“What on earth are you doing on the stoop?” an older, feminine voice scolded. “I swear, if you don’t have your spouses around to remind you that you’re fully grown, you regress to middle school. Quit swarming the poor woman. Let her come inside. Girls, you said you’d set out the food. Ern, your father needs help with the pool cover.”
Her siblings rolled their eyes and muttered apologies as they scurried past their mother into the house, leaving Mira facing Claudina, the person she was most apprehensive to meet.
Silvio’s wife was an attractive woman with the dark hair and eyes of Italian heritage, sophisticated taste in clothes and creases in her face that suggested she smiled big and often.
Her expression was reserved as she gave Mira a thorough study.
Perhaps Rocco sensed how the fear of rejection was gathering in her. His arm arrived around her back and he protectively pulled her into his side.
“Claudina, this is Mira.”
“Mira.” She accepted the hand Mira held out and pressed it between her own. “You look so much like Trude it’s disconcerting.”
That wasn’t why she was staring. Mira suspected she was looking for her husband in Mira’s face. And for traces of the childrenshehad born for him.
“Thank you for inviting me,” Mira said humbly. Her heart was sinking as she began to imagine criticism and hostility coalescing against her.
“Look at the ring, Mama,” Simone blurted from some location inside the house. “I guess you have another wedding to plan, but I’m telling you right now I won’t wear a dress even if I am a bridesmaid.”
“That child,” Claudina sighed while she admired the ring on Mira’s hand. “I do love a wedding, though. Goodness, that’s beautiful. I’ve always admired your taste, Rocco.” Claudina set her hand on his cheek and gave him a very indulgent, maternal look. “I’ve harbored dreams of you marrying into our family, you know. Now, it will happen and I couldn’t be happier.” She hugged Rocco and offered Mira a warm embrace, kissing both her cheeks. “Let’s go outside before Silvio thinks we’ve run away on him.”
Oh. Tears came into Mira’s eyes. She hung back slightly to hide how moved she was.
Rocco pulled her close and helped her disguise her shaken reaction by pressing a kiss onto her forehead.
“Okay?” he murmured.
She nodded, thinking she couldn’t be happier, either.
Epilogue
Four years later…
“BE GOOD FORNonna and Nonno,” Mira urged three-year-old Ricci. He was named after his father and his grandfather, but Rocco had shortened it to a nickname that had suited his colicky newborn personality. Thankfully, Ricci had grown out of his most prickly, hedgehog moments, but the name had stuck.
“Help them look after Tutu, hmm?” Rocco crouched to speak man-to-man to their son. “You understand her better than anyone else so you tell them what she needs.”
Ricci hadn’t been able to say his little sister’s name, Trude, after Mira’s mother. He had called her Tutu from the day she arrived and the moniker was even more apropos these days. Tutu was more “two” than ever.
“We’ll be fine,” Claudina assured them, trying to shoo them toward the door. “Take the afternoon. Stay out for dinner if you want to.”
It wasn’t the first time she and Silvio had sat for them. The children loved them. Silvio was already sitting with Tutu, reading the book she’d brought him, proving she knew exactly how to get what she wanted even though she wasn’t talking much yet.
“They’re such a handful these days,” Mira protested to Claudina as she accepted Rocco’s help with her jacket. They had a nanny, but she had booked this vacation ages ago, long before Mira had known she would have an ultrasound appointment to go to.
“All the more reason you should turn this into a date. Go have fun,” Claudina insisted.
After a last hug and kiss, Mira allowed Rocco to corral her into the elevator.
“I feel like they deserve danger pay,” Mira said.
“You’d prefer to hurry back? No dinner date?”
“Date night is what got us into this situation, isn’t it?” she said wryly.
Ricci had been born nine months after their reunion at the villa. Tutu had come along a little over a year later, very unexpectedly. After that, they’d been more careful, but a few months ago they’d had an evening away from the children and here they were, headed for a scan.
“Are you okay with this?” Rocco asked, dropping a concerned glance to her middle. “You’ve seemed anxious since we found out.”
