Page 7 of Days Of Valentino

“Aurora, how are you?”

“Good, you?”

“Good. You got time to meet me for dinner tonight?”

“Are you bored already, Nonno? You haven’t been retired that long. Can we make it tomorrow?” she asks.

“Let me rephrase that, Aurora. You are meeting me for dinner tonight. I’ll pick you up at six,” I tell her.

She huffs out a breath before groaning. “Okay, can’t wait. I was actually going to call you today to see if you wanted to meet up this week anyway.”

She wasn’t, but I don’t call her out on that. “I’ll see you at six, sweetheart. Ti amo.”

“Ti amo, Nonno,” she says before hanging up.

“Why are you having dinner with Aurora? What has she done now?” Holly asks.

I spin around from the sofa to see my wife leaning against the doorframe. She’s wearing a black floor-length gown. Her hair twisted in an updo and a teardrop pink diamond pendant hanging around her neck that matches her earrings.

Fuck, she’s beautiful.

“Dolcezza, you look fucking breathtakingly gorgeous.” I push up from the sofa and slowly approach my wife as my eyes rake up and down every perfect inch of her.

No matter how our bodies have changed with age over the years, she is still hands down the most beautiful fucking woman in any room.

“Thank you. What’s going on with Aurora?” Holly repeats. She is the epitome of a mother lioness.

“Matteo found fake IDs in her room. He asked me to have a little chat with her.” I shrug.

“Fake IDs? That seems a bit tame for Aurora. What was she doing with them?”

I wrap my arms around my wife’s waist, pulling her flush against me.

Holly’s hands land flat on my chest. “Don’t get any ideas, T. I have to leave in ten minutes.”

“To go where, exactly?” I let her step back and my eyes do another once-over.

“I have that charity gala with the girls tonight.”The girlsshe’s referring to are our daughters-in-law. The women each of our sons married.

“I remember. Now, tell me again why I’m not invited?”

“Because it’s girls’ night,” Holly says firmly.

“How about I pick you up afterwards, then?” I suggest. I hate when she goes anywhere without me.

“Oryou can go enjoy your dinner with Aurora and then come home and wait for me. I won’t be late.” Holly leans in and briefly presses her lips to mine. “Have fun,” she says before spinning around and walking away.

“This is a fancy place,” Aurora says, looking around the restaurant like she hasn’t been here a million times before. Which I know she has because we own it.

I raise an eyebrow at her and wait. I don’t need to say anything. She’ll be squirming in her seat within minutes.Hopefully. I’d be certain of that fact if it were any of my other grandchildren. Aurora, though? Yeah, I’m not so sure.

“Guess it helps to know the owners, huh?” she replies while looking me dead in the eye. “How was everyone down under when you visited Sydney?”

“Good. Lorenzo and Kyla seem to have settled into Melbourne life,” I tell her.

I watch as Aurora picks up her menu and starts reading it. “I think I’m going to have the lobster,” she hums, then snaps it closed. “What would you like, Nonno? Maybe you can even let me pay this time? It could be an early birthday gift?”

“And what card would you be using to pay for it, Aurora? One with your legal name or one of those many fakes I hear you have in your possession?”

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