LITMIR.BIZ

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I go home tomorrow. Daniel may have to continue the hunt there.”

      “The hunt?”

      Lara wiggled her hips; the stool rocked. She grabbed the tiled edge of the counter. “Yes. He’s a hunter.”

      “And you…?”

      “Blame it on the chemistry,” she said with a lick of her lips. “I am dying to be caught.”

      “But not encaged, hmm?”

      “Nor engaged,” Lara said drolly. Bianca scowled.

      Lara squared her shoulders. “You know how I feel about that.” She’d decided early on that she was the go-it-alone type. She couldn’t see subordinating her independent desires for the security of a marriage ring, as her mother and sister had done.

      “Lovers, yes. Love, no. Marriage, never.” Bianca leaned her elbows on the breakfast bar, put her chin on her hands and stared broodingly into the spirals of food Lara had arranged in the pattern of a nautilus shell.

      Despite the glum expression, Bianca looked as beautiful and exotic as a bird of paradise. Bright clothing, plenty of makeup, gold hoop earrings large enough to touch her shoulders. Lara had been strongly influenced by her mentor’s style and attitude, and was grateful for that. She might have turned out like her sister otherwise.

      “Bianca?” she coaxed. “You’ve always agreed that I am smart to guard my freedom.”

      “In your experimental twenties, yes.” Bianca pulled on her lower lip. “But one grows up and begins to appreciate the advantages of settling for stability.”

      “You’re forty and you haven’t settled.”

      “Forty-one. And I have become an old woman.” With a groan, she banged the heel of her palm against her forehead.

      “Ha!” Lara had done her best to acquire a portion of Bianca Spinelli’s zest for life. It was a matter of attitude, not age. Of finding your bliss, to be Oprah-ish about it.

      “There’s nothing like an energetic eighteen-month-old to make a woman feel ancient,” Bianca said, hoisting her daughter off the floor. She plopped little Rosa into a high chair, buckled her in and scooped a handful of crayons off the floor. “Try the yellow one, cara mia. In this house, we don’t need the dingy old grays and browns.”

      Rosa gurgled happily, reaching for the stubby crayons.

      “You adore being a mother,” said Lara.

      “Of course.” Bianca took a dozen bright blue and pink and green ceramic plates of various sizes from an open cabinet. Nearly every item in her house and studio was colorful and handmade; she bartered with an extensive circle of artsy-craftsy friends. Lara had followed the cue in her own home, though she preferred earthen shades.

      Bianca petted her daughter’s curly crop of flame-red hair. “Listen, don’t tell the bambina, but there are nights I miss my club-hopping escapades. My soul still yearns to dance even when my feet are dragging.” Suddenly she picked up Rosa, chair and all, and swung her around the kitchen. Crayons flew. “Once I was Queen of the Discotheque. Now, I dance barefoot in the kitchen with my little bay-bee-yeee!” Rosa giggled in delight.

      Lara played along as Bianca danced, laughing and clapping to encourage the frivolity that was so dear to her heart.

      Fourteen years ago, she’d wandered into Bianca’s little shop as an aimless teenager, having been harshly disabused of a childish notion that she could become as great a painter as her father. The flamboyant older woman had welcomed Lara with open arms, soothed her wounded pride and started her on a beginner’s pattern of stained glass that very day. The resulting piece was uneven and bumpy and amateurish, yet it still hung in Bianca’s kitchen window. Whereas the crayon drawings Lara had executed at her father’s feet were dissected for line, perspective and color sense, then discarded.

      Staggering, Bianca set the high chair beside Lara’s stool. “You see? I’m out of breath.” She put her hands on her hips and bent slightly, panting. “I’ve become an old woman.”

      “You need a lover, is all. A new romance would perk you right up again. And soon restore your stamina.”

      “A man is easy enough to find.” Bianca waved a hand in casual dismissal. “It’s the reliable baby-sitter that’s a tough get.”

      “Ooh-lo-lo,” Rosa burbled. She waved a chubby hand, looking so like her mother despite the Titian hair, that Lara had to plant a kiss on the child’s forehead.

      “Ah, the mother’s eternal lament,” she said. “Listen, Bianca, why don’t I stay home tonight with Rosa?” She snapped her fingers for the little girl’s amusement. “You go out and have a good time. The bambina’s stuffy nose seems to have cleared.” Rosa had been congested the evening before, putting the kibosh on their plans to attend the restaurant opening together. For all her casual ways, Bianca was a devoted mother.

      “Oh. I don’t know.” Peripherally, Lara glimpsed her friend’s covert calculations. “What about your hunter?” Bianca asked ultracasually.

      “He probably won’t show. You may have the entire evening to go out and find yourself a dashing young lover. I doubt it’ll take even that long.” Men of all ages were attracted to Bianca. She oozed a warm sensuality that was like honey to bees.

      For a woman who’d just complained about slowing down, Bianca was strangely hesitant to take Lara up on the offer. Lara, guessing why, aimed her knowing smile at the toddler. There had been a time when her mentor was indeed the Queen of the Discotheque. In fact, they’d both taken Manhattan nightlife by storm. Bianca’s single motherhood and Lara’s rededication to her art and the resulting move out of the city had altered them both.

      “Unless you’ve already made plans?” Lara cooed at Rosa, abandoning finger snaps for patty-cake.

      “No plans.” Bianca spun away. “You know how I feel about being pinned down by schedules. I go where the wind takes me. Rosa was born with a kite string instead of an umbilical cord.”

      Lara didn’t let herself be distracted. “What about all that talk of settling and stability?”

      “Achh. Did I say that?”

      “You did.”

      “Then I didn’t mean it.”

      “We are both getting older.”

      “Mature,” said Bianca, reaching for a bottle of red wine.

      “Perhaps you should…” Lara hesitated. How could she convince Bianca it was okay to fall in love and marry when she herself had no intention of doing either? The assurances would be hypocritical, and Bianca would know it. She’d seen Lara through too many gripe sessions about the constriction of women’s role in marriage and the perfidy of husbands to be fooled now.

      Bianca pulled a corkscrew out of an earthenware pot. Her glance was sharp. “Perhaps, what?”

      Lara swallowed. “You could admit you’re already in—”

      The shop doorbell chimed. “Buon giorno!” a male voice with a bad Italian accent called from the storefront, and Bianca’s face lit up like the Rockefeller Plaza Christmas tree. Total admission, Lara thought, if only Bianca had been looking in a mirror to see it.

      Eddie Frutt came through the swinging doors, holding a bunch of sunflowers in one hand and a square envelope in the other. A large, shambling, redheaded man, he possessed a rapidly enlarging bald spot that he’d been passing off as a receding hairline for one too many years. Bianca called him Old Baldy, but kissed the top of his head every time she passed his chair on her way to the kitchen.

      Eddie, who owned a shoe store across the street, greeted Bianca with a smooch. He did a sloppy Fred Astaire twirl and handed the flowers to Rosa, then waved the envelope at Lara. “I ran into a courier out front. This is for you. I want a hug in return.”

      “Of

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