“Okay,” I say when we finally come up for air.
“Okay?” she echoes after only a moment’s pause, voice tinged with disbelief. “I chase you down a gravel road, break my shoe, become a bird toilet, then pour my goddamn heart out to you, and you say ‘okay’?”
“Give me a second to recover,” I say defensively, but I can’t hide the smile pulling at my lips. “What I mean is okay, let’s go back to the villa and stay awhile. I don’t know, maybe the rest of the summer? Then we’ll go where we each need to after that. Never running away from each other again. Because I love you, too—I basically don’t remember a time when I didn’t love you, and I’d rather not find out what that’s like. How does all that sound?”
She purses her lips like she needs to consider, before her expression breaks into the sweetest smile I’ve ever seen. “Okay,” she answers.
“Do you know how to ask Luigi to turn this cab around?”
Cam smiles against my cheek while she presses a kiss there.
“Not at all,” she answers cheerfully. “But we’ve solved bigger mysteries.”
Epilogue
One Month Later
Cammie
“I realize Luca’s only beenin my life for, like, two minutes,” I tell West as we watch the man in question order a drink at the bar, oblivious to his onlookers, “but he needs to remember he’s a father now. And there are some things a daughter can’t unsee.”
West laughs into his club soda. “I don’t know, I think he rocks the white jumpsuit.”
I scoff, bumping my hip against his. I bet it almost looks like we’re using this dance floor for its intended purpose, rather than standing here playing costume police. “You don’t have to side with him in some effort to win his approval, so he’ll give his blessings upon our courtship or whatever. Luca’s still concerned with winningmyapproval.”
As if he can hear us clear across the deck, Luca catches my judgy gaze, meeting it with a teasing lift of one sandy-brown brow. I hide my smile behind my limoncello spritzer—heavy on the spritz, as I take bambina steps into the world of adult beverages.
“Which he did pretty quickly,” West teases as he bumps me back. “Not that you give him any sign of your good opinion.”
I give a faux indifferent shrug. “Yeah, well. He missed my most angsty teen years. Making him work for it a little bit is probably healthy, for his…parental development.”
“A very mature take. I can tell you’re in your twenties now.”
As of today, that’s true—it’s the very reason we’re on this boat, cruising along through the Mediterranean waters under the glow of the late-August evening sun. Paolo was generous enough to offer the largest vessel in the Bianchi Voyages fleet for my big twentieth birthday bash, one they normally use for their “Sunset Booze Cruise.” Tonight, it’s been transformed into a nautical nightclub, complete with karaoke, a photo booth, a DJ, and a dance floor, all aligned with my chosen theme, “Bambina di Disco.”
So in that way, I am personally responsible for every hideous outfit on board.
The good ones, too, like Ilaria’s bell-bottom flares and scandalously sheer lace top, with matching orange platform heels. Or Mom’s belted minidress in this swirly, psychedelic floral print with white go-go boots. Those two were together when I first saw them, as the whole group of partygoers—thirtysome of the people I’ve spent the most time with thissummer, basically—met up at Villa Russo to shuttle over to the marina.
“It’s rude to upstage the birthday girl,” I told them.
“Bellissima Camilla, we could not if we tried,” Ilaria insisted as she fawned over my own outfit and fluffed my hair. One of the girls on my hall helped me style it today, blowing it out into long, sleek, straight layers that still have volume, thanks to how much freaking hair is on my head.
“Come on, my little disco ball.” Mom wrapped an arm around my waist, rustling the silver sequin fringe that covers the short sheath dress. “Let’s try this party thing again, maybe without an almost-physical altercation or paternity bombshell? Not that those weren’t their own boatload of fun…”
“Do you ever think it’s pretty impressive that someone as unserious as you has kept another human alive for twenty years?” I mused as we headed toward the driveway, checking over my shoulder to ensure West was still following, talking to Dr. Danny a little behind us.
“Darling daughter, you have no idea.”
Our most recent Villa Russo terrazzo–hosted party was the reason I immediately ruled that out as a location for ringing in my twentieth. But it was my mother who reached out to Paolo and got us here, on just about the dreamiest birthday party venue I could’ve imagined. And even without the extra “excitement” tonight, it’s been the best birthday of my life.
“Okay, everyone, it’s cake time! Birthday song and candles and cake and crying—but maybe the last one’s just me—on the upper deck, if you’ll all make your way there,” Mom announces,projecting her Dr. Lovett voice enough to reach a boatful of pupils, a good number of whom have certainly been enjoying the open bar.
“May I escort the Birthday Bambina to the upper deck?” West asks, extending his hand my way. I smile as I turn to take him in again, head to toe, just to bask in my own luck and love and happiness. Not only because I have the kind of boyfriend who let me choose his entire costume and offered no complaints.
It’s also because I have a boyfriend who—miraculously—looks damn good in faded jeans that are tight on top and flared at the bottom, a button-down with flowy sleeves that I left unbuttoned to his mid-chest (“showingallmy cleavage,” West had said, cheeks flaming red), and a fake Tom Selleck–style mustache.
“Naturally,” I answer primly, sliding my hand into his and still feeling the little swoop of excitement in my stomach when we touch, even with a couple months to get used to it. “There’s no other man I want to accompany me there, or to kiss me senseless despite the squirrel stuck to his upper lip.”
