I want my mother's husband

"Your mother is dead, Nyx. You need to come home."The words were the last thing I expected to hear while elbow-deep in someone else's dirty espresso cups, my third shift of the day barely halfway done.

I stood there in the back of the café, trying to process what my mother's lawyer had just said.Dead? My mother was dead?

"Miss Torelio? Are you still there?"I realized I hadn't responded or even breathed.

"When?" My voice came out flat.

"Three days ago, it was a quick heart attack."Three days. She'd been dead for three days and I was just finding out now because I'd been too busy chasing a dream that was slowly starving me to death in this expensive city that didn't care if I lived or died.

"The funeral is tomorrow," the lawyer continued. "And there's the matter of the restaurant. She left it to you."

The restaurant was a tiny, rundown place in Sicily that barely made enough to keep the lights on.

My mother had poured her life into that restaurant after my father died, and now she was giving me the same sentence.

"I'll be there," I said and hung up before he could say anything else.I finished my shift because I needed the money, went home to my studio apartment where the eviction notice was still taped to my door, and started packing the life I'd tried so hard to build in Milan.

Packing didn’t take long but the bus ride back to Sicily took eight hours which was plenty of time to remember why I'd left.

Sicily looked exactly the same when I arrived and even the air smelled the same, like sea salt and lemon trees and memories I'd tried to outrun.I walked to the restaurant with my single suitcase bumping against my leg.

I couldn't help but notice the sign above the door, Torelio's, was more faded than I remembered.

The windows needed cleaning and the whole place looked like it was holding its breath, waiting to collapse.

The door was unlocked.I pushed it open and stepped into the dim interior, my eyes adjusting to find tables covered in dust, chairs stacked in corners, and a man I'd never seen before crouched under the bar with a wrench in his hand.

He looked up when he heard me, and I got my first real look at him. He was older, maybe late forties, with dark hair starting to silver at the temples and hands that looked like they'd built and broken things in equal measure.

He was wearing worn jeans and a faded work shirt, and something about the way he moved was too controlled and deliberate."You must be Nyx." He stood, wiping his hands on a rag tucked into his belt. "I'm Gus."

"What are you doing in my restaurant?" I kept my voice cold and deliberately unwelcoming."Fixing the sink. It's been leaking for weeks." He gestured at the mess of tools spread around him.

"Your mother asked me to take care of it.""My mother is dead.""I know."

His expression didn't change, but something flickered in his eyes. "I'm sorry for your loss."

The way he said it sounded genuine, which only made me angrier. I didn't want this stranger's sympathy.

I didn't want him in my restaurant, fixing things like he had any right to be here."You can leave now," I said."I'm not finished.""I don't care."He studied me for a long moment, and I got the uncomfortable feeling he was seeing more than I wanted him to see.

"The funeral is at three tomorrow. Your mother wanted it small.""How would you know what my mother wanted?"

"Because she told me." He picked up his wrench again, turning back to his work like I hadn't just dismissed him. "She talked about you constantly and how proud she was that you went to Milan to chase your dreams."

My mother had been proud? She'd never said anything like that to me, never encouraged my photography, never understood why I needed to leave.

"Mr. Santoro is waiting for you at his office," Gus continued, still working under the sink. "He has the papers you need to sign."

"Who are you?" I asked. "Why are you here?"He paused, and when he looked at me again, there was something in his expression I couldn't read. "I'm the town handyman your mother called me when things broke. That's all."

"That's all," I repeated, not believing him for a second.The lawyer's office was three blocks away. I left Gus in the restaurant and walked there in the fading afternoon light, my mind spinning with everything that had happened in the last twenty-four hours.

Mr. Santoro was an old man who'd known my family since before I was born. He offered his condolences, handed me documents to sign, and then dropped the bomb I should have seen coming."Your mother remarried six months ago."I stared at him. "What?"

"To Gus Santoro, my nephew. They had a small private ceremony ." He slid another document across his desk.

"The restaurant is yours, as she specified in her will but Gus has been living in the apartment above it since the wedding.

"My mother had remarried, to the handyman, someone I'd never heard of or met before now and was living above my restaurant like he belonged there.

"He's a gold digger," I said flatly. "He took advantage of a dying woman."

Mr. Santoro's expression hardened.

"My nephew is one of the finest men I know. He took care of your mother in her final months, asked for nothing in return, and has been maintaining that restaurant out of his own pocket for the past year.

"I signed the papers in silence, my hand shaking with anger. When I got back to the restaurant, Gus was still there.

"All set with Mr. Santoro?" he asked."You married my mother."He stopped wiping, his shoulders tensing slightly. "Yes."

"She was dying and you married her." I moved closer, my voice rising. "What were you after? The restaurant? Her money? Whatever pathetic savings she had?"

"I was after keeping a promise I made to someone I loved." His voice stayed calm, maddeningly calm. "And your mother had nothing but debts when she died. The restaurant is barely standing"

"Then why stay? Why marry her if there was nothing in it for you?"He looked at me for a long moment, and I saw something flash across his face, probably grief or maybe guilt.

"Because some debts can't be paid with money."

"That's cryptic nonsense."

"I know." He picked up his toolbox and headed for the door. "I'm upstairs if you need anything. The apartment has two bedrooms but your mother wanted you to have yours back when you came home."

"I don't want you here." I injected angrily.

He paused in the doorway, his back to me. "I made a promise to someone I loved. I'm not leaving."