“Maybe I’ll come to your island sometime,” he said, his voice wavering.
Estelle kissed him then, if only to keep him from making promises that he couldn’t keep. The kiss was splendorous; it seemed to stop time. But when it was over, Estelle opened her eyes to find Albert before her—just a man in the world. He wasn’t her next love story. She could feel it in her bones.
After their kiss, Albert walked Estelle back to her hotel, where he kissed her on both cheeks and said good night. “I’ll be watching for your new book!” He called into the night, just before he disappeared around a pillar.
Estelle went upstairs to find Rachelle still fast asleep, as though her body couldn’t get enough rest. Estelle washed her face and slid into bed beside her granddaughter. Exhausted, she fell asleep almost immediately. Estelle knew it would be brighter in the morning. The events of the previous few days would collapse on themselves, and they’d be able to understand everything that had transpired better soon. But just now, their bodies needed sleep.
21
It was the morning after Rachelle’s first sleepover at her grandmother’s hotel—the first blue-eyed morning of Rachelle’s reunion with her family. Rachelle couldn't describe the peace she felt. Rachelle and Estelle were in the breakfast room of the hotel, their plates full of eggs and bacon and cream-filled croissants and various types of cheeses. Rachelle sipped coffee and watched the others in the hotel, dining and laughing together in various stages of pajamas or not, many of whom were married couples, maybe on their honeymoon. The idea that maybe she and Riccardo wouldn’t get married, that they wouldn’t have a honeymoon, tore her apart inside. But it excited her, too—the prospect that she could have a new story and escape the poison that was Riccardo’s family. She hadn’t thought it was possible before.
“I think I need to talk to Riccardo,” she told Estelle that morning. “I don’t want to make any decisions before I see him.”
Estelle had outlined her idea: that they return to Nantucket, that she use the money she’d earned from her most recent book sales to help Rachelle get started on a Nantucket-based restaurant, and that they “blow this Roman popsicle stand andrejoin the girls at home.” But Estelle told Rachelle that despite her rhetoric, she understood that they couldn’t escape as easily as that. “You’re engaged,” Estelle said quietly. “I understand how complicated it all is.”
Because her grandmother didn’t want Rachelle to be in the dark about anything, Estelle explained what Tio Alberto had told her about the restaurant. “He doesn’t think they set the place on fire deliberately. But he says there’s a mountain of evidence that suggests they’re not who they say they are. Namely, they don’t have any of the money they throw around. And they’re trying to lie and scheme and manipulate Albert to return to where they were, status-wise.”
Rachelle was taken aback. “I don’t understand?” She told her grandmother about their immaculate house, their fine food and expensive wines, and so on. Estelle shrugged her shoulders. “Maybe they’ve convinced themselves of that lie, too. Maybe they can’t see themselves as anything but what they want to be, or what they used to be.”
It hurt Rachelle to think about it.
But she couldn’t find the nerve to meet up with Riccardo today. Today was for walking the streets with her grandmother, for eating gelato and recounting their memories from the previous few years. Rachelle had a hunch that Estelle had a minor crush on Albert, although she couldn’t say how serious it was, and she couldn’t tell how much Estelle wanted to talk about him. Suffice it to say, it was clear that Estelle was still grieving the loss of her husband, of Rachelle’s grandfather. But Rachelle was so glad to see Estelle living again.
After turning her phone back on the following morning, Rachelle saw she had a number of missed calls from Riccardo, proof of how frantic he had felt. She texted to ask where he’d be later that afternoon. He wrote back immediately to say that he could meet her at home.
RICCARDO: I need to see you. I’m going crazy.
Rachelle wasn’t sure what to make of it. On the walk from her grandmother’s hotel to the apartment she shared with Riccardo in Trastevere, she recounted to herself the beautiful memories that she and Riccardo had shared. She remembered picking out this very apartment together. She remembered that they’d told themselves it was their “starter” apartment en route to better and bigger spaces. Rachelle had half imagined one day bringing her mother and sister here, showing them where she and Riccardo had built their lives.
Now, she limped through the door to find Riccardo on the sofa. His cheeks were red, and his eyes glinted with tears. Or was it all an act? Rachelle wasn’t sure what to think.
Riccardo twisted around to look at her. Rachelle felt a rush of love that she tried and failed to dismiss. Instead, tears filled her eyes, too. She went over and sat beside him. For a little while, they held hands and stared at the black television in front of them, as though the empty screen could tell them anything about their future.
Rachelle waited for Riccardo to speak first, because there were too many things in her head, and she didn’t know what would come out of her mouth if she opened it.
“They told me about your restaurant,” Riccardo said, speaking English for what felt like the first time in ages. “They told me that they had Tio Alberto buy it for me.”
Rachelle let her shoulders slump forward.
Riccardo wiped tears from his cheeks. “I think you’re starting to see how messed up my family is. I was raised under so much pressure, Rachelle. When my mother found out I was going to be working as a sous chef under you—at a restaurant you owned—she panicked. I think she imagined what all her friends would say.”
Rachelle withdrew her hand from Riccardo’s, not because she wanted to be mean, but because she wanted to remain inside herself, separate from him. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Riccardo moaned. “I didn’t know how. I was hoping that you’d get distracted with the wedding and all the chaos of planning it. I was hoping…” He trailed off. “I mean, you love me, don’t you?”
Rachelle was taken aback. “Of course I love you.” She was surprised how easy it still was to say that.
Riccardo smiled, as though that settled things. “My family has lost so much of their money over the years. I wasn’t in charge, so I don’t know what went wrong. But that’s why it’s been so important that Tio Angelo is back. My mother sees him as a master of finance. She keeps saying that he’s going to dig us out of this mess. I don’t know!” Riccardo threw up his hands. “I think we should just run off and elope, Rachelle.”
For a moment, Rachelle considered that. She imagined leaping into a taxi and heading straight for the Roman courthouse—a place that looked far more majestic and ancient and storied than anything in the United States. She imagined kissing Riccardo on the steps of the courthouse, throwing a bouquet to passing tourists who told her how beautiful they looked. She imagined dragging Riccardo back over the Atlantic, where her grandmother had promised to help her open her own restaurant on Nantucket, where she belonged.
But Riccardo had other things on his mind, it seemed.
“When they told me about the restaurant,” Riccardo continued, “I didn’t know how to tell you. I swear, I couldn’t sleep, Rachelle.”
Rachelle wanted to scoff at that. Riccardo had slept like a baby ever since they’d met. The previous few weeks had been no different.
“But there’s no reason that it can’t be like before!” Riccardo cried. “I mean, sort of like before. I would be the head chef in name alone. We could work together, Rachelle. It wouldn’t be your restaurant or my restaurant, really.”
