Page 31 of My Dark Ever After
Carlotta’s mouth was stained red from wine, and Stacci was lured into dancing the traditional steps of a local jig with some friends of hers, who had us all clapping and laughing along with them.
It was idyllic.
So perfect I felt inexplicably like crying.
The last five days at Villa Romano had been their own kind of exquisite agony. The entire family was wonderful, if a little chaotic.
Angela Romano was clearly the matriarch, but she was made of sugar without an ounce of bitterness or vinegar to offset her sweetness.She happily enlisted me to cook before mealtimes in the kitchen, patiently teaching me how to hand rollorecchietteand curedlardo di Collonata, when to take a braised lamb out of the oven and how to bakeschiacciata alla Fiorentina, the traditional dessert of Florence. She did not speak English as well as her children, but it gave me the opportunity to flex my Italian, and she delighted in teaching me obscure expressions and dialect from her youth in Naples, where she was born.
Stacci and Carlotta stopped apologizing for their sons on my second day in the house, when they caught us playingnascondino(hide-and-seek) swiftly followed by a rousing round ofpalla prigioniera(basically dodgeball) out by the small field beside the pool. Zacheo had become my little shadow, but the rest of the boys delighted in having an active adult to play in their games. I didn’t have much to do before the US market opened and I started my remote work, so I spent most of that time playing games.
It was hard to be confused and sad when I was surrounded by sweet, rambunctious children.
Delfina was busy preparing for the harvest, but when she rolled in at the end of dinner and grabbed a plate to eat standing up in the kitchen while the rest of us cleaned, she always made it a point to talk to me. I liked her perhaps even more than sassy Stacci and sweet Carlotta. Delfina was blunt in a way that reminded me of her brother, and she had a fascination with film that I could relate to. She had ducked into my room the last two nights after dinner to sit on my bed and watch Sebastian Lombardi movies with me. He was from Naples, but he was still Italian, and Delfina told me she’d had a crush on him since she was ten and he was the sole reason she was still single.
She made me laugh.
Emiliano and Lando were both kind, the former more gregarious than the latter, but they both worked long hours, so the only men I really spent time with were Carmine and Ludo.
I could not complain.
Even though I wasn’t allowed to leave the estate without an escort, Ludo took me for a jog every day down the hill, around the looping road, and back up. It was still warm enough that we were dripping with sweat by the time we returned, but my stamina was getting so much better. He also helped me with sparring, something he excelled at. Unlike my teacher at the dojo, Ludo had real-world fighting experience, and he taught me what a true fight for my life might look like. The first time I landed a punch, he gave me a fist bump that felt like a trophy.
When I had to work, Carmine shared his temporary office space with me. I tried not to eavesdrop, but it was impossible not to be drawn in by his phone calls and conversations with Ludo. The Romano business had interests in everything from green energy to agriculture to imports and exports. I learned that they owned a few genuine luxury brands and a number of factories that reproduced fake designer products, which seemed counterproductive, but Carmine only smirked at my expression and explained that they could corner both markets.
It was fascinating.
So much so, I found myself gravitating to Carmine’s desk when I was done with my own work. He didn’t say a word, only shifted a portfolio across the tabletop toward me; it contained a financial pitch from a wind turbine company near Turin.
“What do you expect me to do with this?” I asked, even though there was a pen between my fingers already, my eyes on a pad of paper beside Carmine’s elbow.
He handed it to me without looking away from his screen. “What do you think?”
What a powerful question for a curious mind.
An hour later, I’d written a summary of why I thought the company itself was a bad bet but that the idea had merit.
Another hour after that, Carmine casually pushed a folder across the desk at me; it contained five companies that could do the same work the original one had proposed. I found the right candidate in the time it took me to eat the panini Carlotta brought me for lunch.
I didn’t ask if the business they intended to conduct with the company was wholly legal because I already knew the answer and found I didn’t want to acknowledge it. Even watching Carmine work, overhearing conversations that were not always kind in tone, I tried to ignore what was right in front of my face.
It was considerably harder than it had been my first six weeks in Tuscany.
Five productive, fulfilling days in Italy, five days I never would have assumed I’d enjoy, given that I was technically there against my will.
And all five of them spent away from Raffa.
You shouldn’t miss him,I thought as I leaned against the stone wall of the bell tower in Impruneta with Ludo while the others socialized around us. I was tired, both from lingering jet lag and from chasing the kids through the square. The sun was dipping behind the red-roofed buildings, but there was no sign of the festivities halting anytime soon. It wasn’t very smart of me, but I’d had my share of wine with the sisters, sampling the local offerings and toasting to this, that, and the other. I wasn’t used to drinking, and my head was spinning like a top about to stop, wobbly and slow.
“I’m going to grab a coffee,” I told Ludo in Italian, and when he moved to join me, I shook my head and pointed to the café four yards across the crowded street from us. “I will be right back. Stay and have fun.”
His lips twisted in an eloquent way that said clearly,Yeah right.
I laughed as I walked away from him, swerving through the bodies to get to the busy coffee shop and the collection of people standing in the open doorway, drinking wine and espresso. The interior was just as busy, but I wedged myself into a small gap at the bar and fluently ordered myself an espresso when the server noticed me.
It felt good to taste Italian on my tongue again. To stretch the muscles I’d honed for weeks in Florence and know that I hadn’t lost any skill over the past two months.
I leaned against the counter, taking deep breaths to settle my spinning head, and hoped the coffee would cut through some of the haziness.
