“In Italy, a notte bianca is a sleepless night. Shops remain open, the streets fill with people, and everything that normally happens during the day happens under the moon instead.”
I pause. I’m a man of action, not words. Writing down these vows was hard enough. Remembering them is harder still.
But Izzy is worth it. For her, I will become a man of words just this once.
“It is the one night when light and dark stop fighting each other. They mix together. They become indistinguishable.”
Her eyes begin to glisten.
“For most of my life,” I continue, “I believed darkness defined me. My work, my responsibilities, the world I inherited. A man raised the way I was does not expect redemption. Survival is often the most we can ask from life.”
My thumb brushes lightly over her knuckles.
“You did not try to change that world. You did not demand that I abandon it.”
Her breath trembles slightly now.
“You accepted it,” I say quietly. “And you brought your own light into it. You made the night beautiful.”
A tear slips down her cheek.
“I spent most of my life believing kings stand alone,” I continue. “Now I know better. I am no longer alone, and I owe that miracle to you.”
I lift her hand slightly.
“My queen.”
Then I kiss it.
“Wow,” Leone mutters. “Way to break protocol.”
The room erupts in snorts again.
Izzy laughs softly through her tears. “How in the hell am I supposed to top that?”
The bridesmaids giggle.
But then Izzy takes a breath and turns serious again. “I didn’t expect this,” she says, and the honesty in her voice goes straight through me. “Fairytale love doesn’t happen to girls like me. Girls who grow up worrying about rent and overtime shifts.”
She glances at the other women standing nearby. Erin squeezes Luca’s hand. Savannah leans into Riccardo. Rose and Amber exchange knowing smiles with their men.
“But I’ve seen it happen four times now,” Izzy says. “And in our case… twice. Once seven years ago, and once now.”
Her fingers tighten around mine.
“They say lightning doesn’t strike twice,” she continues softly. “But sometimes it does.”
Her eyes shine as she studies me.
“You’re the kind of dad Noah waited for his whole life. The kind of husband I never dared to imagine. The kind of king who makes a girl like me feel like a queen.”
My chest clenches hard.
“I love you,” she says simply. “I’ve always loved you. And after seven years apart, I don’t want to spend another second of my life without you.”
She squeezes my hand. I squeeze back.
Leone wipes imaginary tears from his eyes. “That’s the most romantic thing I’ve heard since I got certified online.”
