Page 45 of An Italian Wedding Adventure

‘My bad luck,’ Caro agreed with a lopsided smile. ‘But we should be apologising to you two, I think. Mama, should we go back home? Leave Andreas to…’

‘Goodness me, no!’ Sophie said emphatically. ‘I can stay at a hotel. My employer will pay. There’s no reason for you both to drive all the way back.’

Andreas gritted his teeth as though he wanted to disagree, but Petra’s eyes lit up.

‘Please, don’t go to a hotel on our account,’ his mother said graciously. ‘There’s an extra bed in the attic, which Caro can sleep on in my room, and we can all have dinner together.’ Andreas again looked ready to protest, but his mother cut him off with, ‘Speckknödel? Your favourite? I brought the Speck from home.’

Sophie’s stomach growled and she pressed a hand to it to try to stay out of the argument, but she’d tasted lo speck, the distinctive cured ham from South Tyrol, and it was delicious.

Andreas said nothing, which Petra seemed to take as assent.

‘You did promise me Knödel,’ Sophie commented, then nearly choked again when she remembered Tita’s joke about canoodling. Andreas’s blazing expression suggested he thought she’d said it on purpose. Trying not to laugh, she turned to Petra. ‘That’s very kind, thank you.’

It was only afterwards, when Petra moved her things into the room with Caro, that Sophie realised exactly what sharing the apartment meant: Petra had assumed Andreas and Sophie would share a bed. The thought made her pace her bedroom floor, arms crossed, as she waited for Andreas to appear.

They’d been planning to share a bed that night, anyway. It shouldn’t have sent goosebumps up Sophie’s arms. But they couldn’t exactly continue where they’d left off when Caro and Petra went to bed, which meant… they’d spend the night cuddling and that felt like a worse idea than sleeping together in the other sense.

Plus, they’d be giving his family the wrong impression. She was desperate to know what he’d told them about her to provoke such a reaction.

Andreas strode in, dumping his rucksack in the corner without looking at her. He stared out of the window, hands on hips, and even that was attractive. ‘You can have the first shower.’

She swallowed at the reminder that they’d been about to share the shower stall and thanked him. Peering at his profile, she asked, ‘Is this okay?’

‘It’s a bit late for that, isn’t it? Anyway, I should be asking you that question.’ He glanced at her, his expression grave.

‘Do you want me to make it clear that…this… is nothing serious?’

He grimaced. ‘That might be worse.’

‘Worse than them marching us to the nearest chapel? Or were you joking about that?’

‘Of course I was joking – in a way.’

‘I get that you didn’t want to introduce me to them back then. I do understand.’

His gaze snapped up, full of consternation. ‘What do you understand?’ He rubbed his hand down his face.

‘You struggle with how much you love them. You don’t want to imagine someone delivering the same news you had to give to Toni. With me, you had a choice. With them, you don’t.’ Sophie was startled by her own words, but they settled in her mind like a missing puzzle piece.

She wasn’t a pre-marriage counsellor, but she’d done some training when she’d started at I Do. She’d learned the theory of attachment styles and the challenges of the various combinations of anxious and secure, attached or avoidant, but she’d never applied it to Andreas – or herself in combination with Andreas.

What a disaster they’d been, her attached, him avoidant, both of them anxious. But the realisation didn’t stop her wanting to get to know Petra and Caro – to know everything about him that he held back. It didn’t explain why he still felt like part of her, all these years later.

Part of herpast, she reminded herself fiercely. And maybe part of the next week or so of her life. But that was all.

18

Speckknödel usually made everything better, but the meal was unbearable.

First, he’d brooded for half an hour about Sophie’s calm accusation:You struggle with how much you love them.

Then he’d had to watch Sophie and his mother laugh and joke – occasionally at his expense – while Sophie helped to make the South Tyrolean speciality. He had sat at the table sharing a beer with Caro and avoiding her meaningful looks.

The necessary conversation had been whispered while Sophie was in the shower:

‘You didn’t mention you were back together!’

‘I’mnot– we’re not. Not really.’

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