Unexpected Wedding (21 page)

She was humbled by their response.

“The food’s out,” she said. “I’ll pop those rolls in the microwave for few seconds and warm them back up.”

The doorbell rang again. She glanced at Rocky.

He shook his head. “I don’t know. Could it be your parents?”

“Anything’s possible.”

The ringing turned to knocking.

She checked the peep hole. “Uh... Rocky? Did something happen today I should know about?”

“Nope, why?”

“No reason. Just wondering why there are two policemen here. They don’t look too happy about it either.”

12

Rocky sped toward the door. “I’ll get it. Maybe something’s going on in the neighborhood.”

“It’s that kid and the basketball,” his father said.

“No, Dad, it’s not. Gia, did you make that call we talked about today?”

“Yes, but no one would send a deputy here for that. We’ll talk about it later.”

He reached for the handle.

“Stop!” Gia said.

“What?”

“You should check first before you open the door.” She rubbed her hand across the wood. “But I see that’s impossible because you don’t have a peep hole at your eye level.”

“You told me who it was.”

“I know,” she said all cute and flustered and worried about him. “We’re getting another peep hole.”

“I’ve been saying the same thing,” his mother agreed.

“Maybe if I was some helpless old lady.”

Now they were pounding. “Open up! It’s the police!”

Gia’s mouth dropped open. Her eyes grew wide with surprise and excitement. “I didn’t know they actually said that.”

“You better move back. They’re about to come in here whether we open the door or not.”

Gia’s hands were hot on his shoulders as he pulled the door open.

Yep. Unhappy policemen.

“Sorry.” He gestured toward his chair. “Took me a minute to answer.”

Gia pinched him. It hurt.

“I can’t believe you played the wheelchair card,” she hissed in his ear.

He moved another two inches toward the door and away from her lobster claws. “Can I help you?”

One officer glanced at his phone. “Uh... Nicholas Lionakis?”

“Yes.”

“Sir, we got a call to do a welfare check at this address. “We’re looking for a...” Again to the notes on his phone. “A Giavanna Rinaldi.”

“Me,” Gia said and nearly tumbled across him to get closer. “That’s me.”

“Giavanna’s my wife. What’s this about?”

“I need to see some ID from both of you,” the other officer said. “Is there anyone else here?”

Rocky backed out of the doorway and reached for his wallet. “My parents are here.”

They, too, joined them near the door and offered two hesitant waves.

Static crackled in the air as the men looked at each other and nodded. One of them mumbled something into his radio.

“I don’t understand,” Gia said. “I’m fine. I live here. Who called you?”

“Get your license, Gia,” Rocky said and passed them his. “Would you guys like to come in where it’s cool?”

They shook their heads, muttered, and looked around.

Gia turned to do as Rocky said—until a loud female voice stopped her.

“I’m not waiting any longer, Vincent,” she screeched. “I hear her talking. She’s all right. I need to see her.”

“Mom?”

A skinny woman wearing a huge pair of sunglasses came from the edge of the house and slipped between the officers. She had Gia in a tight, desperate hug before the cops had a chance to grab at one of the links in her large, silver, chain-like belt.

“Gia, thank God you’re OK.”

“Step back, ma’am,” the officer commanded.

He wasn’t nice about it. Rocky figured she’d already be laid out on his front lawn if they seriously considered her a threat.

“This is my mom,” Gia said. “It’s fine.”

Someone else crept from near the garage.

“And my dad,” she added in a barely audible whisper.

“Now it’s a party,” Rocky said.

“Susannah,” her father said. “Come over here and let the officers finish their interview before you get into trouble.”

Gia’s mother stepped back. The dark, distinguished man with silver streaks at his temples and a too-white smile seized her as if to hold her captive until the law left.

Gia disappeared in a flurry and returned with her wallet. She absently waved the whole thing in the officer’s face.

“Why on earth would you call the police, Dad? I told you what was happening. I told you about my husband, I gave you my address...”

“Just the identification, ma’am.”

She attacked the inside of the wallet and wrestled with the tight slot that held her license. Rocky had seen her do the same thing at the courthouse.

“Here,” he said and stilled her frantic hands. “I’ll get it.”

“I told you I’d send pictures tonight. I haven’t heard from you all day. You could have picked up the phone, but nooooo, you call the police?”

“We were in shock, Gia. We thought you were working at camp. We hadn’t heard from you in weeks and all of a sudden we get this cryptic message that you’re married and living here?”

“It wasn’t all that mysterious, Dad.”

“We called camp,” her mother said. “They couldn’t—or wouldn’t say much because of privacy issues. We didn’t know what to think. For all we knew you’d been kidnapped and were tied up in this man’s garage.”

“That’s impossible. I’m not allowed in the garage.”

Rocky stopped what would have been a huge bark of laughter.

“But yes, Mom, I was tied up and left for dead. I managed to get away, but rather than leave this dungeon of my harrowing ordeal, I crawled to the couch, put my feet up, and sent a coherent and informative e-mail about how I am well and happily married. And I included the address.”

Rocky tried to corral one of her wildly gesturing hands in his. “Uh... Dial it back a little would you, babe? You’re taking us down a bad path here. These guys are going to get the wrong idea.”

“Yeah, sorry. Look officers, I’m fine.” She did a couple twirls. “This is my husband. My parents overreacted. Sorry to take up your time.”

He returned their ID’s. “Well, it is a welfare check and you look like you’re doing OK. Congratulations,” he said and nearly cracked a smile.

“Thank you,” Rocky said. “Can I get you a couple bottles of cold water?”

“Not necessary. Have a good day.”

Gia leaned against the door frame and bent one leg to stand like a flamingo. She did that a lot. He thought it was cute.

“C’mon in,” she said. “I see all the neighbors have come out to gawk. That’s great.” She waved and smiled at them from the entry. “Mrs. Konchesky already hates me and that pervy guy across the street keeps winking at me because I threw my panties on the driveway that day.”

Rocky tugged her inside and closed the door. “Calm down.”

They all meandered into the living room. His parents returned to the couch to watch the show, and he took his spot near the recliner and waited.

Susannah removed her giant sunglasses and captured Gia in another big hug.

“Honey, you look beautiful.” She grabbed a mass of Gia’s thick, shiny hair and let it spill over her hands. “It’s so long.”

“Time for a trim,” Gia said. “Speaking of hair, what’s with yours? I’ve never seen it so short or so... brown.”

“I needed a change. It was time to say good-bye to the big, blonde, Dallas-do. This is better for me at my age.”

“It’s a lovely change,” Gia agreed.

Vincent stepped in with his embrace. “Good to see you, pumpkin.”

Gia seemed to respond, but stiffened in his arms. “Hi, Daddy. You look good, too.”

“Thanks, pumpkin.”

Rocky cringed. Pumpkin? He had to wonder if the man thought one day about his parental negligence or the pumpkin episode of Gia’s senior year. And he didn’t know much about clothes, but he did know high-dollar golf shirts and sunglasses when he saw them. Pastor Vincent had both, and Susannah came across as a high-maintenance southern princess, dripping with silver jewelry and expensive accessories.

Do not judge, or you too will be judged.

Rocky heard the words in his head as clear as if Pastor Charles was repeating them from last Sunday’s sermon directly in his ear. He looked around, knowing full well he’d been given an internal gut-check by the Holy Spirit. He made a mental retraction when he realized all his negative thoughts were a result of the sad things Gia had told him. He would always take her part, but didn’t he have to come to his own conclusions about Pastor Vincent and Susannah? They hadn’t done anything to him. He, on the other hand, had married their only daughter without talking to them first. Who really should be aggravated with whom?

“Mom, Dad, this is my husband, Rocky Lionakis. These are his parents, Nick and Bev. Everyone, these are my parents, Vincent and Susannah. But I guess we all know who everyone is.”

Rocky extended his hand. They shook, they stared, they maintained their large, near-fake smiles as they studied him. He’d seen those looks a thousand times. The most tolerant and enlightened people often looked at him as though he were half a person because of the chair. Many did worse by assuming that when his spine snapped, so did his intellect. And the very worst? When people assumed he somehow lost his hearing when he lost the use of his legs. If he had a nickel for every time someone shouted at him, he could have paid for his truck outright.

The twinge of disappointment in her parents’ eyes was hard to take. All parents wanted strong, able-bodied men for their daughters. Gia’s dad hadn’t dreamt of the day she’d marry a man with a spinal cord injury. Rocky wouldn’t dream of that for his own daughter either.

They were understandably confused. They knew nothing about his ability to take care of their daughter, and because of Gia’s strained relationship with them and their infrequent contact, they didn’t know if she’d known him for one month or one year.

“Rocky,” Susannah started kindly, “forgive me for jumping right on this, but Gia did not tell us you use a wheelchair. May I ask, are you recovering from an accident or surgery or...”

“The accident was a fall and it was years ago. It’s a complete spinal cord injury.”

“I see.” She jerked slightly and her eyelids fluttered as if someone had smacked her and she was trying not to flinch.

Vincent, too, seemed to want more information. “So you are...ah...”

Rocky wondered what word he struggled to say—or maybe avoid. Paralyzed? Handicapped?
Crippled
?

“It’s permanent,” he said. “Have a seat and we’ll try to answer all your questions.”

“I’ll get a chair from the kitchen,” Gia said.

Susannah piled onto the couch with Rocky’s parents and Gia returned to the recliner.

Vincent arranged the ladder-back chair right in front of them. He leaned back, crossed his legs and rested his hands in his lap. “OK, talk. What’s going on here?”

“Well, sir, I’ll tell you the same thing I told my parents. Gia and I met at camp. Everything happened fast and one thing led to another and we eloped.”

“You should have married in the church.”

“The Greek church,” Rocky’s dad interjected.

“I don’t belong to the Greek church, Dad. Gia and I have our own common faith and church family.”

“I didn’t want to be married in your church,” Gia said. “It’s too big. I don’t know anyone there. I wouldn’t have wanted you to marry us anyway because you’re my dad and I think that’s...weird. And I no longer know any of your associates.”

The last sentence came off her lips with such a bite that Rocky put his hand on her leg to keep her from further attack.

“Perhaps if you would come home once in a while and try to be a part of the congregation—”

“That’s not my congregation.”

“You grew up in that church, Gia, and there are still people who pray for you every day and ask about you every week. How am I supposed to explain this sudden marriage? What is your mother supposed to tell her friends when they talk about their daughters getting married in the church we built and our own daughter went off and had this significant life event without us?”

“Aahhh,” Gia said. “Now we’re getting to the point of this whole visit. What will everyone think?”

“Don’t misunderstand, Gia. Your exclusion of us in your important decision is only one of many points of this visit. We’re looking for a lot of information and a lot of answers.”

“Yet the first answer you wanted was what will everyone think?”

“As usual you are misinterpreting my intentions. Your mother has been devastated by this. What you did was selfish, but I can see you still don’t understand you are not the only person who is affected by your actions.”

“And, as usual, Daddy, you still don’t understand that my actions should be of loving concern
to you
. Not the eighteen thousand church members you put ahead of me.”

“That’s enough,” Susannah yelled and scrambled off the couch. She smoothed her crisp, navy blue slacks. “Bev, Nick, I’m sorry you had to see this family drama.”

They did the polite thing and waved her comments away with a shrug. “Not at all,” his mother said. “We were as surprised as you.”

“Sure,” his father said. “We all came here with questions.”

“Vince, this is our daughter. Can we have one discussion where you’re not trying to manage this family like you do your staff? And Gia. Can you stop being defensive long enough to tell us the happy details of what’s going on here? I would hate to think you married this man simply to get back at us for being horrible parents.”

Rocky was beginning to wonder the same thing. She seemed to take great pleasure in gnawing at her father’s torn flesh. Yeah, the guy was an ego trip and a half, but he was still her dad.

Gia wilted in her chair. “I’m sorry for the outburst, Mom, but I’m very happy. I wanted to marry Rocky. It’s the smartest thing I’ve ever done. I know you’re disappointed about a wedding, but the big to-do you had in your mind would never have happened anyway.”

“Big or small, it was still your wedding, and I wasn’t there to help you or be happy with you.”

“It was very small and very fast. We were about to eat when you got here and then I was going to show Bev everything from yesterday. What I wore, the flowers... I texted Candi to see if she could get some pictures posted so we could all look at them together.”