A Place in the Sun(79)

“You do then?”

“So much it feels like torture at times.”

She pointed to the bare wall behind her.

“You’ve taken away Allie’s things.”

I nodded. “A few days ago.”

She turned back to me with a small frown. “You don’t have to, Luca. Not on my account.”

“I didn’t do it for you. It was long overdue.”

I needed her to know I wasn’t using her to get over Allie. Georgie wasn’t my second love. She was my only love.

“You should know I never intended to fall in love again. I never imagined I’d have a reason to move on, and when you came along, I wasn’t prepared. I didn’t know how to handle you. You were…a lot to take in at once. I tried to keep my wall up, but you blew right past it.”

She grinned. “Tramontana.” Her Italian accent had improved dramatically.

“Exactly.” I leaned forward and cupped her cheek, stroking my thumb across her skin. “You’re the woman I love now, Georgie. The only woman.”

She mashed her lips together and nodded, trying to keep from crying, I thought. I didn’t pester her about it. She’d had a long day and I didn’t want her getting too stressed out. Apparently the doctors said she needed lots of rest and relaxation, though Georgie also went on about needing a daily allotment of prenatal chocolate and circulation-improving foot rubs. I didn’t mind giving her everything she wanted. I’d spoil her and in a few months, I’d spoil our child just as much.

It’d been too long since I’d been this happy, this full of hope for the future, and I knew it was no coincidence. Something had brought Georgie to me, and whether it was fate, or God, or Allie working the cosmic magic she’d promised, I knew I’d spend the rest of my life loving Georgie Archibald here, in our place in the sun.





IT MIGHT SEEM odd, but I would have given anything for one conversation with Allie. There was so much I would have liked to tell her, and more that I wanted to ask. She was Luca’s first love, an irreplaceable part of his life. She’d taught him what it meant to be a man, to grow and love in spite of life’s hardships. Given the chance, I would have thanked her, pulled her close, and promised to do my best to love him. When I’d first arrived in Vernazza and had struggled and fought with Luca, I wasn’t upset by the idea of sharing his heart with her; I was concerned that he was still wearing his tragedy like a stiff mask he refused to take off. A part of me feared he would never emerge from the veil of mourning.

Allie, who had lost her own life at such a young age, would have hated to know that she’d cut Luca’s short as well.

In the year since I’d moved into the villa, I thought of her often. I felt her presence during the birth of Julianna. I’d held my newborn baby in my arms and I’d cried, first with happiness, and then for Allie, for all she had lost. Handing off Julianna to Luca and seeing him step into fatherhood was a gift I never once took for granted. I wanted Allie to see it, to know that more than any role he’d tried on before—financier, husband, widower, recluse—he was meant to be a father. His love for Julianna eclipsed all else.

There was even a moment, a few months after Julianna was born, when my imagination fooled me into thinking I might get the chance to have that conversation. Luca, Julianna, and I were eating breakfast at The Blue Marlin. Our addiction to their croissants was as strong as ever—not to mention, Julianna seemed to enjoy waking up at the crack of dawn, so Luca and I were mostly functioning off espresso and the sheer stubborn willpower only available to new parents.

We took our favorite seats outside on the wooden porch. Antonio brought us a few pastries that had just come out of the oven and I tore one in half, handing a bit to Luca while he bounced Julianna on his knee.

She looked so much like him. She’d inherited his long, dark lashes and thick hair, his olive skin and pouty lips. Her eyes were like mine though, light brown and round.

She started to giggle, watching her dad while he talked to her.

God, she was putty for him. He could do no wrong in her eyes, and though I couldn’t prove it, I swore she purposely saved her spit-up for me.

“I was thinking we could go on a hike later?” he asked. “Nothing too far.”

I hummed in agreement, eager to enjoy the good weather.

“I just have a bit to do at Il Mare. I need to see that Elena is managing everything all right.”

He nodded and turned back to Julianna, but she was focused on me now. She’d locked onto her mamma and I bent forward, rubbing the bottom of her feet until she lapsed into a fit of giggles. There was no better sound.

“Katerina asked about dinner tomorrow.”

He nodded. “That’d be nice. We’ll have to see them at Massimo’s. I doubt Katerina would want to trek all the way up to the villa.”

She was just beginning her seventh month of pregnancy.

“True—although, I did it.”

“Sure, though I seem to remember quite a bit of moaning about it.”

I grinned. “Only there at the end, when I was more beach ball than woman.”

Antonio came round with our espressos and we settled back into our seats to enjoy them. The street was busier than usual. It was Tuesday, so the open-air market would start soon and vendors were bustling around getting everything ready. Katerina wasn’t there—she was too tired to manage the shop and the market so close to the end of her pregnancy.