Free Mafia Chic by Erica Orloff

his sleight of hand, I told Di I was going to treat her to a night out at a little French bistro on the Upper East Side. I opened Teddi’s, cooked for the lunch crowd, and then handed off the kitchen to Leon. Quinn was, of course, with those Irish-Italian movie star looks of his, greeting each table and doing his usual superb job of making everyone who entered Teddi’s feel like a big shot. After the lunch crowd slowed to a trickle, he and I sat at the bar for our good-luck sambucas. Restaurateurs—at least Italian ones—are a superstitious breed.
    Quinn grinned at me, his blue eyes absolutely dancing—doing a damn macarena —as he handed me my drink. Quinn is my first cousin on my father’s side of the family so we have the same last name. He has long black lashes, that by all rights—if there’s any justice in the universe—shouldhave been mine. But no. I have to apply five coats of L’Oréal’s Voluminous in jet black just so you can see mine, and Quinn gets to bat his impossibly full lashes at every woman who walks through the door. His mother is Irish, Aunt Colleen, and she says a novena for our restaurant every day, praying that we somehow, miraculously, in New York City, where restaurants fail each day, make it.
    “What are you twinkling about?”
    He leaned on the bar, his smile infectious. “I met a girl.”
    “God, Quinn…you have more sex in a week than I have had in my lifetime, I think. I don’t understand it. I do and I don’t. I mean, yes, you’re beautiful.”
    With that, Quinn turned around and surveyed himself in the mirror behind the rows of liquor bottles. “I have to agree with you, Ted.”
    I grabbed a cocktail straw and threw it at him. “Arrogant and beautiful.” I waved my hands (Italians speak with their hands). If I had to sit on mine, I’d be rendered mute. “And you have the whole bad-boy thing going.”
    “And last night, I was a very, very bad boy.”
    “Please, spare me the gory details.”
    “I’m a gentleman. I don’t kiss and tell—except to my best friend, cousin and business partner all rolled into one, Teddi Gallo. We should have been born brother and sister.”
    I rolled my eyes but smiled despite myself. It was true. Of all my relatives, except maybe Tony, I loved Quinn best. And though I was very fond of Tony, especially when he came over to make pastry or to hang out and watch TV with Di and me, sharing pizza and wine, it was Quinn who was my friend, my true friend. I told him nearly as much as I told Di. My brother, Michael, and I could barely stand in the same room without it leading to an argument. I’m sure thatpained my parents, but Michael had left Brooklyn and never looked back. Sometimes I envied his L.A. life so far away from the family, and other times I thought he did it out of some sense of shame, that my father with his pompadour and my uncle Vito in his “guinea Ts” and hairy back weren’t good enough for Michael. None of us were. I had wished Quinn was my brother for as long as I could remember.
    “How about you, Teddi? You’re gorgeous. And you never date.” Quinn wagged his finger at me.
    “I’m married to this restaurant. I’m either waking before dawn to open, pulling a double shift or closing. How you can close this place six nights a week and then go out and party…and then go and get laid, I have no idea.”
    “I’m young. And so are you. Sometimes you just have to burn the candle at both ends.”
    “I did have a date the other night. Went well.”
    “Oh?” He arched an eyebrow.
    “But I’ll leave it at that. Don’t want to jinx it…. And shouldn’t you be prepping for the dinner shift?”
    “Not without my sambuca, cuz.” He lifted his snifter, and we clinked our glasses.
    Quinn had gone to the Culinary Institute of America, and I truly admired how he could walk into the restaurant and instantly spot if a single fork was out of place. He was able to do it all and in any condition—hungover, on no sleep,