Page 87 of Storm and Sea

Marina counted the forms for the third time, tallying up the numbers. There were more young kids this year than she’d seen in the past. Her heart sank; they had zero chance of winning, going up against teens as old as fifteen.

“We should separate them into groups based on age. What do you think, Nonno? Nonno?”

Her grandfather sat in his rocking chair, eyes closed, mouth gaping. When she shook his knee, he snorted. “Che succede! I wasn’t sleeping.”

“Sure, Nonno. Did you want to go see the festival?”

“I can see plenty from here. You go enjoy, I’ll guard the booth.”

Marina very much doubted it since there was a one hundred percent chance he’d fall asleep again, but it seemed all the kids who would sign up this year already had.

“You’re okay by yourself?”

Niccolo slinked around the corner, his tail wrapping at the edge of the rocking chair before gracefully hopping onto Horace’s lap. “I am not alone. Niccolo is good company.”

“He sure has a lot to say,” Marina said, scratching the cat behind the ears. His purring was so loud, she half-expected him to rattle right off Nonno’s lap. She kissed her Nonno on the head. “I’ll be back in a bit.”

He waved her off, and when Marina glanced over her shoulder, his eyes were closed, mouth open, with Niccolo swatting at his white beard. She laughed and made her way to the center of the merry-making.

Marina wound her way through the stalls, trying to spot Atreus. He’d been off, and she hoped the festivities lightened his mood.

She was quickly distracted by a stall selling women’s clothes. Marina admired a yellow sundress on display. The stitching practically yelled the word libertà. She imagined wearing it on a bright morning sunrise. Free as a sunflower in the breeze.

The older women would call it revealing, but Marina gravitated to the open-shoulder cut. It would fit her perfectly. Yet, as she looked, the price warded her away. They weren’t struggling for money—not with her mother’s inheritance tucked away in a bank in Firenze. Marina used part of it to pay for her schooling, but with just one semester left, half the original amount still remained.

But her Nonno was old, and every rasping cough felt like the tick of a bomb. He might need medical attention at any moment, and Marina was ready to use everything she had left to help him. Her father would swallow his pride when it came to Nonno’s care, even if he refused to accept her funds for anything else.

With her future uncertain and Nonno’s coughs worsening, there was no room to spend on frilly dresses—even if they would make her boobs look phenomenal.

She was admiring a pair of silver earrings with a blue stone carved to resemble a fish scale when the edge of her sandal caught on a beam beneath the booth. It hooked her leg, and she fell.

Marina grabbed at the table but only managed to wrench the black display cloth as she toppled. Something hard collided with her back, and as Marina landed on the stone, she realized it was another person—who was now also on the ground.

“Marina, you cow!” a female voice screeched.

Anna, the same girl from the fabric store, glared as sticky orange liquid splattered all over her shirt. The man on the ground held an empty cup, and it didn’t take Marina long to piece together what had happened.

Man holds drink —Marina knocks into him —man spills drink— Anna’s dress is ruined. A beautiful domino effect of chaos. Marina’s specialty.

She didn’t bother apologizing to Anna, instead addressing the man. “Are you okay? I’m so sorry.”

He turned, and despite the orange splatter on his cream cotton shirt, he smiled as if being knocked to the ground by her was the highlight of his evening.

“It is no problem. Accidents happen.” He straightened and offered his hand. Marina’s gaze lifted from the tragedy staining the man’s shirt and then to his face. She blinked.

Is he… real?

Standing before her was the most gorgeous man she’d ever seen, his dazzling smile so bright it made her wonder if she should worry about getting sunburned—or maybe gorgeous-man-burned? Whatever it was, this man radiated it. An aura was definitely exuding from him, and Marina was quickly getting overwhelmed. This man was not from Baia Vita. There was an air of refinement that floated around him like a barrier between him and everyone else.

He was tan, with a tasteful amount of manicured scruff framing his jawline. His dark brown hair was long, reaching the tips of his shoulders. It waved with enough messiness to be considered windswept without being untamed.

“Are you hurt?” he asked as she found her feet.

“Just my butt and my pride. Nothing major,” she said, wiping her hands on said butt.

He laughed, and it was so relaxed that Marina almost forgot she’d nearly concussed the man.

Anna clicked her tongue in disapproval. “Of course, you’d make a mess. For god’s sake, when do you return to that preppy school?”