‘Ms MacGregor, I have a lady on the line says she’s related to Mr Costa,’ Ed, the penthouse’s service manager, said, sounding harassed as Ellie’s heart sank back into her chest. ‘She’s very persistent, says it’s an emergency.’
Related to Alex? Ellie’s curiosity peaked, alongside her concern. Even if Alex wasn’t speaking to his family, surely he’d want to know if something had happened to one of them.
‘I’ll take it,’ she said, willing to give this woman Alex’s number if she checked out.
‘Hello,’ she said, when the line clicked through.
‘Hi, my name’s Mia Da Costa, I’m Sandro’s youngest sister, is he there? I don’t trust the goon I just spoke to,’ the woman demanded in a sharp Brooklyn accent.
‘Sandro?’ Ellie asked, confused as well as impressed by the woman’s determination. Ed tended to scare off most people.
‘Sandro, my brother. Alessandro Da Costa,’ the woman replied. She sighed heavily. ‘You probably know him as Alex Costa. We knew him as Sandro, until he started ghosting us.’
‘Oh, right.’ Ellie understood the young woman’s frustration. She’d got an inkling today of how it felt to be ghosted by Alex. ‘I’m sorry, he’s not here, he’s at his office. But Ed said something about an emergency?’ she prompted, convinced the woman was genuine. She sounded almost as forceful and dynamic as Alex.
‘Your accent...’ the girl said, her tone softening. ‘You’re her. The Scottish mystery girl? Right. The one he’s so into from all the pictures we’ve seen of you two on the Internet.’
‘Um...yes.’ Ellie’s felt her face heat, knowing Mia Da Costa’s brother wasn’t quite as into her any more, in anything other than a sexual sense. Why did that make her feel so compromised, when it really hadn’t before?
‘It’s so cool to speak to you,’ Mia said, the enthusiasm in her voice surprising Ellie even more. ‘We’ve all been so excited. It’s about time Sandro got hooked by the love bug. Even my sister Arianna...’ She hesitated, but only for a nanosecond. ‘That’s my oldest sister. She’s ten months younger than Sandro, three kids, divorced, not the romantic type since her rat of an ex started boning his secretary.’ She took a breath, giving Ellie a crucial moment to correlate the stream of information. ‘Anyhow, even Ari thinks he’s smitten. He looked so happy—and possessive—in those photos, like he would never let you go. Even I was swooning and he’s my brother.’ The woman let out an infectious laugh. ‘So you’re living at his penthouse? That’s awesome,’ she added, sounding increasingly excited. ‘Matty—that’s Matteo, my second-oldest brother, twenty-six, a rookie firefighter, thinks he’s the boss of everyone ’cos he can scale a hundred-foot ladder in ten seconds—he calls Sandro’s penthouse the Fortress of Bachelorhood, so Sandro must really adore you.’
‘That’s nice of you to say,’ Ellie said, feeling stupidly devastated by the woman’s misreading of the situation, but also enchanted by her candour. Alex had said he’d lost touch with his family, but apparently his family hadn’t lost touch with him. Was the truth more one-sided?Hadhe ghosted them, as Mia said? And if so, why? ‘But I’m only staying here until after Christmas, this is just a wee holiday fling, for both of us,’ she added. ‘No’ a big deal at all.’
‘Uh-huh, I’ll bet,’ Mia said, not sounding at all convinced.
‘So, about that emergency?’ Ellie continued, trying to redirect the conversation. Again.
‘It’s not an emergency. Specifically,’ Mia said, sheepishly. ‘It’s just...’ Her voice took on a wistful quality, tempered with regret. ‘Every year we invite Sandro to Thanksgiving, and then Christmas in Brooklyn. And he never comes. I figured this year I’d be more proactive. I haven’t seen him since I was a little kid. None of us have. He’s got a ton of nieces and nephews he’s never even met. And we never got to thank him for all he’s done for us, as a family. It just seems dumb. I know he’s got issues with what happened when he was a kid. According to Ari and Isabella—that’s another of my older sisters,’ she supplied helpfully, ‘Mom was always super tough on him. But she was a broken woman after Pop’s death. And Sandro looked so like him, maybe that had something to do with it?’ Mia sighed. ‘But she’s been dead for ten years now. And it just seems wrong somehow, that we’ll all be getting together on Christmas Day, and he’ll be missing again. I know Ari and Bella, especially, would love to see him, because they remember him better than I do.’
‘That sounds heartbreaking, for all of you,’ Ellie said, not sure what else to say.
‘I know, right,’ Mia said. ‘You’re very nice to listen to all that,’ she added, making Ellie feel like a bit of a fraud.
‘Well, I—’ Ellie began.
‘Could you at least tell him I called?’ Mia interrupted, the plea in her voice making the empty space in Ellie’s chest grow again. ‘Tell him how much we’d all love to see him tomorrow,’ Mia continued before Ellie could formulate a reply. ‘And you should totally come too, we’d love to meet you. And it might make it a bit easier for him. We can be pretty overwhelming all in one go.’
Ellie couldn’t imagine Alex being overwhelmed by anything, but there was something about this whole situation that just seemed so wrong, and so sad to her. She drew in an unsteady breath. This really was none of her business.
But what harm could it do telling him Mia had called?
‘I canny promise anything...’ she began. ‘But I don’t see any harm in at least asking him.’
‘Oh, thank you,’ Mia gushed, sounding so excited, Ellie felt guilty.
‘Really, I doubt it’ll do any good,’ she added, trying not to get the girl’s hopes up. ‘We really don’t have that kind of—’
‘Yeah, I know, just a vacation fling,’ Mia shot back, still sounding delighted. ‘Tell him we’re meeting at Aldo’s house. That’s my youngest older brother. Him and his girlfriend, Sammy, have a newborn. Their first. Luca Alessandro Carmine Da Costa. Eight pounds three ounces of unbelievable cuteness born two weeks ago. That’s the emergency I was talking about,’ she said, laughing. ‘The address is 1543 West Acacia Avenue. We’ll be gathering there after Mass from noon onwards. Sandro knows where it is, because he paid for the remodelling of our whole block. See you tomorrow.’
Before Ellie had a chance to interrupt the flow of details, the line had gone dead.
She stared at the phone, stunned. What had she just agreed to? Because it felt like a lot more than she was capable of delivering on.
One thing was for certain, she thought as she dropped the phone back into its cradle. There was absolutely no question there was a genetic bond between Alex Costa and Mia Da Costa, because the woman had the same ability to make Ellie feel as if she’d just been run over by a bus.
Ellie’s breath caught as she walked down the black marble staircase into the upscale Madison Avenue restaurant at seven-twenty. The white and gold Christmas décor complemented the starkly modern space, adding an enchanted glow to the marble cornices and double-height ceiling that had been adapted from an old nineteen-thirties bank building. Once a cathedral to commerce, the interior was now a cathedral to everything America’s best modern cuisine had to offer—with eye-watering prices to match. She’d checked out the menu online once Dax, Alex’s driver, had told her their destination, and was still in shock.
The maître d’ directed her to a private booth at the back. She spotted Alex, busy typing something with both thumbs on his phone as she approached. As soon as he spotted her, he stood to greet her. Her breath got trapped somewhere around her solar plexus.