“I observed a scene between her and a man who came over to my table and stood there until I finished whatever I was saying to your sister. He excused himself and then asked if he could steal her because he had something he needed to talk to her about in the kitchen.”
“Was it Mitch?”
“He didn’t introduce himself but my guess is he worked there. He acted like he was in a position of authority. I got the impression he was annoyed, and your sister didn’t seem too happy with him either.”
Lucia shook her head, a look of disgust on her face. “It had to be Mitch. I wish I knew what that guy’s story is. Eliana and I are worried he’s taking advantage of Cat and she’s got blinders on or something.”
“Is Mitch her boss?”
She frowned. “Yes, and unfortunately, he’s her boyfriend as well. I’ve got a bad feeling about him, though.”
“I didn’t get a good one, either. I hope I haven’t upset you by bringing it up.”
“No. If you picked up negative vibes during such a brief encounter, it just convinces me more that Eliana and I are right about the guy.”
“Have you talked to Caterina about your concerns?”
“Once or twice, but she gets defensive and makes excuses for him. Honestly, I don’t think she’s happy, but she either doesn’t want to admit there’s a problem or…I don’t know, maybe she doesn’t want to risk getting fired if she stood up to him.”
“I don’t get the impression she’d let any man push her around for long before she stood her ground, even if it meant losing her job.”
“Let’s hope so.” Lucia reached out and took his hand. “I’m glad you said something. You wouldn’t have brought it up if you didn’t care, and that means a lot to me.”
One of the inn’s guests walked into the lobby, and Antonio gave her hand a squeeze before releasing it.
“I’ll get out of here so you can get back to work. Since you offered, I’m going to go check out the attic to see if it might work as an office space.”
LIGHT STREAMED INTO the room through two sets of double-hung windows on the front wall and another set on one of the long side walls, making the attic much brighter than Antonio had anticipated. The walls and ceilings were finished and would need nothing more than a coat of paint to freshen things up.
Pine planking covered the floors. It creaked when he walked across it. Old wood, but it seemed to be in good shape, and solid.
There were a few boxes scattered here and there, several old trunks, and some small furniture items, things no one had much use for but hadn’t wanted to throw out. Forgotten items.
If he consolidated everything in the back corner, it would only take up about six square feet, leaving the majority of the room empty. There was enough space he could even pick up some inexpensive furniture and create a place to stretch out if he got tired of working at a desk.
He planned to reach out to some local builders when he got back from his trip, see if he could pick up a few more jobs, renovations, the like. He’d still be consulting with his team back home, but he’d need something else here to keep busy when he wasn’t working on the Bonavera’s job.
He turned around, took another look at the space. It would be more than adequate for his needs. Pleased, Antonio left the attic and went back down to the main level.
Lucia was on the phone taking a reservation. She looked up and smiled at him as he walked through the lobby. He gave her a wink and held his keys in the air.
“Be back in a couple of hours,” he mouthed.
She nodded, holding the phone to her ear with her shoulder. She lifted her free hand in a wave as she jotted something in the registry book with the other. He found her efficiency a total turn-on. There was little about her that didn’t turn him on. He wasn’t sure what that said about his growing feelings for her, but he’d deal with them if and when the time came they needed to be dealt with.
They hadn’t talked about their feelings, or what they might be involved in. Were they in a relationship now? Just friends? He shook his head as he climbed into the car. No, they’d become more than friends. He just wasn’t sure what, or what it meant for his plans.
Antonio frowned. When had he ever spent time analyzing a relationship or where it was headed? He didn’t want to do that now, but their situation was different. He enjoyed spending time with her, so he would. And when the time was right, he’d present her with his proposal and hope she’d be amenable to it.
The eye sees only what the mind is
prepared to comprehend.
Robertson Davies
During the week Antonio was away, Lucia and her sisters cleaned the attic and repainted everything with a fresh coat of crisp, white paint. They moved all the boxes and trunks, most of which they had no idea what they contained, to the back corner of the room. Lucia blocked them from view with two Chinese screens she’d bought for the purpose. One day they’d have to go through them to see what they contained and weed things out.
The glass panes in the windows, which probably hadn’t been cleaned in decades, now sparkled and let even more light into the room.
It would be a nice surprise when Antonio returned and saw what they’d accomplished, and he could use the time he would have spent doing it himself to finish the next set of drawings instead. The sooner they could move on to the construction drawings, the sooner they could start interviewing contractors.
Next week they were going to settlement. Once they actually owned the property, Lucia knew both she and Cat would be even more anxious to move ahead.
It had been another full house that weekend, and Lucia had been glad to be busy. It surprised her how much she missed Antonio. She’d gotten used to seeing him every day, even if it was just to exchange a few words in passing. The first couple of days after he left she’d found herself looking up whenever the front door opened. Her heart would race at the possibility of seeing him walk through, and then she’d remember he was out of the country. It should frighten her, these emotions he stirred, and it did a little, but mostly he made her happy, and her heart kept telling her to trust him. Maybe it was time she listened to it.
With the last guest having checked out that morning, and no more scheduled to arrive until Friday, Lucia had the rest of the day, and most of Wednesday and Thursday, to herself.
Darcy would be in Thursday to give all the rooms a thorough going over, put fresh sheets and blankets on the beds, clean towels in the baths, and restock the necessary toiletries. She currently only came in two days a week, but when Serendipity opened as a boutique hotel and full-service restaurant, they might need to bring her on full time, and possibly someone else. At least that was Lucia’s hope.
She ate a quick lunch of yogurt with fruit, went up to her room to change into a pair of jeans and an old, long-sleeved navy tee, and climbed the stairs to the attic.
The paint supplies and drop cloths they’d put down to protect the floorboards were still spread around the room. She wanted to get everything put away and give the floors a final cleaning before Antonio got back.
Gathering up all the empty cans first, she loaded them into one of the cardboard boxes she’d brought up earlier. She stacked those that still had paint in them by the door to return to the basement. Everything else—masking tape, caulk, the single-edge blades they’d used to scrape splatters from the window panes, trays, and the unused brushes and roller covers—went into another box.
Lastly, she folded the drop cloths and set them next to the boxes. Taking a final look around to make sure she hadn’t missed anything, she picked up the box of empty cans. She could probably carry everything to the basement in three trips, and then she’d deal with the floor.
Balancing the box on one hip, Lucia reached for the doorknob and gave it a pull. The door stuck. She tried again but it didn’t budge. She put the box down, grabbed the knob with both hands, and pulled. When it still didn’t open, she put a foot against the frame and gave it all she had, as if she were in a tug-of-war.
&nb
sp; “What the…?” Maybe the little release thingy’s catching. She turned the handle again, as far as it would go—nothing.
“Are you freaking kidding me?”
Wrestling with the door was getting her nowhere. Lucia pounded on it. “Hello, can anyone hear me?”
No one heeded her summons.
Not sure what else to do, she sank to the floor with a groan. Good thing she’d eaten something before she came up here. There was no telling when one of her sisters would venture to their room and hear her up here banging about.
One of the Chinese screens she’d put up to block the boxes and trunks in the far corner fell onto the floor with a bang and she jumped.
Lucia slapped a hand over her heart. “Way to startle a girl.” She blew out a relieved breath and stood up. The windows.
Hurrying across the room, she unlatched the lock on one of the ones that looked out over the front of the house and lifted up on it. “Really?”
She went to the next one, the next, the last. “You’re all freaking stuck!”
They hadn’t painted them shut. She knew it. They’d taken extra care to move them up and down while painting so that wouldn’t happen, and they’d opened and closed easily enough then.
The second Chinese screen fell and she spun around, startled again by the sharp crack of wood smacking against wood when it hit the floor. She stared at the toppled screens. The foot braces were supposed to prevent them from falling over. Maybe the floor was uneven and they just hadn’t noticed when they put them up.
She sighed in frustration. She had plans to get together with Jenna for happy hour at O’Dwyer’s Pub, so if she didn’t get out of here soon, the floors would have to wait until tomorrow.
She shivered and rubbed her hands up and down her arms. She hadn’t noticed it being so cool when she’d been packing up the supplies. The temperature seemed to take another dip.
Lucia rolled her jaw, trailed her eyes around the room as a ridiculous possibility popped into her head.
No! She shook her head. There was a logical explanation for everything—the stuck door, the windows that refused to budge, the chill in the air, and…she turned toward the far corner, both of those screens spontaneously falling over by themselves.
She didn’t believe in ghosts. Yeah, but what about Antonio thinking he saw someone standing next to his bed on the same morning I thought I saw someone in my room? Well, he admitted he might have been dreaming. Still…
“Okay, look, I don’t believe in—I don’t know—ghosts, spirits, whatever, but if by some…” She rolled her eyes toward the ceiling, staring at it a moment before going on. “I can’t believe I’m even saying this, but if there is someone here, you know, like Rosa, or whoever, could you just cut the crap? I’ve got things to do.”
The room remained awash in silence. Lucia reached up, massaged her temples. What would she do if no one found her for several hours?
“Please?” she whispered into the empty room.
She heard a click behind her and spun to see the door drift partially ajar.
Lucia bolted for it, yanked it all the way open and darted into the hallway. From the other side of the threshold she stood and looked around the room. The next time she came up here she was bringing something to wedge in the door.
“SO WHEN DO I get to meet this guy?” Jenna asked Lucia as they sat at one of the high-tops in O’Dwyer’s for happy hour sharing a selection of appetizers and sipping three dollar glasses of wine.
“He’s out of town until the weekend, gone back to Italy to take care of some things, but now that he’s going to be working with us I’m sure you’ll meet him when you come by the winery.”
“Have you slept with him yet?”
“Jesus, Jenna, I told you I’ve only known him a month.”
“So? You want to, and don’t try to deny it. You’ve got this bill’s long overdue and the creditor’s knocking at the door written all over you when you talk about him.”
“Maybe I don’t want to rush things.” Lucia swirled her glass on the top of the table, making small circles with the foot, and then took a sip.
“Why? You like him. You said you think he likes you.”
“Because I’m still not sure it’s worth the risk. Even though he’s going to be here a while now, he will be returning to Italy when everything’s done. I could fall in love with him with no effort at all. I mean the real thing—the want to spend every spare minute with, share food from your own fork with, offer to give barefoot massages to and not get grossed out by it—kind of thing.”
Jenna laughed. “I’ve never liked a guy enough to offer to rub down his smelly feet.”
“Me neither. That’s just the point. If I think about massaging Antonio’s bare feet, it doesn’t make me cringe. It should make me cringe, but it doesn’t. Don’t you think that’s dangerous? Maybe I’m already half in love with him, and if I start sleeping with him, I might not be able to slow down the train. We’ll just keep barreling down the track until we come to the last stop and it’s time for him to get off and go back to Italy.”
Lucia leaned toward the table and propped her chin in her hand. “And where would that leave me? Standing on a platform waving goodbye as I watch him walk away, trying to keep the pieces of my breaking heart from scattering all over the tracks to get crushed even more.”
“You know you’re doing it again, right?”
“Doing what exactly?”
“Talking yourself out of what could be a very satisfying relationship because of Brad.”
“Oh, here we go. Don’t start with that, Jen. That was over three years ago. I’m over it. Wanting to take a little time to get to know someone better before getting sweaty and naked with them isn’t the result of any long-harbored psychological repression over someone I should have never gotten involved with in the first place.”
“Yeah, it is. He charmed you, swept you off your feet, you lost your head over him, wanted to marry him and make babies together, and then you found out you weren’t the only one who wanted to spend your life with him and make babies together. He broke your heart, you felt like a fool, and although you say you’ve scrubbed the last of the grimy dregs from that experience from your subconscious, you still keep a foot on the brake pedal, and whenever you start feeling something for a guy, that foot starts twitching.”
Jenna picked up a piece of the shrimp appetizer. “Remember who you’re talking to, honey. This is me, your best friend, so I know better. You’re not willing to risk your heart again, so to avoid any possible pain you deny yourself the joy.”
“Are you gonna send me a bill for that diagnosis, or should I just pay your part of the tab?”
“No charge. That’s what friends are for.” Jenna dipped her shrimp into some cocktail sauce and, holding it by the tail, wagged it in the air at her. “And friends are also for telling you when you should take a chance on something that you might regret not taking a chance on when you had the opportunity. Take your foot off the brake, Luch. If you’re not ready to push the accelerator to the floor and fly into paradise with the man, try coasting.”
Lucia flipped her hair back behind her shoulders, smiled across the table at her friend.
Jenna popped the shrimp into her mouth, chewed, and then swallowed. “You’re thinking about it, aren’t you?”
“Kind of.”
“Go for it, honey. Trust me, you’ll regret it if you don’t, and if it doesn’t work out and he breaks your heart, I’ll apologize for steering you wrong and let you have my Donatella.”
“The strapless, powder blue satin dress with the full-length back zipper?”
“Yeah. The one I wore New Year’s Eve.”
Lucia tilted her head, thought a moment, and then reached her glass across the table to tap it to Jenna’s. “Okay, deal.”
“Wow. You must really love that dress.”
“Who wouldn’t? It’s gorgeous, but the truth is, I don’t know if I can resist him much longer even if I wanted t
o. The attraction is just too strong, and you’re right, I let what happened with Brad make me overly cautious. It’s time I stop denying myself because there’s a chance I might get hurt. There’s just as much a chance I could be missing out on something wonderful.”
Jenna stared at her with an open mouth. “Then what the hell was that I don’t know if it’s worth the risk, and I might have to rub his feet shit all about?”
Lucia shrugged. “I wanted to get your perspective, give you a chance to talk me out of it in case you came up with a compelling reason I should reconsider.”
“You just snookered me out of my Donatella.”
“I’ll let you borrow it.”
“Maybe he won’t break your heart and it stays in my closet.”
“In this particular case, I hope you’re right. All joking aside, Antonio’s a good man and I care about him a lot. When the time comes for him to leave, it would be nice if we can remain friends and remember each other with a smile rather than sadness.”
“Sounds like you’re ready for another glass of wine.”
“Yeah…you?”
Jenna signaled their waiter. Lucia had begun to wax poetic, but she meant what she’d said. Regardless of what happened between them, she hoped she would always look back on their time together as a special chapter in her life…without regrets.
“WHERE ARE YOU going?” Eliana asked when Lucia passed her on the stairs carrying a WetJet and a three-foot-long two-by-four.
“The attic. I just finished clearing everything out of there, and now I want to clean the floor so it’ll be ready for Antonio to set up his office next week.”
Eliana hitched her head toward the two-by-four. “What are you going to do with that?”
Lucia grimaced, not sure if she wanted to say anything about what had happened the day before. The door and window might just have been sticking because they’d swelled from the heat…although that rationale didn’t hold water since the temperature had dropped to the point she’d started shivering.
Lucia (The Bonaveras) Page 13