Page 60 of Royally Roma
But he didn’t order her around. On the contrary, he was as close to humble as she’d ever seen him.
“Please,” he said.
The desperation in his voice was palpable. Julia had the distinct feeling that for possibly the first time, he was being real with her. Straightforward.
Honest.
This moment was some sort of crossroads, and she didn’t have the first clue which path to take. Should she do the sensible thing and stay here, or go with this man who thus far had been nothing but trouble?
He could be wanted by the law. He could be a criminal, no better than her father. He could be anyone.
She should think with her head for once and not her heart. She was a lover of history, after all. And if history had proven anything, it was that her heart couldn’t be trusted.
Church bells rang through the piazza, a melodious call to midday prayer.
“Julia,please.” He held out his hand.
She took it. It wasn’t so much a choice as an instinct. As much as she would have liked to blame the coins, deep down she knew she couldn’t.
What are you doing? This is insane. He’s obviously running from something.
The sound of the church bells swelled until she could feel them ringing inside her chest. “Where do you want to go?”
He yelled over the noise, “Back to the Vespa, then anywhere. Just not here.”
She nodded. “Follow me.”
She charged through the crowd at breakneck speed, pulling Nico behind her.
Maneuvering through a mob of meandering tourists was an art form, one that could only be honed through months and years of practice. When Julia had first begun working as a tour guide, she was awful at it. Terrible. Her tours had taken twice as long as they should have simply because she couldn’t manage the crowds.
Now, however, it was one of her better skills. Practice makes perfect and all that.
She managed to drag Nico all the way back to the scooter before the bells had chimed noon.
“Get on,” she said, reclaiming her place in the driver’s seat.
He jumped on the seat behind her without a word of protest, which only proved his getaway was every bit as urgent as she’d suspected.
Just as the church bells rang to a close, she cranked the engine.
Nothing.
Oh no. Not now.
She tried again, to no avail.
“Don’t worry. It will start in just a second and we’ll be on our way.” But even she could hear the false cheer in her voice, and its forced enthusiasm was alarming.
She didn’t dare turn around. Nico was probably having a coronary right behind her.
“Perhaps we’d do better staying on foot,” he said wearily.
But the Vepsa roared to life and they were pulling away from the curb before she could even remind him to hang on.
She headed down the first narrow alley she could find and followed it until the first available left turn. From there she crisscrossed through the city’s backstreets, avoiding the major thoroughfares and sticking to the tiny, tucked away cobblestone passages where old men sat playing cards on foldaway tables and laundry was hung out to dry.
She had no idea where she was going, but figured most of the major tourist attractions were out. The scooter only had about a half tank of gas, and stopping at a petrol station also seemed like a bad idea. So either out of necessity or some visceral need to feel safe, she headed back toward her own neighborhood.
