Page 41 of The Rainbow Recipe
Dante might be a self-centered prick, but he was a damned good looking one. And every so often, when he actually tried to behave like a concerned father...He set off her bells and whistles.
Telling herself it was because she’d never really had a father, she returned to the kitchen and mixing dough. Old-fashioned biscuits, she decided, comfort food. No ground sausage for gravy, but she’d improvise.
Then she’d go to her room and look for tickets home.
Late the next morning,Dante fastened Alex into one side of the back seat while his enigmatic companion settled Nan into the other. The kids were practically bouncing in excitement, making it hard to check that their booster seats were fastened properly.
Guilt ate at him. He never took them anywhere. He should be taking them to carnivals or whatever it was parents did with children. A zoo. He could take them to a zoo. Sometime.
He’d have to give up his travels and settle down at the local university and teach. He resented the hell out of Lucia for leaving him with all the burden. Maybe what he needed to do was go to London and hunt her down again. This time, she wouldn’t be expecting him and wouldn’t have time to hide.
He couldn’t even go to London until he hired a nanny and his mother returned to hold down the fort.
He was bad company as they drove to the farm, but his guest wasn’t much better. Priscilla had informed him this morning that she’d found a good return fare out of Rome for the day after next, but she’d keep looking for next week if the nanny couldn’t come sooner. He’d given her his credit card so she could buy a refundable ticket instead and wouldn’t have to hunt economy fares. It was the least he could do.
The car bumped down the rocky lane toward the cave, and the twins giggled and laughed at the rough ride.
“Something’s wrong,” Pris suddenly murmured, jarring him from his thoughts.
Instead of hitting the brake, she stomped the gas pedal and pushed the little Fiat until they practically bounced off the roof.
The damned woman was a speed demon, but his pulse accelerated. He strained to see what she did, but all he saw was the olive orchard. He’d sent one of his more experienced foremen over to make certain the tunnel was safe for further exploration. He didn’t want anyone else hurt by falling rocks—although his students had more sense than Leo. They wouldn’t ram hard hats into cracked ceilings.
Dust poured from the entrance as they pulled up.Shit, shit, shit. Dante bit off his curses and threw open his door before Pris had the ignition off. “Leave the twins buckled,” he ordered.
He pried himself out of the rolling tin can with his crutch, not waiting to see how she took his commands. He could see more hard hats emerging from the narrow entrance, tugging someone or something behind.
“Fred’s still in there,” one of his students shouted as Dante approached. “The whole ceiling collapsed and a large slab landed on his legs.”
Given the type of rock in there,slabsdidn’t make a bit of sense, but he wouldn’t argue with the assessment. “Have you called an ambulance? Did you construct the supports as you went? Where’s the creeper? Can I fit back in there?”
He shouted questions as he approached the entrance. Red dust poured out, obscuring his vision. He grabbed a hat with a light that someone handed him.
“Dante! You can’t go in there with that leg,” his foreman argued. “We’ll need to jack up the slab so we can pull him out.”
“He could lose the leg if we leave him too long.” Dante had first-hand knowledge of how bad that could be for an archeological career. “Bring me a jack from the truck and some lumber.”
He didn’t make promises. He hadn’t seen the situation. He simply knew he had twice the experience and more muscle than college kids and a forty-five-year-old desk jockey. His foreman knewwhatto do. He physicallycouldn’tdo it.
Of course, Dante wasn’t fit to crawl either, but he could work around that. The rolling flatbed meant for working under cars helped in tight spaces like this one, even more so with his bad leg. The cart was a piece of junk cast out by some service station, but it held his weight. Lying on his back, kicking with his one good foot, he went in head first, illuminating the ceiling and unable to see ahead. This first part of the tunnel was just as he remembered, perfectly sound bedrock.
He’d assumed it eventually connected with the storage areas above, providing an exit or entrance for the original builders. Those areas had withstood thousands of years of use without a single crack. Why would this one cave-in so easily?
“Federico?” he called. “Can you hear me?”
“Si, signor,” the student called with an exasperated sigh. “I cannot turn over to lift the slab.”
The tunnel had widened at this section. Dante cautiously rolled over on his stomach so he could see ahead. Odd, the slab that had fallen looked more like concrete than volcanic tuff. He spoke reassuringly in Italian. Fortunately, the student had been on the way out and faced Dante.
“I have a jack,” he told the kid. “If I can lift this corner and push the lumber under it, I should be able to lift the whole. I don’t know if it’s enough. Do you think you can move?”
The edge of the slab appeared to be resting on the student’s thigh. If he could pry that edge up...
“Si. I am well padded. It is the angle trapping me.”
Hampered by his injured leg and the narrow space, it took Dante forever to situate the lumber, the jack, and exert enough pressure to lift the stone even an inch. Federico worked with him, pushing and lifting where he could, sliding the trapped limb slowly as the weight rose off him.
They both gasped in relief as he finally wriggled free.
