Page 1 of Marry Me in Rome

As I saton a hard chair on the edge of a cobblestone street, covered by a red awning and its heavy shade, I heaved a happy sigh. First Paris, and now Rome. “The only thing that could possibly make this day better is chocolate.”

“If Italian chocolate is as good as this pasta was, I’m in,” my sister, Kennedy said. The plate in front of her was as empty as mine, and she sat back in her chair with a contented smile, gazing at the man on her right. Hunter. Our next-door-neighbor from the small town where we were raised.

Finally. It had taken days of work to get them together in Paris, with both of them fighting my efforts tooth and nail. For two people who’d loved each other since childhood, they sure knew how to take their time.

But nobody could fight the city of love, and Paris worked its magic. Ironic that it took our grandfather dying, his lawyer surprising us with an inheritance on condition that we traveled Europe together for a month, and a stop in Paris, where Hunter was living, to get her in his arms.

It wasn’t a small inheritance, either. The numbers were staggering. Not that the money mattered to me. My Instagram empire was finally picking up, and I’d be supporting myself as aninfluencer within the year. Meanwhile, as much as we enjoyed each other’s company, what remained of our little family still had a big rift—Dad’s leaving us a decade ago and taking Alexis with him had changed all of our lives forever. She still refused to discuss why she went with him all those years ago . . . which made our forced vacation awkward at times.

Some sisters hurled unkind words at each other over stolen clothes or boyfriends. Not us. The words we spoke were kind, but painfully so. Nothing we said could change the fact that a decade ago, on my birthday, our family had split nearly in half. After that day, the five of us would never be in the same room again.

I had to stop thinking gloomy thoughts. Paris was a feast for the eyes, for sure. But Rome? Rome already held a part of my heart and I’d only been here a few hours. Something about it just seemed like home.

Rome, I think I love you.

“If we want to come back to this restaurant for dinner tonight, I won’t complain,” I told the others. “My tagliolini was divine.”

Kennedy and Hunter nodded absently, still absorbed in each other. I doubted they’d even heard me. They barely noticed Alexis, who sat to my right, and me these days. Not that I could blame Kennedy—Hunter would be leaving for the States in two days, and then she’d have the rest of the month to spend with us two sisters.

Matteo leaned over the table. “White truffles are the secret to tagliolini. That’s a mushroom, by the way. Not chocolate.”

Rome, I take that back.

For a moment, I’d completely forgotten about Hunter’s Italian friend, who deserved a college degree in cockiness with a minor in mansplaining. From the second his massive dog had bowled me over on the bridge earlier, he’d barely spoken at all except to send little verbal jabs my way.

The run-in earlier wasn’t my fault, either. What kind of guy knocked a woman over and then refused to apologize? Dog or not, it was simple manners. Which this man clearly did not have.

I looked him dead in the eye. “This may be hard for you to believe, but we do know the difference in America. You know what else we know? How to train dogs not to jump on people.”

He feigned surprise. “What a relief. And here, I assumed you were destined for cat lady-hood.”

Alexis snorted. “She has two of them.”

When I sent a glare her way, she wore an innocent look. Alexis was no stranger to verbal jabs either, but she could at least have my back right now.

“Expected,” Matteo said with a dramatic sigh. “I bet she also has an entire nursery worth of potted plants with names.”

I gaped at him.The guy couldn’t be serious.

“You’re two for two,” Alexis said. “But you’d better be careful, Matteo. Might want to apologize before she gets feisty.”

“This little thing,” Matteo echoed, his gaze locked on mine as if with a pair of steel handcuffs. His dark brown eyes held a challenge, like he wanted me to engage and would continue to jab until that happened. Like he meant to find the line that separated polite youngest sister Jillie and serial killer Jillie.

Dante, the huge dog who rested at Matteo’s feet, sat up, his giant tongue slopping around in his mouth. Short fur covered his wrinkly skin, unable to hide his muscular build. Like a boxer, but with long, floppy jowls. A Napoleon Mastiff, Matteo called him. Neapolitan, maybe? I couldn’t remember.

And yes, I had two cats, but I didn’t mind dogs. What I did mind was getting knocked over by one. At a petite 5’2”, I wasn’t the biggest person in the world, sure—but that dog washeavy.Trained dogs didn’t do things like that, and good owners didn’t defend their dogs’ bad behavior, refuse to apologize, and then hurl unfounded accusations at their dogs’ victims.

If I didn’t know better, I’d guess the guy hadtoldthe dog to jump on me. It seemed like something he’d do.

No, I didn’t like Matteo at all. Despite the fact that he brought us to a restaurant popular among the locals for lunch that served us the best pasta I’d ever tasted. Or his unfair attractiveness and the way his gaze halted on every single forkful of pasta that entered my mouth.

Sure, the guy was model-attractive at first glance. Not just his build, which he clearly cared about, but his face too. Like an Italian Bond who only spoke Sarcasm. He reminded me of a radio announcer or audiobook narrator with an Italian accent, if such a person spoke with a teasing glint in his eyes. Above straight white teeth, no less.

Italian Bond radio announcers didn’t have teeth like that. Did they? This guy broke pretty much every stereotype I’d ever believed about European men. But pretty teeth or not, nobody called me “little” and got away with it.

I tried to look unaffected. “Sorry, but whatever you think you know about me, you’re wrong.”

“Maybe, maybe not. That’s the third time you’ve apologized for something in the past two hours.”

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