Hello dear Readers,

Here is the promised third chapter, though the story grew itself hence there will be one or two more. Hope you will enjoy. Sorry for the errors, I tried to be quick.


Next morning the sun's first beams found them in each other's arms in Molly's bed.

'Hmm,' she was humming while stretching. 'Good morning.' Molly smiled as she turned to the already awake Sherlock, pressed herself against his body and gave him a long, loving kiss.

'Good morning.' he chuckled at the naturalness of them waking up together.

'I'm starving. Let's have breakfast. I'm sure Nonna made you some Tuscan specialities.

'Well, if you mean, she had been preparing to kick my ass out of this house in a traditional Tuscan way, I am sure too. She hates me. Can't we have our breakfast here, in bed?' Sherlock tried his puppy eyes.

'You are afraid of her?'

'What? No-o. Of course not.' Sherlock frowned with a nervous smile.

'Yes you are.' Molly was grinning uncontrollably poking at his chest. 'Listen, when my mom was seventeen, my dad came here to work on the farm during the summer and they fell in love. The next two summers my dad came back to work for months, and on the third one he proposed to my mum, who said yes. They moved to England leaving my grandmother without a daughter but with four sons. Nonna always felt that my dad had stolen her only girl from her. Of course she forgave him after I was born, and I spent here almost every summer. But you know...she has her revulsions, but she has a wonderful heart.'

Sherlock nodded thoughtfully. 'So...you say the only way to make her like me is to procreate a child?' he asked with narrowed eyes arching one brow.

'What? That wasn't what I was meaning.' Molly' eyes gone wide in shock, but Sherlock's chuckle made her release the breath she was holding and sulkily put out her tongue. This amused Sherlock more and he started to laugh and between two titters he pressed a loving kiss on Molly's forehead.

'I really should eat something so I don't care if you are too scared to go down to the kitchen, but I will.' With that Molly jumped out of the bed with a sheet around her small frame and with overacted grace, holding her chin high she marched into the bathroom and locked the door. Sherlock didn't need to get more invitation than a locked door. He got out of the bed too, only he didn't bother with the sheet and grabbing one of Molly's barrette from the bedside table he picked the lock to join Molly in the shower.

'Oh, you are here.' Molly jumped as she blinked through her wet lashes.

'You knew I would come.' Sherlock smiled contently as he slipped his arms around Molly's waist stepping closer.

'I hoped so,' breathed Molly before his mouth captured her own.

At the end Sherlock could convince Molly that launch was a perfectly adequate as first meal of the day and when they finally wandered down the stairs the whole family had already flocked together to eat.

As they were walking towards them, six women and ten men, Sherlock quickly observed the people gathering around the long dinner table on the terrace under the arbour of red grapes. The major part of the family didn't live there, but in one of the smaller villages in the surrounding country, but they all worked in the family business being run from Nonna's farmhouse. According to their clothes and the fact that all of them did physical work around the house it was not a huge business, just big enough to keep them in a moderately good financial state. The people were cheerful, constantly chatting over each other's head, shouting to the other sitting on the other end of the table.

As they saw approaching the pair of them the loud talking stopped almost immediately, and Sherlock felt everybody's observing stare on himself. So that was it like, he tought with a low chuckle. He straightened himself and continued walking to have a seat following Molly who sat down next to Daniele. Sherlock other neighbour was a strongly constituted balding older man, apparently one of Molly's uncles, Daniele's father deduced from the facial similarities. He turned his head and silently nodded with a huff narrowing his eyes before he continued eating the antipasti.

As Sherlock accommodated himself under the attention which was getting more and more uncomfortable for him, the chatting suddenly went on as nothing had interrupted it. From then seemingly nobody was in particularly interested in him, but now and then he saw them looking at him from the corner of his eye.

When a few minutes later all the women including Molly disappeared in the kitchen to help bringing out the food, all the remained men's faces turned towards him. One of the four uncles, the oldest, started to speak in Italian, and Daniele possessing the best knowledge of English began to translate.

'They want to know what your real job is.' Sherlock took his glass and sipped from the water before putting it back slowly on the white tablecloth.

'Ho capito il questione completamente.' (I understood the question completely.) He seriously nodded towards the uncle. Just as he took a deep breath to answer the actual question all the men cheered and shouted loudly, and jumped up from their seats, all trying to shake his hand or pat his shoulder in the same time.

When Molly came out from the kitchen with a bowl full of meat in her hands she saw the strangest sight in front of her. Sherlock Holmes was surrounded by a lot of happy, smiling cheerfully chatting people. She almost dropped the bowl before putting it down on the table and quickly shoved herself to her seat.

'What did you tell them?' Molly asked in suspicion.

'Nothing,' he whispered with arched brows.

'Ahhh, that's why.' Molly nodded knowingly.

'What?' Sherlock frowned. 'I've just revealed my knowledge of the Italian language.' He shrugged.

'Do you speak Italian?' Molly was shocked then turned red remembering the phone call she recieved in Sherlock's presence from one of her Italian cousins a few years back, when she discussed how hot was Sherlock's bum in his new pants in Italian. His sly, knowing grin didn't helped at all. When she looked at him with embarrassment her blush deepened even more.

When Nonna finally arrived to the table all the others were settled down, relatively calm. They prayed silently then they started to eat producing cheerful, appreciative noises. The only one who was unusually silent was Molly's grandma.

She was just eating slowly and eyeing her grandchild and the strange Englese. Nonna knew exactly how many tears had fallen for this man till finally he got to his senses. Her heart clenched looking back at the years she was listening to this dear ragazza's sobbing over the phone. But now Molly looked so happy next to him staring at each other lovingly when they tought nobody was looking. Maybe it was not a good idea that in the morning...

'I invited Francesco for dinner.' She heard her own husky voice as she blurted out the sentence.
The fork stopped in Molly's hand.

'You did what?' She asked silently. Fortunately everybody else was engaged in a conversation so nobody hear the two of them except Sherlock who was listening with a furrow between his brows.

'I invited Francesco Coricelli for dinner tonight. I met him and his mother at the market.'
Molly became white and shakily hissed, 'This was really unnecessary, Nonna.' There was no other word of the topic, precisely there was no other word from Molly at all during launch.

As the men and the women went back to their work, except one of Molly's cousins, Elena, Nonna excused herself to have a nap referring to her age. The three of them stayed to clean the table. Well Sherlock being Sherlock walked to the edge of the terrace and lighted the cigarette with a lighter, both snitched from one of the uncles during the celebration over his command of Italian.

As Molly and Elena were doing the washing up, the girls were had a little time to chat a bit.

'Well, he does have a nice butt.' Elena winked at her cousin.

'Just off your eyes!' Molly poked the other woman's shoulder with a playful smile. 'Anyway, you are married.'

'Oh, yes, sometimes I forgot it.' Elena sighed sadly and quickly changed the subject. 'I can't believe she asked Francesco to dinner. Sometimes she is so bull-headed.'

The corner of Molly's smile flinched at the thought and murmured, 'Yes, I just have to survive the evening.' She sighed and putting down the last clean plate onto the dryer she turned and leaned back to the counter next to Elena. 'I know she wants the best for me, she just doesn't want to understand that my life is not here and not with Francesco.'

'You are her favourite, you know,' Elena said with faked ignorance.

'Just because I am not here.' Molly sighed and uncomfortable silence took its place between them. As they were standing there Molly was watching Sherlock who had finished his cigarette and easily jumped down from the terrace turning up the sleeves of his white shirt, and was walking towards Daniele, who was occupied with loading up the truck with barrels.

'Nonna is just missing my Mum. Me too, but I'm not her.' Molly swallowed hard and looked at her hands in her lap, losing both her parents was still so painful after all these years.

'I'm sorry Molly,' said Elena and hugged her tightly, holding her to comfort. 'But he really has nice butt.' They chuckled in each other's arms and getting back their light mood they agreed to drink a glass of wine as a preparation for the evening.


I like Nonna and the family so I decided to get to know them better. I have a small family, but hubby has a huge one. They have a temper but they are so nice and loving and they greet the new members kindly, so my intention was to draw Molly's Italian family like this. Did you like them?

In next chapter we will get to know this Francesco. I'm still not sure about his personality yet, but I already know who he is.

Let me know your opinion about anything.

Be well,

Lanceletta