An Echo in the Mafia (Echo Reid, Reid Family Book #1)

Part 58

"Echo?" 

"What's up?" Echo asked, turning to Adelia as she fumbled with the tape. They'd been wrapping presents for hours, laughing over the mess they were making. Echo was used to just paying for things to be wrapped for her but Adelia had insisted that they do it themselves. Of course, this meant they had to wait for Luke to be gone to do all their shopping and wrapping. So, here they were, just a couple of days to Christmas and trying to get it all done. 

"Do you have..." Adelia blurted as she continued to try to unroll her tape. "the things... the... for cutting?"

"The scissors?" Echo asked with a smile, holding them out to her. Adelia sighed. 

"Yes. Thank you." Adelia said, as she rolled out another piece of wrapping paper. "How many do you have left?"

"Let's see... I have one for Romy... and one more for Luke... and one for Ben." Echo said, glancing at the bags that were left. "You?"

"Just one for Luke and one for your parents." Adelia said with a smile. Echo sighed. 

"You know, you really didn't have to do that." Echo said, looking at all the gifts Luke and Adelia had bought for her family. 

"Oh, we're happy too." Adelia said, counting over the gifts. "I'm really excited about Christmas. Last year it was just Luke staring at me as I unwrapped a bunch of gifts."

"Really?" Echo asked, raising her brow. "What about your aunt Daniela? Didn't you go spend it with Nadia and them?"

"No, they've invited us but Luke isn't really the type to join in. Usually we have some dinner here and the next day we watch TV as we open presents." Adelia said. Echo frowned. Her parents made such a big deal about Christmas. Everything from Christmas Eve until the day after was an endless stream of food, cheesy games, movies and presents. 

"Well, we're happy to have you. My parents... they've got holiday spirit in their DNA. They love it and honestly, their enthusiasm is contagious." Echo said, "They're excited you're coming. It's been a long time since they had a kid in the house."

"I'm not a kid." Adelia said, sitting up straight.

"Of course not. I mean someone so young." Echo said with a nod as she tied another bow. "It's hopeless."

Adelia laughed. 

"Alright, I'm going to take baby out. Wanna come?" Echo said, setting the gift aside and standing. 

"No, I want to finish up." Adelia said as she carefully continued cutting. 

"What's going on in here?" Marco's voice cut through the room, a big smile on his lips. 

"Hey!" Adelia said brightly. "We're just finishing up our Christmas wrapping. Don't worry- we already wrapped yours."

"I'm honored." He said, turning to Echo who was trying to get a ridiculous looking harness on the little dog. 

"I... was just about to take this little guy for a walk." Echo said, standing with a smile and admiring the dog. 

"I'll come with you." He said, following her as she made her way out the back. 

"You okay?" He asked after they'd walked on in silence for a few minutes. 

"Yeah, I'm just... I hope Luke doesn't mind." She said, making his raise his brow. 

"Mind?" Marco asked nervously. 

"Yeah, you know his study. I just sort of took over and I'm lucky he hasn't gone in there." Echo said. Just across the hall from his study was a bedroom, not very large but not too small that she'd decided would now be their library. It was an ambitious task to undertake, especially to try to complete in a week but it turned out that in this town, being Luke's wife really pulled a lot of strings. Marco had helped her by getting some men to pick up large bookcases, and furniture had been delivered to make sure the room was a comfortable one. As it was just across the hall from the study, it was very convenient to cart the books in once the shelves and book cases were installed. While the men were busy installing them, Echo and Adelia went through all the books in the study, plus the books Echo had brought with her from home and they carefully indexed and cataloged them.