JE gets the credit for the characters below. I'm just taking from her for my own amusement.

Jenny (JenRar) thank you for all the time you've put into organizing my thoughts, correcting my mistakes and suggesting better ways of getting my point across. Your work as the beta on this story has been invaluable.

Chapter 10 – Unexpected Admiration

"I believe I'm beginning to get older," my father said, seated behind his huge mahogany desk with his middle finger rubbing his right temple as a sure sign he was tense about something.

"You aren't one to complain about an AARP card," I countered, not sure why he was acting so out of character.

"The number on my license isn't what I'm referring to," he cryptically retorted, letting his hand fall away. "I'm getting soft."

An hour ago, I'd seen Uncle Guido in the kitchen with his knuckles bleeding and his face flushed. Obviously, he'd worked Constantine, over so I couldn't figure out why that equated to my father going soft.

It took a few minutes of silence before my father began to talk without me having to question him about his meaning. "Guido gave me his report, and I can't decide what my next steps should be regarding Constantine."

"If you have the information from him, and he has betrayed you, what's left to consider?" I can't say I always agreed with my father's termination policy, but in this particular case, I didn't really have a problem with this guy not seeing another day. Besides, he'd flirted with Stephanie enough to make her uncomfortable, which was a feat most skips on distractions couldn't accomplish, so for that alone, my conscience was clear about him not leaving the holding room while he was breathing.

"According to my brother, Constantine wasn't sent here by any government agencies. He was here strictly for personal reasons," Pop began.

"Most of the dead people in your profession bit it because of personal reasons," I pointed out.

"Yes, yes." He waved off my reminder about the high mortality rate for mob bosses. "Constantine claims that he's here because his mother told him he was the son of a major mafia leader, and based on his own research, he felt his father had to be either Alexander or me. He was here trying to gather evidence to prove I was the one who knocked up his mother."

There were several questions I could have asked at this point, but my mind was spinning from that revelation. I already knew from Stephanie's research that he was younger than me, so for this to be possible, it would mean accepting that my father had an affair. I would easily believe a good number of accusations against Pop, but for some reason, this one didn't sit well.

"Aren't you going to ask me if it's true?" Pop pushed.

I shrugged, knowing it wasn't really a response. "If it's true, I assume you'll tell me so. But unless I hear it from you directly, I won't believe it. That's not the kind of thing you taught me was acceptable, so I don't see you stepping out on Mom yourself."

It was hard to surprise my father, but my response had obviously done it. "You distance yourself from me at every turn and deny our relationship in your professional life, but still you defend me?"

"I want to make a name for myself and figure out my own way in the world outside of your business. That doesn't mean I'm not proud of my family," I argued, wondering if it were really true.

Based on how long he stared at me, Pop was probably trying to figure out the same thing. Finally, he let out a long breath and pushed a piece of paper across the desk in my direction, indicating I should pick it up. "Here is the name of his mother, where he was born, and his given name at birth. I am not that man's father – it's a physical impossibility because I've never strayed from your mother – but because he seems so convinced it's true, I need to know more about his mother."

"What difference does it make?" I wondered. Regardless of who gave birth to him, he'd still lied to my father about why he was here.

Pop's head fell back to rest again his chair, and he looked at the ceiling as though attempting to read the answer there. "Guido believed that the boy was sincere about why he was here. He just wanted to get to know his father in some way. He cannot stay here, obviously, but since he is going to need some time to recover from his time with my brother, I might be able to give him the answers he is risking his life to find."

This was why he thought he was going soft. He wasn't going to have Constantine killed if his story panned out to be true. "Are you going to have someone look into this?"

"As strange as this sounds, most of the people I employ would probably assume the kid's guess about his father was true based on my business dealings. I would prefer to have this investigated quietly and by someone who is trustworthy to keep the information to themselves," he said, looking at me as though willing me to pick up the unspoken words.

"You want me to have Stephanie look into this," I guessed. A simple nod was all I got in return. "Does Mom know?"

"Not yet, but she will in an hour," he replied, making me proud of him for the first time in a long time.

"Why are you telling her?" I wondered, not so sure I'd be impressed if it was just because he felt like I was pressuring him to bring her in.

"I try to protect your mother from the day-to-day stresses of my job. She knows what I do for a living, but the best way to keep her safe is to keep her ignorant of most of the details. However, from time to time, a detail crosses out of the strictly business end of things and moves more into the personal area. Anytime that happens, I tell her. Personal stuff always concerns her, and especially something like this – an accusation against my fidelity – I must bring to her directly in order to be sure she will trust me when I tell her it is absolutely untrue."

It was probably true that everybody struggles to picture their parents together romantically. But at this moment, all the small gestures of their devotion suddenly flooded through my head, and I realized I'd grown up with two people who were absolutely in love with each other. It was the real deal, and it was why I'd never pushed for a relationship with any of the women I hooked up with. With a model like my parents, settling for some cheap imitation never set well. I wanted what my parents had, and up until this last week, I didn't think it was possible. Of course, I was putting a lot of stock into whatever Stephanie and I had now transitioning back into the real world.

Holding up the paper in my hand, I assured him, "I'll give this to Stephanie. If it's possible to dig up any information on who this guy's real father is, she'd be the one to do it."

Three steps away from the office door, he called out, "I don't want to insult you or Stephanie, but I don't want this to get out. As soon as you have something, bring it to only me."

"Of course," I replied, wanting to resent him for the reminder to keep my mouth shut, but I couldn't find the anger that was usually so easy to grab hold of when it came to my father and his business. Instead, I took my leave and went straight up to my room, wanting to see Stephanie.

I needed to give her the information so she could begin doing whatever it was she did to get to the bottom of a mystery like this, but at the same time, I felt like something strange had just happened with my father, and I was off center. Although I had to no reason to feel this way, I was convinced that being around Stephanie would make my world right itself again.

"Hey, Anthony," she greeted me happily from her seat on the sofa, watching some kind of sappy chick flick on my television. It appeared to be from a DVD, which was puzzling since I knew there was no way a romantic movie had been in my collection before her visit. "I hope you don't mind that I made myself at home."

Her comment shook me out of my confused haze, and I shook my head that it was fine, electing not to confess that I had no idea where the movie had come from in order to defend my manhood.

"Maria came by with some more clothes and brought a box with some books and movies in it that she thought I might enjoy. I was going to tell her that I was fine with your collection, but she insisted on starting one for me, so I sat here to make her feel better and then got sucked in to the story." Her confession made me glad I'd kept my mouth shut.

"Feel free to keep watching it if you want," I said, more to assure her I was okay with her doing anything she wanted to here than because I cared about a movie.

Fortunately, she hit pause and pointed at my hand. "What's that?"

At least now, I didn't have to worry about how to bring up the subject. I sat down beside her and spelled out the entire conversation with my father, including the role he hoped she would play.

When I was done, I expected her to ask me if I believed that Pop was innocent; instead, she set the folder down and said, "This bothers you."

I couldn't decide if her intuition was a blessing or a curse. She seemed to ask the questions that would bring me right to the heart of whatever matter was at hand. But she was so direct, it was hard to wiggle out of the center of attention if it was something I didn't want to talk about. Then I thought back to Pop telling me he was going to tell my Mom everything, and I realized if I was sincere in saying I wanted what they had, then I needed to at least try to answer her question. "I admire how he's handling this."

"Is admiring your dad something new for you?" she pushed gently.

"Yeah, I guess it is. I mean, you'd think in light of what Constantine has accused him of, I'd be pissed as hell, but everything he's doing seems like the right thing to do, and I'm impressed." I was as surprised as she appeared to be at the last sentence. "I'm impressed and…jealous."

"Why are you jealous about a paternity accusation?" She was clearly confused about the last part.

"He's going to tell my mother everything, and she'll believe him because they have this trust thing. He's a lot of things, but he's not unfaithful, and I envy that solid faith he has that by being upfront and letting Mom in on everything, it will allow them to move through this together." As I finished speaking, I watched her face closely to see if she'd judge me for my rare display of sentimentality.

There was the slightest trace of a smile on her face, but not enough that I felt like she was laughing at me. Still, I felt my head dip down, not wanting to see it if she started to find humor in the situation.

"You want what your parents have."

It was a statement, not a question, but I still felt like I had to reply.

"Yes, I do."

"So do I," she agreed, causing my head to snap up so that I could once again look at her to judge the meaning behind her words. But on her face was just plain longing and honesty. There was no hidden agenda; she was being as sincere as I was.

"How do you get it?" I asked, wishing she could explain it to me.

"You don't get it," she replied patiently. "You make it."

Still confused, I couldn't even come up with a question. Luckily, she took pity on me and explained what she meant. "You make it by being open and honest with the person you want. That way, the trust between you grows and never gets broken. There are a lot of things you can fix in a relationship, but trust is something that's really hard to put back together. I think if you want it, then day by day, you give it, and after enough time has passed, the foundation between you is so solid, nothing can knock you over."

I found myself making a joke because I agreed with everything she said and didn't know how else to reply. "Were you watching Dr. Phil before this touchy-feely movie?"

"Nah, I've just had plenty of experience with people breaking my trust, so I know what I want more than anything," she answered, pulling the conversation back to a more serious turn. I was at a loss about what to say next, and then she completely floored me. "I trust you, and when you come to me with this kind of stuff—" she held out the folder I'd given her earlier "—then I know you trust me, too."

"I do," I assured her. Then my hand began to move on its own. I could see it lift and move toward her face, but I found that I was watching it as though it were someone else's and not a limb I could control. It wasn't until I felt the soft skin of her face under my fingertips that I came back to my senses. Her eyes fluttered shut, and she didn't make any moves to pull away from me, so I slowly moved my hand in order to stroke her cheek.

The pause on the movie gave way and caused us both to jump when the normal television programming came on loud enough to break the mood.

"I should get to work and see what I can dig up," she said, looking down as though she were shy.

"I really appreciate you doing this for Pop," I told her, glad to see her look back up when I spoke.

She smiled so sweetly at my words and then corrected me, "I'm not doing this for your father; I'm doing this for you."

My mind was forced blank at her words, and I wasn't able to even formulate the simple question of why. She stood up and walked into the bedroom, and I knew within a matter of seconds, she would be digging and lost in the mystery.

Feeling at a loss about what I should do next, I went into the spare room and decided to do what I always did when my mind was racing – I worked out. It took me an hour and a half before I found that place of mental silence and could just be. I was six miles into what I wanted to be a ten-mile run on the treadmill when Stephanie's voice caused me to stumble slightly.

She was grinning, as though Santos has just told a joke, when I turned around and looked at her.

"Yuck it up," I warned her, trying to sound stern. "But in a couple more days, you'll be clear for more activity, and I think getting you on this thing might be in order."

Her laughter died immediately and I almost regretted my snarky comment if it was going to wipe the joy off her face.

"There's a big difference between more activity and trying to kill myself on a treadmill," she countered. "If you expect me to get on that thing, it's going to cost you a lot more than a threat and a doctor's note."

Before replying, I wiped my face with the towel I'd thrown over the treadmill's handle and then moved closer to her. "Please let me know what the cost might be, and I'll analyze the benefit to see if it's worth it. Never let it be said I'm afraid to work off a debt."

That comment seemed to cause her to stumble a little, and I realized I loved this. I liked it when she came in confident and assertive, and I loved meeting her comment for comment in order to unnerve her and cause that lovely blush to creep up into her cheeks.

"I can't win," she mumbled under her breath.

Despite my efforts to ignore her comments when I was sure she hadn't intended me to hear them, I couldn't let that one go. "Didn't you learn that winning isn't important, it's how you play the game that matters?"

"I'm not really much of a player," she confessed, seeming to increase in confidence with every word. Of course, her response knocked me down a notch or two so that I didn't have a ready reply. She must have sensed that'd she won this round after all because she held up the folder she'd brought in with her and told me, "I've got some news for your dad. Do you want me to walk you through it first?"

Now I understood why she was such a fan of distraction methods. There were some circumstances when a totally different topic was a welcomed thing.

"Let's go downstairs, and you can tell me and Pop at the same time," I suggested, not wanting to waste her time in having to run through it twice.

Twenty minutes later, she began the meeting with us and both of my parents by announcing, "I know you've already said this, but the facts I found prove you aren't Constantine's father."

"You know this how?" Pop asked as my mother looked on with a smile. She didn't look relieved or surprised by this announcement, which just went to prove that she trusted him completely and had never thought the accusation was true in the first place.

"I pulled your credit card records," she replied, obviously glad to walk someone through all her methods.

"How can you do that from so long ago?" he asked, shocked.

"It's not easy, but someone I work with showed me that many of the major providers do keep archived records if you know how to access them," she explained cryptically.

"You…" Pop was searching for a word and finally found it. "You hacked into their system?"

Stephanie blinked a few times at his question. "I accessed information that was held in a secure way," she agreed, rewording his statement to lessen the sound of what she'd done.

"Isn't that illegal?" Pop pushed, crossing a line I wasn't willing to allow with Stephanie.

Before I could say anything, my mother surprised me by speaking up. "Glass houses, dear. You're really not one to question her using whatever skills she might have to gather the information you asked for."

Pop looked surprised – not that my mother had spoken, but at what she was speaking about. "I'm sorry, Stephanie. I didn't mean to sound so…accusatory. I just wanted to understand if the information you accessed could be gotten by just anyone."

"Probably not," Stephanie confirmed. "Most people wouldn't know to look, but for the people that are aware and willing to sort through old records, it's pretty clear."

At that, Pop promised to sit quietly and listen without interrupting, so Stephanie took him through the financial trail she'd found that proved Pop was nowhere near Constantine's mother during the period conception must have occurred. She even cleared a three-month window to be able to state emphatically that Pop couldn't have conceived a child with this woman because during the most likely time it would have occurred, he was out of the country and she was clocking into work every day at a casino. Then if you widened the window of when it might have happened, Pop never went to the casinos the month before or after his trip to Italy, so they didn't even see each other.

When Stephanie mentioned the trip to Italy and spelled out the places he'd been, including pulling a newspaper article that had a picture of Mom and Pop in it, proving he was there and wasn't just laying a false paper trail, I noticed my father began to scowl. It was like the memory of that trip brought up something he would rather have forgotten.

Not letting my father's facial expression slow her down, Stephanie moved on to talking about other people that might be suspects as Constantine's father. She was able to easily rule out Alexander and then spoke of my father's brothers. It was at this point that Pop leaned forward, clearly interested in every word. Being Italian, coming from large families wasn't unusual. Pop had six brothers, so it took her a while to speak of them all, and I couldn't help but notice she didn't do them in birth order. Still, she saved Guido for last, and based on what I knew of Stephanie, I was confident it wasn't coincidence.

"The only person who was at the casino during the two week period that I think was most likely to have been when Constantine was conceived, was your youngest brother Guido. On the day your picture is credited in an Italian newspaper, there is a small mention of you being at a fundraiser in New Jersey, but the photo has Guido in it, not you. And if you look really carefully, the person standing behind your brother is the woman Constantine listed as his mother." At that bomb, she stopped talking and sat back.

"You're saying Guido is this boy's father?" Pop asked, trying to get his head around everything Stephanie has just revealed.

Quickly, she shook her head no. "I'm not in a position to say that much. All I can say is that you aren't, and neither are any of the other people in your family or Mr. Ramos's. The only possibility could be your youngest brother, but looking at financial records and newspaper clippings, I can't find proof of a child being conceived."

"No." Pop was smiling, obviously enjoying her defense of his brother that you can't prove someone had sex; all you can prove is there was an opportunity for them to have hooked up. "You have far surpassed anything I expected, and once again, I am in a position of being in your debt."

Stephanie blushed and looked down, obviously not used to receiving compliments. This fact still surprised me because I'd never met a person that didn't think she was brilliant at this kind of thing, so the idea that people worked around her and weren't constantly complimenting her seemed strange to me. Then again, she worked around people like me, who didn't tend to talk much unless we had something useful to say or a negative message to deliver. When Stephanie was working, there was little we could add to be useful, and we'd never have a reason to be negative, so we were just quiet instead. Maybe she'd misunderstood our silence as a lack of approval. The next time we had a moment together, I was going to bring this up and set the record straight.

"I'm going to have Vincent run a test on Guido and Constantine to see if it is possible that he's the father. If not, I'll turn over the proof that no one in my family or Alexander's is who he is looking for. If it is true, I'll give Guido the chance to inform his son and explain his absence."

I couldn't remember my father ever explaining his intentions like that before. I approved of his plan and found myself admiring him for the second time in a single day.

"And while you're doing all of that," my mother spoke up, "I'm going to steal Stephanie away. I think she needs a break from all this investigating, and I too am feeling very grateful for what she pulled together, so we're going to catch up over a cup of espresso and a slice of tiramisu."

I looked at Stephanie to be sure she was comfortable with my mother monopolizing her afternoon, but the expression on her face told me that she didn't care about anything other than the promise of tiramisu. I'd lost her to a serving of dessert. If I was going to be in her life, I probably needed to get used to that as a possibility.

The women stood and left me alone with Pop once more.

"Please tell me your mother is going to help plan the wedding – soon."

"What wedding?" I was still reeling over losing to a sweet treat so that I wasn't catching his meaning.

"I couldn't have created a woman that was more perfect for you. You are planning on marrying her, aren't you?" he spelled it out for me.

"If you'd asked me last week, I would have said no," I told him, going about as far as I was willing to at the moment.

"Give it some thought, son. Women like that don't just fall in your lap every day. I married the first one that turned my world on end, and I've been thankful every day for having her in my life. If you let her get away, you'll spend every spare moment you have regretting it." He had no way of knowing that for sure, but in my heart, I knew it was true.

"And if you could hurry up and come to the right decision, it would mean a lot to me. Something tells me after they share a cup of coffee, your mother is going to be pressuring me for information, so it would help me out if you could give me some news to share sooner rather than later."

"I'll see what I can do to make your life easier, Pop," I teased, wondering when the two of us had last relaxed enough in his office to joke with one another.

"If you're really interested in making my life easier, then a couple of grandchildren would go a long way," he answered with a loud laugh.

It wasn't until I shut the door on my way out of his office that I realized I hadn't panicked at the idea of having children. I guess having a wife and kids of my own had always felt like a vice designed to pull me into a life I didn't want because I'd never pictured it with the right person.

Now all I had to do was find a way to inform Stephanie she was the only person I could picture any of this with, and I'd have it made. On second thought, maybe I should just ask her out for a real date. If nothing else, we could go out for dessert and coffee, and I could spill it all then, when she was too distracted to listen.