He pointed frantically in the direction of the dining room.
“I love my brother with all my heart and soul, but that guy in there is killing me. Five kids! Who, by age twenty-six, has five kids? I’m older than Tony and not even married. Not even engaged. Hell, the last time I had a steady girlfriend was when I was still in college. I like the single life. I like being unencumbered. Kids scare the shit out of me, and every woman I’ve ever dated wants like twelve of them.”
He inhaled several gulps of air.
“I come from a family of six siblings, Elizabeth. Only my little sister Ginny is still unmarried, and that’s just because she’s a college junior. But even she’s got a serious boyfriend. Andy-something-or-other. And he looks like the type who’ll propose the second after he crosses the stage at graduation. The others are scattered around the country, but they call Mama. They speculate about me and exert their pressure on me long distance.”
He ran his fingers through his thick dark wavy hair and looked at her with the closest thing to “fear” she’d ever seen on his handsome face.
“I know this has to be really awful for you,” he said. “But would you please pretend you’re my girlfriend, just for a few weeks? We can break up when our uncles come back from Europe. I’ll go back to Chicago and won’t ever bother you again. And I promise I’ll make it seem like I’m the bad guy so you don’t have to deal with my family’s wrath or resentment if you run into any of them in town.” He paused. “I’d be forever indebted to you, Elizabeth, and in the meantime I’ll work all of your shifts so you can finish your cookbook. I—I own a restaurant. I know how to make really great sandwiches. I can bring lunch over to you on my break. If you’ve got a dog, I can walk him. I do windows. I’ll have Jacques teach me how to make éclairs and—”
“Rob?”
“Yeah?”
“W-Would you please shut up now?”
He clamped his lips together so comically she was seduced into laughing. And then, despite the absolute horrendousness of his idea, she found herself agreeing to “be his girlfriend” (and, yes, coming to family dinners as such) for the month of June.
How did her life get so out-of-control all of a sudden? So bizarre? Oh, that’s right. Roberto Gabinarri came back into town.
“How’s your throat, dear?” his mother asked upon their return. “Did the tea help?”
“Um, y-yes. I-I’m fine.”
“Good. So, where were we when you left?” Alessandra Gabinarri paused and glanced around the table filled with her clan. She smiled with warmth at everyone. “Ah, yes. My son. Don’t you think he should get married soon?”
CHAPTER FOUR
Rob couldn’t believe he’d talked Elizabeth Daniels into this. A smart lady like her posing as his girlfriend. Probably the most intelligent female in his high school graduating class. Jeez, she must think he and his family were criminally insane.
But if she did, she didn’t show it.
He watched her from across the table, still holding his breath as she fielded a slew of questions from his mother. Despite her longstanding difficulty speaking, she bravely fought through the stutters and tried to answer diplomatically.
“I-I think m-marriage is only right when two people are r-r-really in l-love.” She glanced at Tony and Maria-Louisa as she spoke these words and, for the first time ever, he felt a surge of something like envy at what his brother had going. The guy was still in love with his wife, and it showed in Tony’s every glimpse at her and at his passel of children.
“But there comes a time when a man needs to settle down,” Mama insisted. “Don’t you want a husband? A house? Children?”
Elizabeth nodded. “S-Sure.”
“See?” His mother raised an eyebrow at him. “Women are smart. They know what they want. It’s men who need to get their act together.”
And at this, shy, sweet Frizzy Lizzy actually snickered. Mama beamed at her.
He didn’t know which Madonna he should pray to tonight, but he was willing to send invocations to them both to keep his dear mother from planning a fall wedding.
Shortly after they devoured one of Mama’s trademark tiramisus, he said it was time to go.
“Elizabeth has a cookbook to write,” he told them, knowing how impressed they’d be by this fact. “And I have the closing shift at Tutti-Frutti to get to.”
“Thanks for the d-delicious dinner.”
Elizabeth’s words were met with a gigantic squeeze from Mama who said, as he knew she would, “You must come every time with Roberto. He will be here tomorrow night, too, and I’m making a big lasagna.” She gestured to show the enormous size of the tray. No exaggeration, either. Mama cooked large. “Please join us.”
His new “girlfriend” stole a look in his direction before saying, “I’d b-be delighted.”
“Fantastico!” And with that promise to hold close, Mama let the two of them go for the night.
“See you later, Rob,” Tony said to him, and he knew his kid brother would have the sofa sleeper already pulled out and made up for him when he got in tonight after his closing shift. He was one lucky dude, having a brother like that. Even if the guy made him look like a slacker when it came to relationships.
“Thanks, Tony.” He gave his mother a kiss and the family a parting wave. Then he lightly took Elizabeth’s arm and led her to his Porsche.
“Whew,” he said, when they’d driven a mile away from the house. “We did it.” He turned to her. “Thank you. You were amazing. Brilliant. No one suspected a thing.”
She looked at him for a long moment, her expression unreadable. “Roberto Gabinarri, that was the most deceitful, underhanded, lousy trick I’ve ever seen anyone play on their mother, and I think you should be ashamed of yourself. Both for trying to fool her and for manipulating her emotions in such a disgraceful way.”
He felt a stab of pain in the vicinity of his heart. Damn it if she wasn’t right, but this wasn’t something he wanted to admit. Or intended to.
“And that was the longest sentence I’ve ever heard you say to me without stuttering,” he said, striking back without thinking, and then wishing he could slap his own mouth for his thoughtlessness.
“I-Is that why you chose m-me?” she asked, pulling her lovely lips into a tight, unforgiving line. “Not because I wouldn’t want to say no to you, but because you thought I couldn’t?”
He pulled the car over to the side of the road and turned off the engine. It killed him that she’d think so poorly of him, that he’d hurt her like this, especially when she was trying to help him. It killed him worse that, in some small way, she was right. Not that he’d admit that either.
“I am so sorry, Elizabeth. No, that wasn’t why I chose you. My comment was rude and inexcusable, and I hope you’ll forgive me. Sometimes I speak without thinking.”
“I never do,” she whispered.
He nodded but the lump of self-recrimination in his throat kept him from replying.
“So, w-why did you choose me, th-then?”
Her question was a fair one, but he didn’t have an honest answer. He’d already stretched the truth a bit. Yes, her inability to speak quickly and freely had, he was ashamed to admit, passed through his mind when he formed the idea of taking her to his mother’s. With a family as chatty as his, and Elizabeth being so naturally quiet, he thought he might be able to direct the conversation with no one being the wiser. That had backfired, of course. But he’d also counted on Elizabeth’s warm heart to see him through if he got caught. Which he had.
“I knew that, even if you were furious with me, you’d still back me up. That you wouldn’t throw wine or ice water or hot tea in my face. That you wouldn’t embarrass me in front of my family.” All this was true, and he tried to project every ounce of his sincerity in saying it. “Thanks for being someone I could count on. Even though we haven’t seen each other in years, you’re still just as I remembered you.”
At this, something dark passed behind her clear eyes and
she looked down. “It’s almost eight,” she told him, belatedly touching her watch although she was clearly well aware of the time. “You’d better drive us back to Tutti-Frutti.”
“Okay,” he said, and let it go. He’d make this gaffe up to her. Hell, he’d have a month of dinners to do it. Maybe he’d even confide in Tony at the end of the month, ask him if he knew of any nice guys to set Elizabeth up with after he hightailed it back to Chicago.
Although there was something vaguely unsatisfying about that thought. Probably because she was a truly nice girl, and he wouldn’t want her to get hurt by some of those creeps out there. God, there were a lot of bad dudes on the prowl.
They got back to the sweets shop and Elizabeth, after waving to Gretchen and Nick, slipped into her car and sped away.
“Hey, my sporting man,” Nick said. “Glad you’re finally here. Over two hours with the Gretch and I’m sick to death of hearing about reality TV shows and couples falling in love on islands in the Carrib—”
Gretchen gave him a powerful slug in the arm.
“Ow.” Nick glared at her. “I totally hate it when you do that.”
“And I ‘totally hate it’ when you shoot your big mouth off without so much as a thought passing through that sports-festering brain,” she said, thrusting her ice cream scoop into a water bucket and wiping her fingers with a paper towel. Then she kissed Nick on the cheek. “Good thing I love you anyway,” she told the young man as she reached for her handbag. “Where’s Elizabeth? Did she leave already?”
“Yeah, I think so,” Rob said.
“Were you nice to her?” she asked, giving him a threatening look.
He swallowed. “I tried to be.”
Gretchen grinned. “Okay, then.” She turned toward Nick. “In that case, you can talk about sports with Rob.”
“Like I need your permission,” Nick said, but he blew her an air kiss.
She waved goodbye to Nick and surprised Rob by winking in his direction on her way out. This was one weird crowd Elizabeth hung with. But, he had to admit, they were growing on him.
***
“The guy’s demented!” Gretchen shrieked on the phone when Elizabeth explained what had transpired over the past two and a half hours. “And you’re going along with this? Someone ought to knock some sense into that—”
“Listen, Gretch, this was, without a doubt, one of Rob’s least stellar ideas, but what could I do? His mother is this warm, jovial Italian lady who hums Madonna’s ‘Lucky Star’ while she’s buttering her garlic bread. I just couldn’t make a scene in her home tonight. Not after she’d been so welcoming to me.”
Gretchen harrumphed on the line. “But you can’t possibly continue with this charade for four weeks, can you?”
Elizabeth sighed. “I doubt it. Actually, I doubt Rob will want me to. I’m betting he’ll find someone to date for real within the week, and then this whole agreement will be history. Plus, I think his brother’s on to us. But, for now, I might as well make the most of the extra writing time he’s giving me.”
“You’re really okay?” her friend asked.
“Yeah. I’m okay,” she said, collapsing into a chair and marveling at how quickly she’d grown accustomed to lying.
***
The next day at eleven a.m., after four straight hours of morning typing—preceded by six hours of restless sleep spent dreaming about Rob and typing, and four hours of late-night typing the day before—Elizabeth decided it was high time she took a break and peeked in on the happenings at Tutti-Frutti. Just long enough to make sure everything was running smoothly, she told herself.
But, of course, with Rob in charge, nothing was running according to her version of “smoothly.”
Loud music greeted her ears as she pulled into a nearby parking space.
People jammed their bodies against the windows, gawking at something inside the shop and pausing to laugh.
A line snaked its way through the doorway, passed the hedges, across the sidewalk and close to the street.
Elizabeth held her breath and plunged into the mayhem. What she saw stopped her in her sneakers.
For the first time in the shop’s forty-year history, there were jugglers—that’s right, more than one—making spectacles of themselves by spinning, twirling, throwing and catching colorful beanbag ice cream cones, all to the amazement and delight of the gathering Wilmington Bay crowd. It was all she could do to push her way passed the horde and begin hunting for the Gabinarri responsible for this mess.
“Th-This is crazy. What are all these people doing ins-s-side?” she hissed in Rob’s ear as he put a swirl of whipped cream on a chocolate malt.
“Having fun is not crazy. It’s a good promotional tool. Look.” He pointed with his elbow at a mom with two preschool girls. All three were eating double-decker ice cream cones and laughing at the jugglers’ antics. Then he nodded in the direction of another grouping, this time six teens, each holding either a strawberry sundae or a Neapolitan ice cream sandwich.
“B-But, Rob, this is a very small shop. I don’t know what the exact c-c-code regulations are, but I know we’re only allowed an indoor capacity of twenty-five customers.” She glanced around and tried to count heads. “There are over f-fifty people in here!”
“They’ll be out the door and on their way home soon,” he said. “But, the thing is, they’ll all come back in search of new surprises and more great-tasting ice cream. And it won’t be en masse like this. They’ll return in little clusters. They’ll talk amongst themselves and tell their friends. Slowly, our daily visitor average will increase. By the end of the month, we might even double profits. And won’t that just make your uncle and mine do a happy jig in Europe?”
He didn’t give her a chance to answer.
“Sure it will! Before long they’ll be making more money than they know what to do with. Maybe they’ll open up a branch in another Wisconsin town…or even spread their franchise into Illinois or Minnesota or Iowa. The possibilities, my little naysayer, are limitless.”
“Who hired these jugglers?”
“Nobody,” Rob said, starting on an order for a triple fudge ice cream sundae.
“They j-just came in here and started juggling by themselves? Without warning?”
He shot her an irritated look. “No, Elizabeth. The two of them dropped by for a cone and we all got to talking—”
“God, I should’ve known,” she muttered.
“—and I found out they were professional jugglers from Milwaukee, so I asked to see some of their best stunts. And they were great.” He grinned at the two performers appreciatively. “So, I sent Jacques out to buy the ice cream beanbags from the Hobby Shoppe on Fourth and Main—”
“Where is Jacques?” She scanned the room but didn’t see him. Rob just kept on chattering.
“—and I told these guys they’d get free ice cream or a complimentary pastry anytime they came into the shop if they did fifteen minutes of juggling for our customers.” He checked his watch. “Although, I think they decided to use this as practice time because they’ve been at it for over a half hour.”
A beanbag whizzed by her ear, narrowly missing her head. She frowned at Rob.
“They might be getting ready for their grand finale now,” he said.
Amidst a wild flurry of flying beanbags, she gritted her teeth and ducked while searching the room. Her gaze finally came to rest on Jacques who, in time to the hip-hop sounds blaring from the jugglers’ portable stereo, was rolling his shoulders and swiveling his hips as he delivered a tray full of orders to a table of kids and their pleased-looking grandma.
Oh, brother.
“Th-This kind of blatant showmanship is going to get us in trouble, Rob, if anyone complains or if the authorities start checking up on us. We could get f-fined for breaking capacity codes.”
He leaned toward her, his gorgeous brown eyes widening with good humor and impertinence. He pressed his full lips together and got so close she could see the tiny perpen
dicular lines on their ruddy red surface. The lips twisted into a devious grin, and one heavily lashed eye winked at her, which sent her heart rate on a skyrocket mission to Venus.
“Lighten up, Lizzy,” he whispered in that low, ultra-sexy voice of his.
She tightened her Plain-Jane lips and narrowed her own lackluster eyes at him. “Elizabeth,” she insisted.
He grinned bigger. Leaned closer.
“Oh, my gosh! Rob Gabinarri! Is that really you?”
They both turned toward the counter where a familiar woman stood beaming at Rob. Elizabeth hadn’t seen Rob’s high-school flame in years, but the sight of the bottle blonde put her right back into her chubby senior-year stretch pants and seized her voice.
Rob, of course, didn’t miss a beat.
“Tara Welles? Hey, how are you?”
“Absolutely wonderful,” his old girlfriend cooed. Her eyes swept over him. “And don’t you look fabulous.”
“Thanks. Want an ice cream? An éclair? Some chocolate-covered macadamia nuts?”
“Ooh, maybe just a tiny little something,” Tara said, perusing the selections. “A double chocolate-caramel sundae with peanuts and sprinkles on top.”
“You got it,” he said. “Can you help me with that, Elizabeth?” He motioned for her to grab another ice cream scoop.
She tried to whisper “Sure” but couldn’t quite manage it.
Tara’s cool blue eyes surveyed her from head to toe and back again, then the blonde let out a muffled laugh. “Lizzy? Lizzy Daniels? Oh, heavens. Imagine seeing you again.”
Elizabeth succeeded in raising her hand for a brief wave. She refused to be goaded into opening her mouth, however.
“You look—” Tara paused as if searching for just the right scathing adjective, “—the same but…smaller.”
Terrific. But what had she expected? A high compliment?
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