That's Amore! - Janelle Denison [50]
"You? What about my shop? Do you know how much money it's going to cost to repair the damage you've done? Forget the window—the pieces that were in the display are destroyed."
"Stop it!" Efi shouted. "Just stop it!"
Everyone stood and stared at her, Nick included. He lifted a hand to rub his chin, half hiding his grin.
"Both of you go home. Now. And think long and hard about what you've done."
"I've—"
"Quiet! I'm not finished." Efi cleared her throat, trying to get her own emotions under control. "I want you both to think about what happened today. And tomorrow I want you both at my wedding ready to apologize."
"Apol—"
"Shush! Not a word." She looked at her parents, who seemed frozen to the spot, watching her.
Her father cleared his throat. "I'll take Dad home."
Nick's parents considered Gus. "And we'll take him home."
Efi nodded her thanks.
Her father began walking away with his father. Efi could just make out her grandfather saying, "First we have to stop to get my car and the furniture. I want to get it set up in the apartment before tomorrow…"
Efi shook her head when she and Nick finally stood on the sidewalk alone.
"What a nightmare," she whispered, watching as the last of her eccentric family finally disappeared down the street.
Nick was toying with something at the neck of her shirt. "Cute. Can I see the rest of it?"
She realized he was referring to her nightshirt, the one with Betty Boop on it proclaiming how good it was to be bad.
Efi swatted Nick's hand away. "After tomorrow you'll get to see as much of it as you want to."
Not that she intended to wear the old nightgown to bed with her new husband. Well, at least not for the first month or so. She'd bought all sorts of sexy new nighties to keep him entertained.
Although given the way he was looking at her and her Betty Boop nightshirt, she wondered if she hadn't wasted her money.
He bent down and kissed her leisurely, seeming to forget they were standing in front of a police station.
"You do realize we're completely alone," he said, kissing her again. "No families hassling us to do something." Efi melted against him as he kissed her again. "No one looking over our shoulders…"
She pressed her hand against his chest with the intention of pushing him away. Instead she leaned closer. "You realize we're at risk of being arrested for indecent public display of affection, don't you?"
"Mmm. All things considered, I can think of worse things," Nick said, kissing her more deeply.
The shrill beep of a car horn.
Efi lazily blinked to find her father's car at the curb packed full of her relatives.
He'd come back for her.
"Shit," Nick said, smiling down at her.
"You can say that again."
"Efi! Get in the car this minute!" her mother yelled.
"You'd think we were teenagers and they'd forbidden us from seeing each other," she said, kissing Nick this time.
"Instead we're getting married tomorrow."
Getting married… She and Nick…
Efi smiled and kissed him one last time before going to join her family in the car.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Day six continued…
STRANGE THAT EVEN as the arrangements for her wedding came together, Efi's very life seemed to be coming apart at the seams.
Efi stood in front of her bedroom mirror plucking and pulling at her new dinner dress. Forget that she couldn't seem to sneak a few much-needed moments alone with her groom. But worse, every time she turned around, she ran into her cousin Aphrodite, who seemed overly curious about "the groom." While her nonstop questions might sound natural coming from anyone else, the constant "how did you two meet?", "where does he work?", "how many children does he want?" came off a little too … personal for Efi's liking.
"Oh, stop it," she muttered to her reflection. "Your cousin is not trying to steal your groom."
She only wished she believed her words.
Only one more day to go, she whispered to herself. And she and Nick would be husband and wife.
She started. Is that how she viewed marriage? As a type of ownership? Put a ring on Nick's finger and he was taken, her property,