Summer At Villa Rosa Collection. Kate Hardy

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СКАЧАТЬ not, but the thought of pretending that their marriage was more than it was, turning it into a celebration, was not something she could face. No doubt there would be a party of some sort when they got home but that was all it would be—a party. Not a wedding reception.

      ‘Maybe we’re getting ahead of ourselves,’ she said. ‘We’ll have to make enquiries about the legalities. There’ll probably be all kinds of rules and regulations. A million forms—’

      ‘No.’

      ‘No?’

      ‘It would be different in Italy. Yards of red tape, all the stuff we’d have to do at home and then a whole lot of other stuff on top.’

      ‘But not here?’

      ‘No. L’Isola dei Fiori is a small island, the communities are close-knit, relationships are well known. No one could commit bigamy or marry a cousin because everyone would know the minute they applied for a licence.’ Cleve shifted his shoulders. It wasn’t a shrug, more an expression of awkwardness. ‘The clerk in the post office was very helpful.’

      ‘You went into the post office to check up on the legal requirements for marriage? After I turned you down?’

      ‘I went into the post office to call Lucy and pick up some local currency but while I was there I thought I might as well make enquiries.’

      ‘It sounds as if you had quite a conversation.’

      ‘A lot more information than I needed. One woman in the queue told me that if you wanted to marry your cousin you’d have to fly to Las Vegas.’

      ‘She spoke English?’

      ‘The clerk was translating.’

      ‘Oh. Quite a party, then.’ She was struggling not to smile at the image this scene was creating. ‘Does that happen often?’ she asked. ‘Cousins marrying in Las Vegas?’

      ‘Apparently not because you could never come back and being exiled from L’Isola dei Fiori would be as if you were dead. Like this.’ He mimed stabbing himself through the heart. ‘What the locals lacked in language skills they made up for in gesture.’

      ‘Right.’ She made a valiant effort not to laugh. ‘Well, so long as you didn’t go out of your way.’

      ‘Why would I do that when you’d turned me down?’

      ‘Because you’re a pilot and you’ve been trained to anticipate every eventuality.’

      She turned to him and discovered that he was smiling. One of those old-time Cleve smiles that had stolen her teenage heart and, hit by a wave of dizziness, she made a grab for the table. Before she made it his arm was around her shoulders and she was close against him breathing in a mix of smoke, old wet plaster, warm skin. It wasn’t helping...

      ‘Are you okay?’

      ‘Just a bit dizzy.’ His shoulder was just the right height for her head and she leaned against it. ‘It’s the sugar rush from all that banana, marmalade and orange juice on an empty stomach.’ Had to be. ‘I had the same training as you, Cleve, which is why I know that if you’d been here you would have done exactly what I did and I’d have been the one having kittens instead of you.’

      ‘Kittens? I thought we were having a baby.’

      She dug him in the ribs with her elbow.

      ‘I’m just saying that I understand why you reacted as you did.’ Fear driving anger... ‘I’d have been the one yelling at you for being an idiot,’ she said.

      ‘Would have been? From where I was standing you were yelling like a fishwife.’

      ‘Yes. Sorry. It’s the hormones.’

      ‘Of course it is.’

      ‘Are you laughing at my hormones?’ she said into his shoulder.

      ‘I wouldn’t dare.’

      ‘Wise man.’ Cleve’s arm was around her, her head was on his shoulder and suddenly she was smiling fit to bust. Not cool. This was a marriage of convenience, an arranged marriage. She’d arranged it.

      She straightened her face, cleared her throat, sat up. ‘Could you spare some of that ham?’ He raised his eyebrows. ‘I haven’t eaten properly for days.’

      He made her a sandwich, she took a bite, groaned with pleasure. ‘So what are they? These minimal legalities?’

      ‘We have to swear a Declaration of No Impediment before a notary, present it in Italian and English at the local government office in any town, along with our passports and the sindaco, the mayor, will issue a licence.’

      ‘That’s it?’

      ‘That’s it. All we have to do is decide where we’re going to hold the ceremony and who we want to conduct it.’

      ‘Can’t the mayor do that? In the town hall?’

      ‘I imagine so. We can ask when we get the licence. Do you want to go into San Rocco tomorrow to make an appointment with a notary? We could have lunch, do a little shopping?’

      ‘Shopping?’

      ‘Unless you packed an emergency wedding dress?’

      ‘All I’ve got in my bag are jeans, leggings and tops. Even for the most basic wedding I think I’ll need something a little more elegant.’ She felt a blush creep into her cheeks. ‘Not anything—’ she made a helpless gesture with her hand, unable to bring herself to say bridal ‘—you know...’

      ‘Frilly?’ he offered.

      ‘That’s the word.’

      ‘But it should be special.’

      ‘Yes.’ She’d only be doing this once. ‘Have you got a jacket?’

      ‘Not one I’d want to get married in. I need a new suit.’

      ‘Well, that’s convenient.’

      She would be in a special dress, Cleve would be wearing a suit and Matt could use her phone to video them making their vows and signing the register to send to their parents, her sisters, with the news that not only had they got married but they were going to have a baby.

      And afterwards, he would take a photograph of the two of them standing on the steps of the town hall that she could print out, put in a silver frame and tuck away in her underwear drawer.

      Just for her.

       CHAPTER SEVEN

      ANDIE CLEANED UP the kitchen and the stove while Cleve went to look for a ladder so that he could check the roof and see what he’d need to fix it.

      He’d stripped off his shirt СКАЧАТЬ