Page 27 of Marry Me in Rome

I should have acted cool, but I couldn’t help it. “You can fly a helicopter?” I asked her incredulously as I climbed inside. Between that and Matteo still holding my hand, everything seemed like a dream.

“Dad wouldn’t buy it for me unless I could fly it myself,” she explained. I loved her accent immediately—slightly more choppy than Matteo’s yet faster, more direct. “I studied in Naples and got my helicopter pilot license at seventeen.”

“Seventeen?” I’d barely gotten my driver’s license at seventeen. “You’re amazing!”

“I was frustrated to wait even that long. I started with airplanes, but those are too easy. I like a challenge.” She looked back at our entwined hands and a strange look crossed her face. “Looks like you do too.”

“Ready when you are.” Matteo’s voice was calm and easy.

My brain felt positively dizzy as we buckled ourselves in and the pulsing of the chopper began. Matteo broke contact only long enough to slide the harness over my chest and buckle it. His finger brushed my bare shoulder in the process, and I could have sworn his breath hitched ever so slightly before he leaned back into his own. The back seat barely fit the two of us, our legs pressed together so tightly that I practically sat on him.

I couldn’t say that I disliked the idea.

Whoa, honey,I told myself.This might be a good time to set some rules.It sounded like Mom’s voice.

As I opened my mouth to speak, the helicopter began to vibrate louder and the world filled with sound and wind. Matteo grabbed a pair of headphones and lifted them around my head. Then he adjusted the microphone in front of my chin before putting on his own set.

“Thanks for the ride, Vivi,” he said, his voice shouting slightly over the tumult of wind outside the now-closed door. I didn’t remember anyone closing it.

“I needed an excuse to get away from homework anyway.” She flipped a few things among the many gauges and adjusted a straight lever, almost a stick, jutting out in front of her. No steering wheel. I didn’t know why I expected one.

When we’d risen from the ground and the city of Rome disappeared behind us, I decided a little conversation would distract me from the weird feeling in my stomach. I couldn’t saywhich I feared more, the flying or Matteo’s fingers intertwined with mine.

“Matteo thinks you see him as a disappointment,” I said into my headset’s mic. “Is that true?”

Matteo stiffened, his hand gripping mine more tightly.

Vivi chuckled, still looking out the large windshield with her hand on the controls. “He’s always been too sensitive. The only person who has unrealistic expectations for Matteo is himself. But then, he’s always been dramatic too.”

“I prefer brooding.” I shot Matteo a grin. “Would you agree?”

“Broody like Batman,” she agreed. “But he’ll never admit it.”

“I am not broody,” Matteo growled.

She lifted a hand matter-of-factly. “I rest my case.”

“Funny,” he said. “What I want to know, Jillian, is how you managed to ditch your sisters for another day. Or is it the other way around?”

“The other way around, but I’m fine with it.”

He studied my face as if seeing right through my lie yet again. “Are you.”

“So you’re Matteo’s new friend,” Vivi called back to us. “Let’s hope you’re better than the last one. She was, what’s the word? Obnoxy?”

“Obnoxious,” I guessed. My stomach twisted a bit, thinking about Matteo dating other women, which of course he did. The “last one” only meant he wasn’t dating anyone now, right? But that also made me “the current one,” and I wasn’t sure what to think about that.

“Yes, exactly. It was nauseating, how she had control of him.”

“Vivi,” Matteo said, a warning in his voice.

“Come on. I never saw you lose your mind over a girl like that, before or since. At least you learned your lesson.”

My hand went limp in his, and I couldn’t look directly at him. “Was she so terrible? You haven’t mentioned your ex before.”

“That’s because sheisn’t worth mentioning,”he said pointedly, eyeing his sister. “She’s married now. That was years ago.”

“What was her name?” I tried to pretend this conversation didn’t feel like steel through the gut.

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