That's Amore! (15 page)

"Oh, yeah? Then why do I feel like there is?"

"You want me to stop working, don't you?" she asked, surprised.

He turned his head to stare at his hands. "Okay, I admit it—I want to support you. You're going to be my wife and I want to provide for you. For our family."

Efi absorbed his honest answer, a part of her touched by his proclamation. "You know earlier, when I put my wedding dress on, I realized how much I've been looking at this, our marriage, through rose-colored glasses."

He shifted to face her more fully as if something she'd said struck a chord with him. "How so?"

She shrugged and faced him more fully as well. "I don't know. So much energy has gone into planning the wedding, into shopping for dresses, juggling relatives and guests, wrapping
boubounieras,
going to parties … well, I don't think either of us
have
much talked about what comes after. I mean beyond the obvious. Yes, we'll have our apartment. But aside from that?"

She'd warmed to her subject, finding a string she thought she could follow until it led to the answers she so desperately needed to find.

"I didn't understand until right this minute that you'd wanted me to stay home."

"Do you want to work?"

She stared at him. "Yes, I want to work. What in the world am I going to do all day at home by myself?"

"Raise our children?"

"Children? What children, Nick? It's not like we're going to start popping them out one after another the day after tomorrow."

"Why not?"

She gasped. "Are you serious? You really want my full-time job to be looking after our kids?" She held a hand up. "And where's the plural coming from? Let's start with one—a few years down the road—and see what develops from there."

He looked confused. "But I thought that's what happened. You get married, you have children and…"

Efi waited.

When it appeared he wasn't going to continue, she asked, "And what, Nick?"

He looked at a loss for words. "What what? I don't know. We go on family vacations to Greece. Buy a house in the suburbs. Go to soccer games…"

"And you have a career."

"No, I work."

Efi squinted at him. "Is that really how you view your job?"

"What, you think I enjoy crunching numbers all day, every day?"

"What, you don't think there's something wrong with spending your life doing something you don't like?"

"I didn't say I didn't like it. I said I don't enjoy it."

Efi shook her head and turned her hands palms up. "I love my job at the shop."

He blinked at her. "Really?"

His genuine shock surprised her. "Really."

His expression was so dumbfounded she almost laughed. Almost.

She nudged him in the arm. "Hey, I have an idea. I'll work and you stay home and take care of the kids."

Shock turned to insult. "What?"

She hadn't been serious, but his reaction insulted
her.
"What's so wild about that? People do it all the time nowadays."

"Not people I know."

She didn't know any that did it that way either unless the guy had been laid off or outsourced, but hey, if she loved her work and he didn't…

She leaned back on her hands. "What would you do for a living if you could do anything in the world you wanted to do?"

Back to shock.

"Come on, Nick, the question's not that difficult. Surely you've thought about doing something else."

"Never."

"Never?"

He averted his gaze. "Well, okay, maybe I thought about being an attorney at one point."

"Then why didn't you become one?"

"Because my grades weren't quite up to snuff for a scholarship and I didn't want to ask my father for the money."

"So?"

"So what? Do you know how much law school costs?"

"So? We'll get a student loan." Her use of the word "we" where moments before it had been her and him caught them both off guard.

Efi smiled at the same time Nick did. Just like that they had become a couple again. Not the same devil-may-care couple that looked only to where they might catch a few minutes alone to heat up the bed-sheets, but rather two individuals who wanted to share everything together.

"We're 'we' again," Nick said.

Efi smile widened. "Yes, I guess we are."

"Does this mean we're on again for tomorrow?"

Efi's
heart skipped a beat. While neither of them had ever vocally said the wedding was off, they'd understood that if things hadn't changed between them, it wouldn't have been right for either one of them to go through with the ceremony.

"We need to get a few things straight first," she said, tracing patterns on the bedspread increasingly closer to his leg.

"Such as?"

"Such as I don't stop working at the pastry shop."

He slowly nodded. "Okay."

"That we need to talk further about the children issue."

"But we agree now to have at least two."

"Over a period of years. And not right away."

He considered her. "I can live with that."

Now came the tough one. Efi cleared her throat and pushed forward with it. "And that you put me above your parents."

A painful expression came over his face.

"Nick, it's not what you think. Right here, right now I promise you I will never try to come between you and your parents."

He searched her face. "Then why do I need to put you above my parents?"

"Aside from the fact that I'll be your wife and the mother of your children?"

He nodded.

"To guarantee you don't allow them to come between us."

He thought on that one.

"And I promise to do the same thing with my parents." Although her parents had never tried to come between them or made any outrageous requests of him or his family, she thought wryly. "I'm not saying it's going to be easy. Far from it. Your parents are used to getting what they want from you."

"And I'm used to giving it to them."

She leaned forward on her arms, putting their faces inches apart and allowing her to stare at his delectable mouth. "Yes, well, now I'm the one you should be giving all that to."

"Efi?" he asked after staring at her mouth for a long time.

"Hmm?"

"I'm finding I want to give you much more."

She smiled and kissed him lingeringly. "Oh?"

He groaned. "Mmm. Much more."

"Then what are you waiting for?"

CHAPTER TEN

Day seven…

Efi sat in the back
of the car that was to take her to the Assumption Greek Orthodox Church. Her father had hired the brand-new black Mercedes and the inside smelled of fine leather, newness … and of nerves.

She toyed with her white gloves, readjusting the sugar cube her mother had tucked inside her right one to guarantee a sweet marriage and life with Nick. Somewhere pinned to her slip where no one could see was one of the Greek eyes that were supposed to ward off evil. She'd never gotten through to the company that had sent the wrong package, but somehow Kiki had scared up a box and her mother had handed the eyes out to everyone on hand,
then
sent her sister to the church ahead of time to hand one out to everyone else entering the church.

"Marriage is hard enough without having to worry about outsiders interfering," she'd said.

Efi wasn't sure what had happened while she was locked inside her room last night, then at the hotel later with Nick, but this morning she'd discovered a disheveled and glum Aphrodite who, when she wasn't flanked by one of her parents, was flanked by both of them. And whenever she made a move, one or the other would yank her firmly back. Family gossip had it the family was going to arrange a marriage for her back home to an older widower who would know how to keep her in line.

Efi had almost felt sorry for the girl.

Almost.

"Miss, are you ready?"

Efi stared at the driver in the rearview mirror. "No." He gave her a brief nod.

She'd been sitting in the car for a good ten minutes. Her family had already left for the church, upon her insistence. All that was left to do was for her to get there herself.

Efi rested her hand against her stomach, trying to calm the butterflies there. But far from the strange restlessness she'd experienced last night, this was more nerves than anything. That case of cold feet she suspected most brides experienced before they were to be joined with the one they loved in front of God and everyone.

Or was it?

She heard the click of her swallow over the sound of the car's air conditioner. Last night…

Last night she and Nick had talked in a way they never had before. But everything was far from settled. While they'd made some very good headway, there were still so many things to discuss, so many things to work out. Like if her father refused to allow her to do what she wanted with the shop downtown, she wanted to open her own place nearer Grosse Point, or perhaps even farther north in Royal Oak. That's something she should have discussed with her husband-to-be, right? And what if she'd awakened something in
him
that made him second-guess his own choice of careers? What if he wanted to quit his job and go to law school?

Another swallow.

The door next to her opened and she started.

She'd thought everyone had already gone ahead to the church. Instead she found her aunt Frosini climbing in next to her.

"You're about to make the biggest mistake of your life," the old woman said.

The day was sunny
and warm. The church was packed to overflowing. The best man and woman stood outside with the groom and the two families, waiting for the bride to arrive. For all intents and purposes everything was going according to plan. Only the groom knew the true extent of what had happened the night before. And despite the memorable way he'd come together with the bride, she hadn't said one way or another whether she would be at the church on time.

They'd both returned to their respective homes early that morning and he hadn't been left alone for a moment since. Initially he'd been asked where he'd been, why he hadn't called, but all that was soon forgotten as the festivities leading to where he stood now began. His own father had actually serenaded him. He hadn't known Stamatis Constantinos to sing a note in his life, yet he had gotten down on one knee and sung of a son of whom he was proud and a future that was sure to be bright.

Of course, Nick knew that when he and his new bride returned from their honeymoon he'd have to begin the long process of weaning himself from the influence of his parents, to learn how to put his own direct family—Efi—first. But for this one morning, his last as solely a son, he allowed himself to enjoy being the center of his parents' attention. Even after he'd told them that Efi's parents were not to be asked or expected to give anything to the bride and groom that they wouldn't do normally.

His mother had gasped at the news and fidgeted with her necklace. But his father had merely grinned at him in a way that Nick still wondered about. He'd expected anger, or perhaps even a long discussion where his father might try to convince him what they were asking for was reasonable. Instead Stamatis had grinned at him.

Much as he was grinning at him now.

And now it was Nick fidgeting not with his necklace but with his necktie.

Nearly everyone he knew in his lifetime was gathered for the event. Everyone but Efi.

He felt something on his left shoulder and looked to see Efi's aunt Frosini brushing lint from his suit jacket. She grabbed his chin in her bony fingers and gave him a jostle and a smile, then walked away, her black dress broken slightly by a sky-blue scarf she carried rather than wore.

Strange old woman, Aunt Frosini. For the past week he'd gotten nothing but evil looks from her. He'd feel the hairs at the back of his neck stand up on end and turn around and find her staring at him, as if wishing him some sort of ill will. But now he couldn't help thinking he'd been given a nod of some sort, a vote of confidence that perhaps he hadn't had before, but had somehow earned between then and now.

Or maybe she knew something he didn't… He squared his shoulders. It was just nerves, he told himself. Efi was coming. Of course she was coming. Wasn't she?

He looked at his watch. She was already more than forty-five minutes late. While it was tradition for the bride to keep the groom waiting—some sort of dominance thing, much like the stepping on the foot directly after the ceremony—wasn't forty-five minutes too long?

He leaned toward her father. "Who's with her?"

Gregoris Panayotopoulou stared at him beneath his bushy brows. "What do you mean who's with her?" He swept his arm wide. "Do you not see everyone here?"

Nick fought a sudden rush of panic. "No one's with her? She's alone?"

"The driver's with her."

"The driver…"

"Of the car I rented for the occasion."
A stranger…

He reached into his pants pocket for his car keys, only to find them not there. He'd given them to his
koumbaros
—his best man, Alex—for safekeeping.

"Give me my keys," he said, pushing Alex from where he was talking to Kiki in a way that told him there might be another wedding not far in the future.

"Why? Did you forget something out of your car?"

"Just give me the goddamn keys!"

Alex began handing them over. "I wouldn't go just yet."

"Why?"

His friend grinned just as he heard the strident honking of a car horn. "Because your bride just turned the corner."

Efi took her father's hand
and climbed from the back of the car. Her pulse beat slightly faster, but nothing she couldn't handle. Her family and friends applauded her appearance as her eyes swept the crowd looking for Nick.

"Are you ready?" her father asked, beaming down proudly at her.

She kissed him on the cheek and nodded.

Then the group parted, opening a path to where Nick waited for her at the bottom of the church steps.

Her heart skipped a beat.

So breathtakingly handsome, this man who was going to be her husband in a few short minutes.

She began walking toward him on her father's arm, her gaze catching on a spot of bright blue as she walked.

Aunt Frosini…

"You're about to make the biggest mistake of your life," the old woman had said when she'd climbed into the back of the car at the house.

Efi had been afraid she was going to play into all her fears about her coming nuptials. Instead, the old woman had shared with her a story so similar to hers they could have been the same woman.

It seemed when her mother had said Frosini's plans for marriage to a man back in their home village had fallen through and had involved land and goats she had been only partially right. There had also existed an Aphrodite in Frosini's life. A woman, a relative, who had tried to steal her groom from her.

Only ultimately she hadn't had to steal him. Because Frosini had readily given him up.

"I allowed fear to guide my actions," she'd told Efi in the back of that air-conditioned car, the driver trying to appear not to be listening but listening nonetheless.

She'd taken Efi's hands and stared deep into her eyes. "Marry Nick,
agape mou.
Marry Nick and complete the circle I broke so long ago."

Now Efi smiled at the old woman who had lived her life as a single woman, an outcast in Greek society, a person forever relegated to be someone's aunt or pain in the ass.

A woman who had drawn a map for her that led straight to her heart.

Efi's father stopped and she blinked to find she stood at the foot of the steps, looking into Nick's dark, dark eyes. She saw hope and happiness and love. She also saw the same fear of the unknown she felt in the pit of her stomach like a pool of mercury.

Nick held out his hand. Efi looked at it,
then
back up at him. And when she put her fingers in his, she did so knowing that whatever they faced, they would do it as a couple. In every sense of the word…