by Paula Kay
“I think we all know the answer to that question,” said Lia.
Gigi nodded. “Arianna does seem to have a way of bringing us all together.”
“Just like she wanted,” said Blu quietly.
Lia looked at them both sitting beside her. “Isn’t it pretty amazing?”
“What’s that?” said Blu.
“I just count myself so blessed to have you both in my life. It’s a miracle to me that I actually took the chance on contacting Arianna all those years ago when I did. To think what would have happened if I had waited.” Lia’s body visibly shook at the thought of it.
Gigi put her arm around her friend. “Well, it’s a good thing that you don’t have to think about those what ifs. Everything happened exactly how it was meant to happen. And let’s not forget that it wasn’t just good timing for you. It was a timing that made all the difference to Ari. I know that for a fact, as do you.”
Lia and Blu nodded their heads in agreement with their friend and Lia wiped away a single tear—not of sadness, but gratefulness for everything and everyone that she had in her life.
Chapter 15
Gigi smiled at Lucas when she saw him making his way across the room toward her table. Everyone seemed busy chatting, and the kids were amused by the gifts that Sofia had given them earlier in the evening.
Gigi had been feeling that a nice chat between her and Lucas would probably do a lot to put her mind at ease about one of the only regrets that still haunted her from time to time, so she welcomed him approaching her now.
“Gigi, can I get you a wine and then join you for a bit?”
“That sounds lovely, Lucas. Yes, please.” Gigi handed him her empty wine glass and watched him walk over to the bar in the corner, stopping where his wife sat for just long enough to lean down and whisper in her ear. Gigi didn’t miss the quick brush of their lips and the genuine happiness that seemed to radiate from him and Kate whenever she saw them together. She’d spent hardly any time yet with the pair, but it was evident to her that they were well suited to one another.
“Here you go.” Lucas put her wine down on the table in front of her and then sat down opposite her at the small table.
“Thank you,” said Gigi as she started to raise her glass to her mouth.
“To Tuscany—and to Isabella,” Lucas said, holding his glass out beside hers.
“Cheers to that. Do you like the wine?” It was one of Gigi’s favorites from Antonio’s vineyard.
“I do, yes.” Lucas was quiet for a moment. “Gigi, I just wanted you to know that I don’t blame you—for anything in the past, I mean.” He placed his hand over Gigi’s and her eyes instantly filled with tears.
She took a deep breath in to try to calm her tears before she spoke. “I’ve thought about you a lot over the years—about the secrets, about Isabella—before we all met her, I mean. It feels like ages ago and then I have to remind myself that it’s been only months now. As soon as she knew there was a chance of finding you, she wanted that. And I must admit, the relief I felt was so great, Lucas. I always wanted you to know that you had a daughter.”
Gigi stopped to wipe her eyes on the napkin that she held in her hand.
“Please don’t cry. I would hate for you to feel anything other than happiness now for how everything has turned out. We can’t change the past—neither one of us. The important thing is that we’ve all come together now. The fact that Isabella is in my life is nothing short of a miracle to me—the fact that she even exists. Of course, it’s unfortunate that I missed so much of her life—that we all did—but from the looks of things, I’d say that the future seems pretty bright.”
Gigi smiled, feeling any anxiety she’d been holding onto about Lucas leave her body. He was the same gentle boy she remembered from so long ago.
“You were always so good to her, Lucas. Arianna knew that, even though I know she didn’t always treat you the best when you were together.”
Gigi used to scold Arianna tirelessly about how flippant she was in her relationship to Lucas; and then after she’d returned from being away to have Isabella, Arianna couldn’t even be convinced to speak to him. Gigi knew that it had been mostly Arianna’s own guilt along with the pressure of her parents, but it didn’t excuse the confusion that Lucas must have felt at the time.
Lucas was shaking his head. “Arianna never felt for me the way that I felt for her. I knew that, even before she went away and everything ended. And well, there’s nothing really to say about it now. I’d hate to think that Arianna died without forgiving herself; from what Isabella has shared with me, it seems that she had given herself the gift of forgiveness in the end. I’m grateful for that—and most of all, for the chance to know Isabella. That’s all that matters now.”
Gigi nodded. “And you have Kate and Annie, who both seem so lovely.”
As if on cue, Annie come running from across the room to hurl her little body into Lucas’s lap.
“Daddy! Look what Miss Sofia gave me.” She held up a small doll with wavy blond hair and a beautiful woven gown. “She says she picked her out because she looked like me—from the picture that Bella showed her from when she visited my room and had a tea party with me and Thomas at our house in San Francisco.” Annie stopped as if she’d just noticed Gigi sitting there across from her father. “Bella is my sister. She’s real nice.”
Gigi laughed. “Oh, I agree, honey. And she sure is happy to have you for a sister. And you know what?”
“What?” Annie’s eyes were wide, as if she couldn’t wait to hear a secret.
“We’re all very happy that you came here to Italy to celebrate Christmas with us. I’m pretty sure that Santa got a special note to let him know that you were away on a trip.”
Annie nodded her head. “Yes, Daddy helped me write a letter to Santa and we gave him the address of Lia’s house.” She scrunched up her forehead as if deep in thought.
“What’s wrong?” said Lucas, winking at Gigi.
“Daddy, do you think Santa will be able to find the vineyard? It was an awful long drive from the airplane to get here. It was so long that I fell asleep, remember, Daddy?”
Lucas laughed and then adjusted his face when Annie looked at him so seriously.
“Oh, yes. Santa has helpers from all over the world that make maps for him of the different places. Santa never gets lost.”
Annie jumped off Lucas’s lap, all smiles again. “Okay, I gotta go tell Kylie this important information.”
Gigi and Lucas looked at one another and burst out laughing.
“She sure is adorable,” said Gigi. “And smart.”
“She’s a handful, alright.”
Gigi followed Lucas’s gaze to where Kate was laughing with the younger girls and waited for his attention before she spoke. “I’m glad things have worked out for you, Lucas. You seem to have a good life—a happy life. For what it’s worth, in the end, I know that this is what Arianna wanted for you. She had really changed toward the end of her life.” Gigi smiled at the look Lucas gave her. “I loved that girl as if she were my own, but I know she was very selfish when she was younger—when the two of you dated.” Gigi looked down at the table and then back up into Lucas’s eyes. “But she did change in the end. She knew the mistakes she’d made and the wrongs that needed to be made right. She tried her best to make that happen.”
Lucas reached out again to take Gigi’s hand. “I can only imagine, and I’m so sorry for all the loss you’ve had. I hope that knowing now that I don’t hold any grudges against you or Ari—against anyone—for that time will alleviate any of the guilt you’ve felt over the years.” He squeezed her hand gently. “I really mean that, Gigi.”
“Thank you, Lucas. You have no idea what that means to me.”
Gigi felt something inside her shift. It was the final bit of guilt that she’d been hanging on to for all these years. Knowing that Lucas forgave her, and maybe more importantly, that he forgave Arianna, left her with a feeling of relief tha
t she’d not even imagined possible. She quickly wiped her tears away as she saw Isabella coming toward them from across the room.
“Hey, you two.” Isabella leaned down to kiss first Gigi and then Lucas on the cheek. “It’s a nice party, isn’t it? I think that Lia’s meal was the best I’ve ever eaten, but she assures me that it only gets better with Christmas dinner at the villa.” Isabella winked.
“You’re right about that—which reminds me—I need to go speak to Lia about something. Sit here, Bella.”
“Are you sure? I didn’t mean to interrupt anything.” Isabella looked from Gigi to Lucas, who’d gotten up to give Gigi a hug before she walked away.
“Yes. Yes, I’m sure.” Gigi looked at Lucas after they’d hugged. “Thank you, Lucas. You have no idea of the difference your words have made to me tonight. I’m extremely grateful and so very glad that you’re here—we all are.” Gigi looked at Isabella and then back at Lucas. “I’ll leave you two to chat.”
Chapter 16
Isabella smiled at Lucas across the table. “It sounds like that went well.”
Gigi had shared with Isabella about the guilt she’d felt in regards to Lucas and Arianna. Isabella had also known from the time she’d spent talking to Lucas that he didn’t harbor any ill feelings toward Gigi, so it was wonderful to see the exchange that had obviously taken place.
“It did, yes. I always liked Gigi—especially the fact that she was intensely protective of Ari back then. I understand how difficult it probably was for her—just all of it, I mean.”
“I think keeping secrets must be hard.” Even as Isabella heard the words out of her mouth she did a quick mental check about any secrets that she might be keeping herself these days. Nope, all pretty good—not including the thoughts that she wasn’t sharing with Thomas about Thomas.
Lucas laughed. “What’s that look? Dare I ask?”
Isabella laughed too and shook her head. “Oh, nothing. Just a little drama going on inside my head.”
“I’m a good listener—if you want to talk about it. And not that people have been saying anything in particular, but I gather it has something to do with Thomas?”
Isabella crinkled her nose. “So, I guess this is what I have to look forward to now, belonging to this big family of sorts—everyone in my business.” She was joking, but at the same time she couldn’t help but wonder what the others had been saying.
“Oh, no, Isabella. I don’t mean to imply that. No one was saying anything bad and I don’t think it was about nosiness, really. Everyone just really cares about you, of course. They want to you to be happy. And we all know how important your relationship—your friendship—with Thomas is to you, so that’s all it is. And you don’t have to tell me anything at all. We certainly have plenty of things to talk about, don’t we?”
Isabella smiled and reached across the table to put her hand on Lucas’s. “You know what? Maybe I would like to get your perspective on things. It’s nice that you and Kate have met him—that you’ve spent time around the two of us together.” Isabella glanced around the room until her eyes landed on Kate.
“Shall I bring Kate over to join us?” Lucas asked. “Honestly, she gives great advice. Take it from someone who’s listened to her a time or two.”
Isabella nodded. “Yes, please. I’m going to go refill my coffee before my therapy session begins.”
Lucas laughed as he got up to go get Kate.
Isabella was lucky that she had so many people in her life who cared about her. It was unbelievable to her that she’d gone from being a girl who kept so much bottled up inside—well, apart from telling Thomas every secret she’d ever had—to being someone who was willing to be open and honest with so many people in her life that she now trusted.
As she waited for Lucas and Kate back at the table, Isabella flashed to words that Arianna had written her in so many of the letters in the journal she’d left for her daughter—words about being open and honest. Her mother had wanted some things for Isabella that she’d only known in those last few months of her life.
Even though Isabella was coming against some bumps along the way, she was determined to always keep those wishes in her mind—to not close herself off to those who loved her and maybe, more importantly, to not close herself off to true love when it made itself known to her.
Was that why she was so willing to talk to Lucas and Kate about Thomas? Maybe she wanted some kind of assurance from someone else that she wasn’t crazy—that there was something other than friendship there between them.
Before she had time to dwell on what she would and wouldn’t reveal, Kate was leaning down to give her a big hug.
“Isabella, we love it here so much. I’m still pinching myself that we actually made the trip. It’s like a dream for all of us. And Annie—well, I’m not at all convinced that she’s going to want to leave with us.” Kate and Lucas both laughed as they looked over where Annie was deeply engrossed in something with her new friends.
“Well, I love having you all here—and I know I speak for everyone,” said Isabella.
Kate scooted her chair in closer to Isabella’s. “So, Lucas told me that you wanted to share something with us—something that’s going on with you and Thomas. I did wonder if everything was okay, but I didn’t want to pry.”
Isabella took a deep breath and then filled Lucas and Kate in on everything that had happened since they’d last seen her in San Francisco at Thanksgiving. She told them about the night in the hotel room—about how she felt being so close with Thomas there. And she told them about the one kiss they’d shared only a week ago.
She tried not to get emotional about it as she talked, but before she could help it, Kate was handing her some tissue and putting her arm around her.
“So, as you can see, things have been a little weird between us lately. But we are talking and on the surface, everything is fine—back to normal, I suppose.”
“But maybe it’s not so fine with you.” Kate looked at her intently.
Isabella swallowed the lump in her throat and could only nod her head, because she thought that speaking in that moment would cause her to burst into tears. She didn’t want to make a commotion that would draw the attention of Lia, who was busy with her guests in the restaurant.
“Love is so tricky sometimes. I don’t know why that is, but there’s no other way to describe it.” Kate laughed and then must have noticed a look of surprise on Isabella’s face. “Okay, so regardless of where you two stand, I can use the word love because I know you two love one another as friends. Isn’t that right? It sure felt that way when you were together at our house, so I don’t think I’m speaking out of turn.”
“No, that’s a fair thing to say. And I think Thomas would agree. Really, that’s why this whole thing is an issue—because we don’t want to mess that up, right?”
Lucas was watching the two of them from across the table and finally he grinned at Kate. “So, are you going to tell Isabella, or should I?” He laughed.
Kate laughed too and reached down to squeeze Isabella’s hand. “Go ahead.” She rolled her eyes, and the whole exchange had Isabella’s curiosity so piqued that her tears stopped almost immediately.
“Do tell. I feel a story coming on,” said Isabella.
Lucas proceeded to tell Isabella the story of how he and Kate had met one another at a mutual friend’s party and become best friends in the several months following, and how oblivious he’d been for the better part of an entire year of their hanging out with each other.
Kate’s version of the story sounded much like how Isabella had always felt about Thomas. Like Isabella with Thomas, she’d greatly valued Lucas’s friendship. Then one day when Lucas had been asking her advice about his current girlfriend, she looked at him and realized that she didn’t want him to be with anyone else.
“And did you know then that you loved him?” Isabella asked, genuinely in awe over their story and how much her own feelings seemed to mirror the ones that Kate had
been having for Lucas.
“Heck, no.” Kate laughed. “Like you, it freaked me out and I didn’t know what to do about how I was feeling.”
Lucas laughed. “Kate pulled away from me big time and, I admit, it took me a while to figure out how much I missed her being in my life.”
Isabella giggled. “Well, I guess at least one of you finally figured it out.”
Kate laughed too. “Lucas finally came to his senses, asking me what was up.”
“And? You told him the truth?”
“I had no choice. I was a mess, quite honestly. At that point, I figured I didn’t have much to lose. Oh, I still didn’t know that I loved him, but I told him that I was confused about my feelings for him. After a very awkward conversation, he called me the next day to tell me that he wanted us to go on a proper date.”
Lucas laughed. “And the rest, as they say, is history.”
Kate leaned over to give Lucas a kiss on the cheek before she turned back toward Isabella to finish the story. “He took me for a picnic in Golden Gate Park. We spent hours talking on a blanket before he finally kissed me””
“—And two months later during a weekend trip to Vegas, we were married.” Lucas interrupted.
Isabella felt her eyes grow wide. “You eloped?”
Kate turned toward Lucas and reached out for the hand he offered her. “We sure did. And I paid a bit of a price for it from my mother, but she got over it.” Kate laughed.
“I blame it on the lucky streak we’d been having. I don’t really gamble much, but I’d won a few hands of poker that night and at one point I looked over at Kate, who’d been sitting beside me watching the game. I know it sounds corny to say, but I suddenly had this realization that I didn’t want to lose her—not ever.”
Kate laughed. “And the next thing I knew, he’d grabbed my hand and off we went to the Elvis chapel down the street.”