Page 69 of Small Town Swoo
A female voice in the background. “Gianni Lupo! The kids are in the room!”
“Sorry, babe,” he said.
“Any way I could see it?” I asked. “If your father-in-law agrees to sell?”
“Sure. You can come see it anytime. Let me talk to him again and see what he thinks.”
“Any idea what the price would be?”
“No, but I’ll find out. He’ll be fair.”
“Thanks, Gianni. I really appreciate it.”
“No problem.” He paused. “So are you dating this girl?”
“No. We’re just friends,” I said quickly. “But we kind of grew up together. She was my sister Mabel’s best friend, so I’ve known her forever. I’d like to help her out.”
“Cool,” he said. “Well, if you’ve got time while you’re home, come for dinner at Etoile. Just let me know what night you want to come, and I’ll get you in.”
“I’d love to do that. Let me talk to her.”
As I put the potatoes in the oven, I wondered if I should tell Ari up front about the possibility of buying Abelard’s truck or if I should just take her to dinner at Etoile and surprise her. Would she be upset with me? Was she really against the idea or just nervous to take a chance on herself?
I put a pot of water on the stove to boil and started trimming the ends off the broccoli rabe.
“Okay, I’m clean.”
I turned around to see her entering the kitchen, her hair damp and curly, her face free of makeup. She wore gray shorts and a matching cropped sweatshirt, and thick fleece bunny socks on her feet. “Cute,” I said.
She looked down and rocked back on her heels. “Thank you. Now what can I do to help? I’m not good at sitting still in the kitchen and letting other people do the work, so you have to give mesomething.”
I grabbed the bottle of pinot noir and handed it to her. “You can open this and pour us some wine.”
As she opened a drawer and pulled out the opener, I went back to my dinner prep. “Want to hear my cool news?”
“Yes.”
“I spoke to a friend of mine, a chef who runs a restaurant called Etoile at?—”
“You’re friends with Gianni Lupo?” She sounded impressed.
“Yeah. We lived in the same house years ago in L.A.”
“Wow. I didn’t know that.” She placed a glass of pinot noir on the counter next to the cutting board, on which I was slicing cloves of garlic. “Are those crushed pistachios?”
“Yes.” I set the knife down and took a sip of wine. “I gave him a call because I wondered if he had any insight into food trucks.”
“Dash!” She was clearly exasperated. “Why did you do that?”
“Because I was curious. And I wanted to learn more about it.”
“You could have Googled it.”
“I did that before I called him.” I gave her a quick kiss. “I’m very thorough.”
She leaned back against the counter next to me. “So what did he say?”
While oil heated in the iron skillet, I told her about my conversation with Gianni. “So if his father-in-law says the truck is for sale, maybe we can go see it.”
