You Had Me at Merlot: Part 2 by Lisa Dickenson Read Free Book Online Page A

humbling
     about standing in front of an iconic work of art, whose image is seen the world over. I’d never before been taken on a date
     where I’d been shown something so paramount and prominent that I felt my life had changed, just a little bit, for the better.
    There were signs everywhere saying no photos, but how could I not capture this? What would happen if I was old, and Alzheimer’s
     had set in, and someone was trying to tell me about the day an amazing Italian man showed me this masterpiece and I just couldn’t
     picture it, couldn’t remember him?
    ‘Jamie, shall I try and take a photo?’
    ‘That’s a million times illegal, you criminal.’
    ‘But I really want one, and you have to be in it. I need to remember this.’
    ‘Okay, but if you go to prison it’s nothing to do with me.’
    ‘I’ll take it really subtly. You just stand next to him and pose in the same way.’
    ‘In the same way as David?’
    ‘Yes. Left hand up, jutting hip, look to the distance like you’re thinking,
I wonder if anyone’s noticed I’ve got my man-bits out
.’
    ‘Okay. Should I take my pants off?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Okay.’
    Jamie strolled over to the statue, uber-casual, taking his time to look up at the penis, circle to the back and study the
     butt cheeks. All the while I pretended to text on my phone, keeping an eye on him. Suddenly, he appeared to the side of David
     and fell into his pose, and I tilted the phone up and –
CLICK
.
    Shit, how could I have forgotten to turn the volume off? The security guard’s head snapped to attention and she began marching
     directly for me. I panicked and stuffed my phone in my bag, and Jamie reached me in record time, slinging his arm around my
     shoulders and whirling me to face the door, where we speed-walked to the exit.
    ‘
Mi scusi. Signora. MI SCUSI
.’ The security guard was right behind us but we ignored her, only steps away from the exit. Jamie pushed open the door, shoving
     me in front of him, and we both fell out into the sunshine.
    And straight into two Polizia who were leaning against their motorbikes.
    ‘
Signora
,’ said the security guard in a stern voice, catching the attention of police officers. Jamie turned to the three of them
     and they all started speaking at once in rapid Italian. The security guard seemed very angry, and the Polizia looked annoyed
     at having their break interrupted. Jamie was charming and apologetic, and though my heart was racing there was also something
     adrenalin-pumpingly delicious about watching this man defend me in beautiful foreign tongue.
    Just look at him go …
    I caught the Italian words for ‘wife’ and ‘doesn’t speak Italian’. The two male police officers nodded but the security guard
     shook her head and turned on her heel, going back inside the gallery.
    Jamie strode back over with a grin and put his arm around me, and then just to make my knees turn completely to jelly after
     his Italian-language lesson, he did something deliberately intended to make me melt like gelato. He made a show of giving
     me a husbandly kiss on the lips, taking me by surprise though I knew I had to act like it didn’t. So I kissed him back, Florence
     spinning around me, my mind muddled with thoughts of how long it had been since someone had their lips on mine and how I could
     feel his soft stubble and hot forehead.
    As quickly as it started he broke away, slung an arm around me and strode us off across the piazza.
    Once we were a safe distance, and I was quite sure I wasn’t going to spontaneously combust, I pulled a grinning Jamie to a
     stop.
    ‘Sorry about that, but I had to tell them you were my wife, and I had to make it convincing.’
    ‘Were they going to deport me for taking a photo?’
    ‘No, but I just felt like it. Sometimes the little embellishments can make a story more fun.’
    ‘And what story did you tell them, exactly?’
    ‘That you were my new wife from a foreign land, and you didn’t understand