Page 27

I ’m about to thank Giulio for the ride as we pull up outside Nina’s bar, my plan being to throw myself on my bed and spill all to Isla before we open up again.

But before I can even open my mouth, he reaches for my hand and gently tugs me down the street.

‘It’s Sunday, remember? We need gelato. ..it’s the law.’

A jolt ripples through me at his warm grip, but I brush it off. This is Italy – everyone’s touchy-feely, right? I see it all around me. Ren throws his arm around people all the time. It’s just...normal.

But . . . my heart doesn’t skip a beat when Ren does it.

The streets are quiet and empty, and I suspect everyone in Monti is snoozing off a food coma.

There’s zero chance of me and Giulio getting separated by crowds of tourists like there was at the Pantheon, but he still holds my hand loosely in his until we find a little gelateria that’s open for business during the long hot afternoon hours – a little gelateria that still has about twenty-five different flavours on offer.

There are classics like cioccolato and crema , but also caramelized fig and ricotta, and a purple hyacinth ice cream with real petals in it.

‘I’ll have to show Ren this place, although he’d probably convince them to make French onion gelato or something,’ I joke.

For a second, Giulio’s relaxed expression puckers into something like irritation, like it often does when Ren’s name comes up.

We each get a cone and walk over to the fountain that will for ever be tainted by Ma and Pa’s first kiss – knowledge I’m not about to share with Giulio.

We find a spot on the ledge and I leave a decent amount of space between us.

But then more people arrive, forcing Giulio to squish up next to me.

He’s still doing that annoying boy thing, though, where he takes up all the leg room.

I nudge the knee invading my space, and he pushes back.

..until we’re full-on knee-wrestling. My leg is about a foot shorter and I start to topple backwards.

I fling my arm out just in time, waving gelato everywhere, but my hand slips on the edge of the fountain and my arm plunges into the cool water, right up to my elbow.

‘Bathing in the works of art...’ Giulio shakes his head in mock disappointment. ‘And I was starting to think you were one of the locals.’

He’s leaning back, staring at me . . . no, wait . . . he’s staring at my family heirloom of a nose.

‘It’s my nose, right?’ I blurt, trying to play it off like a joke. ‘There’s no denying it’s Roman.’

His lips twitch as if he’s about to tease me, but he doesn’t. Instead, he leans in and lifts a hand to my face. My breath catches. Ommioddio ...is he going to...honk it?!

I shrink back, but his hand keeps coming.

‘Hold still,’ he murmurs, ‘you have a blob of gelato right...there.’ His thumb brushes the tip of my nose, slow and deliberate, almost a caress.

‘Oh,’ I say faintly, my voice barely there.

I’m rooted to the spot, my nose tingling where his thumb had been. How is he so composed when I feel like my heart’s about to burst from my chest?

‘Yeah, I’m surprised that doesn’t happen more often,’ I mutter. ‘You know, given the size of it.’

Giulio shakes his head with a laugh. ‘I like your nose...it suits your stubborn streak. Another thing that runs in your family.’

I think of Ma and Nina at the hospital, how neither of them backed down, how Ma kept pushing without really saying what she wanted to say.

‘Err . . . is that supposed to make me feel better?’

‘You have nothing to feel bad about,’ he says, softly. ‘I think it makes you a tipa .’

I touch my nose self-consciously. ‘Umm...I don’t know that word. And I’m not sure I want to, either.’

Lies! All lies. I desperately want to know, especially when he’s looking at me so . . . so . . .

‘It means you’re unique in...’ He hesitates, swallowing hard. ‘In an attractive way.’

The air between us crackles and Ma’s jokey comment about creating a new first-kiss tradition in this very spot canters through my mind. I push it away, hard, turning to look into the waters behind me.

It’s not the Trevi Fountain, but there are still a few coins glittering at the bottom, their surfaces catching the sunlight.

‘Ready to go back?’ Giulio offers me a hand to pull me to my feet and, as I stand, I wonder what I would wish for if I threw in a coin. Not a kiss, obviously. Definitely not. Probably for the bar to be saved, for Ma and Nina to stop fighting. And for everything to just...work out.