himself out of his freeze to lift his hands and rest them on her hips.

“Babe, don’t talk to him like that,” he ordered, trying to ignore the warmth in his gut at the happiness written all over the woman astride his hips.

She looked down at him and curled Gus into her chest. “Why?”

“’Cause he’s an English bulldog,” Ben explained.

“And?” she prompted as Gus made a successful escape attempt, which meant he successfully landed dead weight on Ben’s chest, something that made Benny grunt.

Frankie scooted the puppy to Ben’s gut and gave him scratches there, her eyes on Ben, waiting for an answer.

Benny got his breath back and continued to explain.

“He’s a male English bulldog. In other words, he’s a badass breed. A chick baby talks him, his ears might start bleedin’.”

She grinned. “His ears won’t start bleedin’.”

“Don’t look at me when you coo at him and that shit happens.”

She rolled her eyes, rolled them back, and declared, “Just so you know, you being annoying is not gonna kill my buzz. I mean, you got Cat there, and Art, and old lady Zambino, who was still so pissed I bailed on you, she hadn’t talked to me in months, but she showed too.”

He tipped his head to the side and asked, “You work that out with Mrs. Zambino?”

She nodded but said, “She busted my chops about how I went off half-cocked and didn’t walk across the street to” —she lifted her hands and did air quotation marks— “‘get some wisdom.’ But I had your pie and a ton of wine in me, so she couldn’t kill my buzz either.”

He took in her shining eyes, squeezed her hips with his hands, and asked quietly, “Happy?”

“Yes and no,” she answered.

He felt his head jerk with surprise. “What’s the no part?”

“You kicked this birthday’s ass. I mean, Ben…” She scooped up Gus and cuddled him to her chest again. “You closed the entire restaurant. Cake. Flowers. Balloons. A surprise party. A sisterly reunion.” She cuddled Gus closer, finishing, “And a freakin’ puppy.”

“And there’s a part of that that doesn’t make you happy?” he pushed when she explained no further.

“Yeah, seein’ as it’s gonna be practically impossible to one-up you on your birthday and I have barely a month to plan.”

At that, Benny burst out laughing, did an ab crunch, and confiscated the dog. He also put an arm around his woman, twisted, leaned to the side, and put the dog on the floor. Then he lay back, taking Frankie with him the way he wanted her, with one arm still around her, the other hand in her hair, holding her close.

“My birthday’s easy, baby. You, a couple sweet nighties, and a bottle of chocolate sauce.”

Her eyes got big and she asked, “Chocolate sauce?”

“Yep.”

“That’ll be sticky,” she declared, but in a tone that said it might be sticky, but it was far from out of the question.

“That’s the point, Francesca. You get sticky, I make you unsticky.”