AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“When it’s time for you to go home to Venice?” I said softly.
She nodded, her face worried.
I put my finger under her chin and lifted her head lovingly. “I’ll have a talk with your grandmother and my brothers. But no matter what, I’m not ever letting you go.”
She beamed happily and we kissed.
“Don’t worry,” she said impishly. “If Nona throws a fit, I’ll just tell her you knocked me up.”
I laughed. “Let’s tell her a little more diplomatically than that.”
“Aaaah, don’t worry – she’s not gonna kill the father of her great-grandchild.”
“So you think you’re pregnant?” I teased her.
“Why, do I look fat?” she asked as she poked out her belly underneath her new clothes. She held her stomach with one hand underneath, the way a very pregnant woman would. “It’s just a food baby.”
“A what?”
“Ice cream and Danishes. You know – a food baby.”
“Too bad.”
She grinned. “Remember – you said if I got pregnant, you’d marry me.”
“And I meant it.”
She put down her cup of gelato, unfolded a napkin, and put it over her head like a veil.
“I’d make a beautiful bride, wouldn’t I?” she asked as she fluttered her eyelashes like a Disney princess.
I laughed. “Yes, you would.”
Then I looked over Lucia’s head and saw something.
“Hold on,” I said as I walked past her.
“You’re not leaving me at the altar, are you?” she said in mock outrage.
“Nope. Far from it.”
I went over to the gumball machine, checked to make sure it had what I wanted, and started pumping in coins and turning the handle.
It took me seven tries to get what I wanted.
Lucia knew I was messing with the gumball machine. The krrrccck when I turned the handle could be heard throughout the small store.
“What, are you getting me some wedding tattoos?” she joked. “Maybe some bubblegum for the reception?”
“No…” I said as I walked over…
Got down on one knee in front of her…
And held a tiny plastic gold ring with a tiny plastic red ruby on it.
Lucia looked utterly and totally shocked – almost like she’d seen a ghost – and took a step back from me.
I certainly didn’t expect that reaction.
