The broken doctor (book 2 of 'Doctor' duology)

Twenty three

"She would be proud of you." I say when she looks at me.

"Niccolo, what are you doing here? Is Hera okay? Where is she? Is everyone okay?"

"Everyone is okay and Hera is perfectly fine with her uncle." I tell her, she smiles a small smile and nods.

"Are you angry?" She asked, she took a few steps away from her mother's grave and sat on the bench made of rock.

"I was, but not anymore." I say and sit beside her.

"How do you know where I was?"

"I always knew where you were."

"Even the hospital?"

"Yes." I said, she took a deep breath and looked away.

"So, what now?"

"How are you? Did it help?"

"I'm much better, it helped me a lot, but I'm not like I used to be, I never will be."

"I still love you and I can't wait to meet this new version of you." I said and her head turned to me.

"You do?"

"I do, I love you so fucking much, I want you to come home with me, to our baby, to our family, everyone misses you. Been trying to teach Hera to say papa but she only says mama. Do you want to come home?"

"I do." She says and I see the tears in her eyes, I get closer to her to hug her but stop remembering that she might not like it, but when she sees me and understands my intention she's the one pulling me to her.

"I love you, Julianna." I say still hugging her.

"I love you too, let's go home." I take my arms from around her but my face is still close to her, so close that if I reach forward my lips will touch hers. Would she like that? Would she let me?

I look at her eyes and see her looking at me and my lips, slowly I lean forward and our lips touched. We moved slowly and in sync but what surprised me was when I felt her tongue against my lower lip asking for entry, and without thinking twice I let her. The slow and soft kiss turned more passionate, but short, we couldn't forget the place we were.

"I missed you." I said with my forehead against hers.

"I missed you too. I'm sorry."

"No, you have nothing to be sorry for. We are together now. I left the mafia." I said and she pulled away.

"It's because of me? I don't want you to stop doing your things because of me. You can't, I don't mi-"

"Julianna it's not because of you."

"It's not?"

"No, I'll admit that before my father went missing I wanted it, but then as the years went by I stopped liking it, it's not me. You and Hera gave me the motivation to leave, I had nothing before you."

"Who will take care of it? What if you get bored of us? And regret it?"

"Talon is the new boss, not even Andrea wanted. And I won't get bored. And I still can go on jobs from time to time."

"Yes. Now tell me, what's your favorite spot in Italy?"

"Riomaggiore at sunset."

"Well, let's go, we have a little drive ahead of us." I took her and made my way to the car.

Now, if you're wondering how I ended up here I'll tell you, two weeks ago doctor Santos told me to not call every day, and it was a struggle but I didn't call for two weeks, I knew she was in good hands and the Dr. told me that he would call me if something happened.

Yesterday I had enough so I called and that's when I knew she would get out, I followed her steps and when I saw that she bought a ticket to Italy I got on the jet immediately.

I heard and understood everything she told to her mother, and I made a promise, I will not let her go back to that place, I will always be there for her.

I drove the car to Riomaggiore, the whole drive was silent but it was a comfortable and peaceful silence, I'm happy to know that she doesn't fear to be touched anymore at least by me.

"Niccolo?"

"Yes?"

"What happened to Sam and Kassandra?"

"They are still locked up."

"Oh." That was all she said.

"Do you want to kill them?"

"Me? No, but I don't want them to live either."

"I'll take care of them when we get back."

"Where are we going?" She asked.

"Riomaggiore." I said and smiled at her.

"What? Why? For what?"

"I think we will get there on time to see the sunset." I said and looked at my watch.

Another hour driving and talking about anything and everything I even heard her laugh sometimes. It was like music to my ears. Today I will ask her to marry me, but to marry me for real, I mean we are married for real but we don't remember and we didn't love each other at the time.

But this time we do, and this time we will have a party and we will remember, I also wish for a different kind of love that night but I will not pressure her or anything. It will happen when she's ready and when she initiates it.

I parked the car and we got out, we went down the street, up and down some stairs until we got to the rocks, we were right on time the sun was almost touching the water, each minute that it passed the colors would change.

I turned Julianna to me, kissed her forehead, and stepped back, I saw her face full of confusion and when I went down on my knees her eyes went wide and full of tears.

"Julianna, fuck I don't know where to start. We've been through a lot, but we survived. I know we are already married but when people talk about it they say we did it by mistake, and it might've been in the beginning but it was the best mistake I ever made. But now I want to do things right, I want to see you walk down the altar in the most beautiful dress you'll find. I want our daughter as the flower girl I want it all, all with you, the rest of my life with you, so Julianna will you marry me? Again?" The tears ran freely down her face, the sun was almost gone, my heart was beating wildly inside my chest. I open the blue velvet box so she can see the diamond ring.

"Yes, Niccolo, fuck yes." She shouted.