Maureen Child - Have Bride, Need Groom

Run! his brain screamed: Run fast and far and whatever you do, don’t look back!

Nick knew good advice when he heard it. Without another word, he turned, sprinted for the door and made his escape.

Four

“She went where?” Nick leapt back out of the chefs way and ducked his head to avoid a low-hanging copper pot

“To the chapel,” Mama said, and paused in stirring her spaghetti sauce only long enough to thought- fully tap one finger against her chin. “The Tender Spot?” She shook her head. “Hug Me Something? No, that isn’t it.”

“Love Me Tender?” Nick asked and knew the answer even before his mother nodded.

“That’s the one.”

“Why?”

“Why what?” Mama reached for the jar of cinnamon and gave it a shake, layering a fine dust of the rich-smelling spice over the top of her sauce.

Nick pushed away from the cooking island and walked to his mother’s side. “Why did she go back to the chapel, damn it?”

Mama gasped, glared up at her oldest son and slapped one hand against her chest. “That you would curse at your own mother!”

“Ma...”

“Don’t you ‘Ma’ me. Jenny went to find a husband and it’s all your fault!”

“My fault?”

“Who else?” She shook her head, smacked the wooden spoon against the lip of the pan, then set it down on a tile trivet. Turning to Nick, she planted both hands on her hips and leaned toward him. “Three days she’s been here and did you bring by one of your police friends to marry her?”

“Of course not!”

“There! You admit it!” Mama threw her hands high in the air and shrugged dramatically. “You don’t help her, she has to help herself.”

Nick watched his mother bustle off, muttering fiercely in a combination of Italian and English as she threaded her way through the crowded kitchen. He told himself it was a good thing he’d never bothered to learn to speak Italian. He was better off not knowing exactly what she was saying.

Bus people, cooks and waiters streamed through the room in an odd sort of orchestrated dance. Bobbing and weaving around each other in a silent symphony of movement, none of them paid the slightest attention to their employer and her son. After all, it was just another Tarantelli war. They were used to them.

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