My Funny Valentina (5 page)

Her
softly waving coppery-red hair had been styled in tight rows of braids down her back – done in fun sitting out on the front stoop by her friend from one brownstone over, Jalissa.  Her long coltish legs had been bare and brown in a pair of ragged-edge denim shorts, the provocative up-thrust of nubile breasts barely contained by the t-shirt knotted high on her slender waist to show off the gold belly chain that had been all the rage in her borough that sizzling summer. 

After the first
iconic test shots had been taken of her by an up-and-coming Chicago-based fashion photographer named Lars Kittson, she’d been signed by the agency immediately.  Pronounced a stunning combination of a pre-Raphaelite angel with a devilish Angelina Jolie-attitude.   Angelina –
pre-Brad Pitt and saintly motherhood –
that is.  The blood in a vial around the neck, brother smooching, Billy Bob Thornton, Angelina!

The bad girl
attitude hadn’t all been an act.  Back then, if you’d dared her to do
anything
– she’d do it.  Valentina gave a sad smile for the confused girl she’d once been.  Feeling unloved and unwanted, passed back and forth among so many uncaring relatives, she’d rebelled against anything and everything in her difficult teenage years.  Especially her overwhelmed mother who’d been fighting her own demons, real and imagined.  There’d been so many loud arguments with her mother – their fights growing more heated and intense as her frequently soused mother had struggled to accept her own beauty was fading. 

J
ust as her daughter’s was coming into full glorious bloom. 

Valentina had
often caught her mother gazing at her across their cluttered table with a twisted mixture of sadness and envy as they’d picked at their heated up frozen dinners
.
  There’d never been any pride in those green eyes that matched Valentina’s own – and now matched the granddaughter’s who she would never meet.  But her stares hadn’t been
nearly
as bad as the lascivious looks Valentine had endured those last months at home from her mother’s latest lover who’d moved into their Brooklyn row house.  

Moose
. 

A
hulking mass of a
‘New Joisey’
truck driver.  Who’d begun lingering around the bathroom door every morning with what she’d newly learned was lustful male desire in his beady eyes just as Valentina was getting out of the shower before classes. His pervy hand had grabbed her bottom beneath her robe one morning as she’d turned away in disgust. 

T
hat had been the last straw. 

It had also been h
er last day living with her mother.  Valentina had marched into a lawyer’s office picked at random out of the Yellow Pages, shown them her newly signed lucrative modeling contract and quickly cemented her ‘emancipated minor’ status.  The angel of a modeling agency representative who’d first signed her had become a kind of surrogate older sister.  Moving Valentina into her own lavish Hamptons abode the first few months, then into a Manhattan apartment with three other seasoned models who’d shown Val the ropes and protected her from the numerous perils of the industry like a flock of gorgeous mother hens. 

After
Valentina graduated high school early through special correspondence classes – for despite her troubles she was also
smart –
her studies coming easily to her, the next few years had been a blur of traveling to exotic lands she’d only seen on television or read about in magazines.  There’d been modeling jobs near and far with world-famous designers who fought over her long-legged, insouciant beauty to hype their designs – and vast amounts of money made she’d burned through almost as quickly as she’d earned it.

But being in New York had ultimately proven to be too close to painful memories. Especially after her mother had begun showing up unexpectedly at her door enraged over some new perceived slight or insult.  The last time it happened, her mother had appeared at her apartment in an exclusive Manhattan high rise late one cold winter night.  Her unknowing new roommate had answered the frantic pounding at the door and overhearing the shouting in the foyer, Valentina had rushed out from her bedroom to find her mother there.

Drunk.
 

W
eaving on unsteady feet in the middle of the poshly decorated living room.  Tossing out undeserved, hurtful recriminations. ‘Having you ruined my life, Val,’ she’d slurred, ‘I...was beautiful once too…I coulda been a model like you, co…coulda been the big…biggest one ever till I met your bastard of a father. 
Tony Vincetti
,’ she’d spat the name out like the taste of it in her mouth sickened her.  ‘My father warned me – said he was a worthless, no-good gambler, but I didn’t listen – was too hardheaded…jus...just like you, Valentina!’ 

Her
false accusations had hurt to listen to – and her claims of beauty had been hard to believe viewing her blowsy appearance.  Witnessing the damage alcohol and hard living had wrought on her heavily bloated face and on the bleary, once luminous eyes now clouded with disease and regrets. 

‘
Come on, Ma, let’s get you home.  You just need to sleep, you’ll feel better in the morning,’ Valentina had said in a tear-choked voice, ushering her mother down to the lobby, supporting her with an arm around her painfully thin waist as her mother’s swollen legs had been wobbly and unsure. 

She’d
had the doorman hail her mother a taxi and paid the driver the fare to get her home to Brooklyn safely.  Included a huge tip for him to make sure of it.  Valentina had also sneakily stuffed a wad of one hundred dollar bills in her mother’s coat pocket when she’d leaned in to peck her drawn cheek. ‘Goodbye, Ma,’ stroking the fading red hair, she’d said her goodbyes, ‘I’d take you home myself but I have a modeling job early tomorrow morning,’ she’d whispered almost choking from the alcohol fumes wafting from the defeated woman sunken into the back seat. 

She’d
waved at her mother’s face that had stared at her from the back window with a sad look in her eyes until the cab had disappeared down the street.  Val had taken the elevator back up to her luxurious apartment in the tall building.  Gone back to her room, climbed beneath the covers and cried all night for what had been lost.  For what had never
been hers. 

She’d
had dark circles under her eyes the next morning but it hadn’t matter as she hadn’t made her modeling job, after all.  Had found out in an early hour phone call from a matter-of-fact police officer with thick Brooklyn accent, that her mother’s body had been found floating in the East River. 

The cab driver
said your mother asked to be driven there after making a stop at the liquor store first.
She must have lost her footing somehow in the dark, he said, her senses blurred by the alcohol she’d consumed.  Probably fell in the river unable to climb back out in her heavy sodden clothes, he’d speculated. 

S
trangest thing, though, there was a bunch of one hundred dollar bills torn clean in half found floating near her body.

Valentina had
asked the officer that the investigation be ended – hadn’t wanted to contemplate any further if it had been an accident. 
Or not.
She’d broken her modeling contract.    Not able to summon up any fake smiles for the camera.  Instead, she’d packed her things and moved to Chicago.  Determined to make a new life for herself without bad memories lurking around every corner. To start fresh in a new city with just the few thousand dollars she had left in her bank account. 

A
n eight hundred mile leap of faith.
 

After a few months of
tedious temp jobs typing reports, filing teetering piles of correspondence at corporate offices located in high-rise buildings on both sides of the tourist-boat filled Chicago River, she’d landed the gig as one of the
Scintillating
perfume girls hired to spray the sweetly odorous fragrance in the vicinity of unsuspecting shoppers at local retail stores.  It hadn’t been nearly as glamorous a job as modeling, but it had paid the rent.

T
he temp agency rep had called early one February morning on a day designated as a special holiday for lovers and given her the assignment to report to the newly constructed department store located in the far northern reaches of the city.  She’d yawned, gotten up, showered and wiggled her way into the shimmery silk top and tight red and black plaid skirt and tights the client wanted its
Scintillating
girls to wear. 

T
his must be their twisted idea of sexy schoolgirl!
 

Valentina could recall
what happened next as if it were yesterday.  Recall brushing the waves of coppery hair that fell halfway down her back into order, flicking dark mascara on her lashes making her vivid-green eyes pop.  Stepping into a pair of dangerous looking, spiky red stilettos and teetering off – never suspecting that her life was about to change.  Forever..
.

Valentine’s Day...four years ago...

What time is it anyway?
  Val gave a bored sigh.  She’d been spritzing perfume for what seemed like
hours
in the newly constructed department store packed with first day customers from affluent homes in communities dotting Chicago’s northernmost suburbs.  All racing here and there like a battalion of frenzied ants, snatching up the Valentine’s Day bargains arrayed in heart-themed displays before them.  Hoping their offerings would serve as adequate proof of their affection to their romantic partners. 

Valentina
made the wry observation then turned with another sigh towards the mall doors – and spotted the curls first. Springy, jet-black curls that instantly made her want to run her fingers through to muss up their regimented order and view them all wild and disarrayed.  Then she looked down – into the stunning face of ‘
a
freaking
Greek God,’
she whispered to herself.  Chiseled as though out of living, breathing golden marble. 

Perfection.
 

The man
was clearly distracted in his blue-pinstriped suit and striped tie, looking around him with narrowed eyes. Seeming to be checking items off on a clipboard he held clutched tight in his hands.  His tall, breathtakingly toned body – a body befitting that of a living statue come to life – walked by her, four, then five times.  Not noticing her.  Not even glancing once in her direction in his preoccupation.  Valentina quickly decided she needed to make her move.  She darted a quick assessing look over at the row of women, fellow perfume hawkers otherwise known as –
the competition
–
staring at him frozen, mouths agog, or delayed a few precious moments touching up their makeup with free samples snatched off counters around them
.
  The coast was clear. 

The next time he c
ame by her assigned station, Valentina hurriedly stepped forward to block his path, squirting her bottle in his direction.  ‘Excuse me, sir, but would you care for me to...
Ssss-cintillate...
you?’ She recited her hackneyed line in a sibilant husk.  But she overshot her mark and the perfume went straight into his eyes.  Blinding him. 

‘
Argh!’
  With arms thrown out wide he lost his footing, dropping his clipboard, stumbling back into the lingerie display set up near the perfume counter.  Dancing for a moment with a scantily clad mannequin in lacy red bra and panties, taking her down to the floor with him in a noisy clatter. 

‘
Oh damn!’ A guilty Valentina rushed forward to try to break his fall, only succeeding in falling with them.  On top of
him
.  Landing winded on six-foot three inches of lithe, sinewy-hard packed muscle.  She blinked down into bottomless dark eyes she felt in danger of falling into that were smiling up at her.  Both of them sat up on the floor, unable to stop the rash of non-stop giggles and amused chuckles at the absurdness of what had just occurred.

‘
It seems introductions are in order.  I don’t know her very well,’ he propped up the mannequin with blonde wig askew, painted smile still politely in place despite her missing bra and rucked up panties, ‘but I’m Stash Karas – what’s your name?’

‘
It’s…Val,’ she managed to get out a raspy response while wanting to flag down security because he stole her heart right then and there. ‘
Valentina
Vincetti.’

‘
Now that name seems somehow strangely appropriate,’ there was a sensual inflection suddenly tingeing the smooth as silk, deep voice.  In the middle of the crowd of shoppers who stepped right over them to get to the Valentine’s Day bargains – he brushed a fiery tendril from her forehead, ‘here it is February fourteenth – and I believe I’ve just found my Valentina.’ 

~
4~

THEY’D ENJOYED A
whirlwind romance after that memorable meeting.  Stash, used to a household of women worshipping his every word, had seemed enthralled by a strong, independent woman who challenged him.  Who gave just as good as she got.  Valentina had her own opinions on just about every subject and was able to clearly voice them. Sometimes
very
loudly. She was used to speaking up for herself.  Had needed that ability in a household with a mother who rarely did.