She followed him up the stone stairs, gasping when he opened the door. As elegant as she thought her apartment was, it was nothing compared to this.
“Welcome to my humble abode,” Marco said with unmistakable pride.
“You own this?”
“Just this floor. But it is the piano nobile.”
It certainly is a noble floor, Olivia thought. It had to be sixty by forty feet. Massive Murano chandeliers hung from a high ceiling frescoed with a scene from mythology, complete with gods, cherubs, clouds, and chariots, all the colors bright, as if it had been recently restored. Paintings adorned the walls, some that looked to Olivia to be seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Venetian, others far more modern. Middle Eastern carpets dotted the marble floors, and precious antiques—tables, settees, and chairs—were grouped around the enormous marble fireplace.
It was true he had only one balcony, but it took up the width of the room, and she stepped out onto it and looked down to the canal. There were no streets along the water, so she knew she was getting a privileged view of this stretch of canal.
“I have the same decorator as Elton John,” Marco said as he led her through the smaller rooms that ringed the piano nobile. “It used to belong to a very famous opera singer.”
She suppressed the urge to ask him how much he’d sunk into this apartment. The artwork alone was worth more money than she’d ever see in a lifetime. Any residual guilt she felt about him paying her student loans vanished. If he could afford all this, her monthly student loan payments were nothing.
“It’s all thanks to Happy Spiders,” he said as if reading her thoughts.
Olivia thought she detected a slightly bitter edge to his tone, and as they paused in his bedroom with its massive canopied four-poster bed, she looked at him.
“Just wish I had someone to share it with, that’s all,” he said, averting his eyes.
So that was it. All this wealth hadn’t made him less lonely. She gave him a hug. “There’ll be someone. I just know it. You’re wonderful, intelligent, good-looking, and, dare I say it, rich.”
“So far the rich part only makes me worry no one will care about the rest.”
“I care. I know you’re my cousin, but I loved you before you gave me this wonderful job and started paying my student loans. You’ll meet someone. Who knows—maybe the man of your dreams will be in Iceland!”
He laughed. “I hope so. Now let’s get you to Silvio’s.”
The offices of Silvio Milan were located in Silvio’s palazzo on the Grand Canal. Since its front door, like Marco’s, was on the canal, they entered by way of the courtyard. “It’s not very interesting now,” Marco explained, “but in spring it explodes with roses.”
He led her up a flight of stone steps to a heavy, ornate door and opened it. She was more prepared this time for the magnificence that greeted her, though surveying it beneath a stunning Murano chandelier, she quickly concluded that Silvio’s taste was much more restrained than Marco’s, perhaps illustrating the difference between old money and new. Even the cherubs on the painted ceiling seemed more reserved. Everything was exquisite, down to the Christmas tree, hung with delicate mercury-glass balls. The far end of the room culminated in French doors, beyond which could be seen the dome of the Salute basking in the glow of floodlights.
At home in these refined surroundings was their owner, Silvio Milan. Not even Marco’s glowing accounts had fully conveyed his confidence and style—late thirties, slender, of average height, signature Italian dark eyes, dark hair, with that fashionable not-quite-shaved look that only Italian men seem to pull off. He was also one of those men who looked as if he were born to wear designer suits, elegant and yet casual at the same time.
He greeted Olivia with a dazzling smile and kissed her on both cheeks. She could see why women (and Marco) found him attractive, but she thought maybe she liked her men a little more real, like the cop, Alessandro Rossi. The very thought of him made the heat rise to her cheeks, which she hoped Silvio didn’t notice or at least attributed to the fact she was still wearing her coat.
“Piacere,” he said warmly. “It’s nice to meet you at last.”
“It’s nice to meet you too.”
“I was sorry to hear about your father. Marco said you were very close.”
“Thank you, we were,” she said with that familiar tug at her heart whenever he was mentioned. But thinking of the chattering teeth sitting in her apartment, that tug seemed a little less painful and a little sweeter. For all the trouble and embarrassment those teeth had caused her, they’d already become an important part of her healing—and that was what this Christmas in Venice with Marco was about.
Marco started to help her with her coat, but Silvio stopped him. “Before you do that, let me show Olivia her first glimpse of our view.” He gestured toward the French doors, and she and Marco followed him out onto the narrow balcony. “I can’t wait until you see it at sunset. The sun is like a molten ball about to set the canal on fire. All of Venice seems wrapped in its rosy, golden glow. To paint Venice is to capture its light. Without the right light, you have but stone and water. With the light, you have magic.”
“Sounds amazing,” Olivia said. Below her, two gondoliers rowed a lone passenger across the canal. While the boat looked the same as the gondolas the tourists loved so much, Silvio explained that this was a traghetto, a ferry, on its last run of the day—one of the many that transported people from one side of the Grand Canal to the other. The passenger stood in the boat, his nose in his smartphone, seemingly oblivious to the glory around him. How could anyone cease to marvel at this place? Surely, Olivia thought, Venetians walked home from work completely enraptured by the beauty around them.
“Venice is a city of illusions,” Silvio continued. “It appears to float on water, but it is all firmly anchored. Everything you see is built on top of tall wooden piles driven through the water and into the mud to make foundations. There are over a million piles under the Salute alone.”
“And they don’t rot?” Olivia asked.
“No. They’re never exposed to air. Some of them are over a thousand years old. It truly is a city like no other.”
“I love it already. Thank you for giving me this opportunity.”
“No, it’s the other way around. Thank you for choosing Silvio Milan. Marco has told me of the excellent work you’ve been doing in Toronto and of your knowledge of art history. You’re going to be a brilliant asset to our head office.”
“You’re very kind. I love my apartment too.”
“You’re most welcome. Let’s go inside and toast your arrival with a glass of Prosecco. I trust your flight was uneventful?”
“It was fine,” she replied. There was no need to mention the whole embarrassing incident, but Marco did it for her.
“Except for the bomb scare,” he said.
Silvio raised a questioning eyebrow. “Bomb scare?”
“Yes, when I arrived to pick up Olivia, they had the whole terminal cordoned off. There were cops everywhere. Apparently, someone had phoned in a threat. The president and his family were on their way here for Christmas.”
“But all a false alarm, I take it?” he asked, looking at Olivia with concern.
She nodded, deciding not to tell them about the toy teeth.
“That’s good,” he said, leading them to a sideboard where a bottle rested on ice. He poured three glasses, handing them theirs before raising his own. “Welcome to Venice,” he said, and they touched glasses. “While we have our wine, I can show you your office, but first, let me give you this,” he said, handing her a new iPhone; she was going to have to put her other phone away somewhere so she didn’t mix them up. “It’s on the company account. Use it for all your calls and texts, including any you want to make home to Canada. Don’t worry about the expense. It’s not like Canada.”
Olivia laughed.
She turned on her new phone and saw a list of names and numbers, including Silvio, Marco, Dino, her mother, and her sister.
“All our staff and clients are already programmed in. The staff members prefer to text each other—they find it much less invasive than a call. I prefer it too. It gives time to think before replying, and it’s easier to ignore if I’m in the middle of something with a client. And it doesn’t matter if you’re in the next room or on the other side of the world. It’s something I still find amazing—but then I don’t share your cousin’s comfort with technology, one of the many reasons I like to have him around. Now, let’s go see your office.”
Her office was one of the rooms encircling the piano nobile. A large desk dominated the room, and the computer at its center was the only obvious modern intrusion. There was a balcony with a view of the courtyard, and in the corner, a cabinet that held Murano glassware, some new and some old. Olivia regarded the glass pieces with awe. “That’s sixteenth century,” she exclaimed.
“You’re right. Murano glass is a big part of our business, so it’s important you know it well. After Christmas, you’ll meet many glass artists as well as dealers. You’ll learn what makes a piece particularly valuable and what our various clients are looking for. In fact, I wondered if you and Marco were part of the famous Moretti glassmaking family. While Marco assures me it is only a coincidence, it certainly won’t hurt to have that name around here.”
Most of the staff was already off for Christmas, but on the way out for dinner, Silvio showed her the ground floor and introduced her to Luigi, a diminutive man in his mid-fifties, whose small features were dominated by a large mustache. “Luigi here oversees the packing of every item to ensure it arrives safely at its destination and deals with Customs and other unglamorous but important things like that.” The ground floor was devoted mainly to storage and workrooms. It was prone to flooding, and Luigi demonstrated how all the benches could be raised with the help of a rope-and-pulley system.
They exited by the water entrance, and Silvio helped her onto the water taxi that was waiting for them. “We meet again,” Dino said. And while his smile seemed genuine enough, Olivia felt some of her earlier unease. But she knew first impressions could be hard to shake, and she resolved to overcome them.
Their destination that night was the Fortuny Restaurant in the Hotel Cipriani on Giudecca Island, and they were soon skimming down the Grand Canal, past the Piazza San Marco. They sat in the back of the boat, and Olivia held back her hair to keep it from flying in her face. Despite the winter wind, she felt like Katharine Hepburn in the movie Summertime. Silvio was extolling the virtues of Fortuny’s when Olivia remembered something about the restaurant.
“The Cipriani family invented the Bellini cocktail, right? There’s a restaurant called Cipriani in New York. I’ve never eaten there, of course. I’ve only been to New York twice, and my dining was mostly limited to hot dog carts.”
“Well, perhaps when you’re there in early February, I’ll make reservations for you.”
“I’m going to New York in February? she asked, surprised.
“Marco didn’t tell you?”
“No,” Marco said. “I left the bad news for you.”
“No,” Silvio said, laughing, “it’s not bad at all. It just means leaving Venice for a week in Manhattan. We’re showing some Murano glass jewelry at our gallery there.”
“But I know so little about Murano glass . . .”
“Don’t be so modest. You recognized the goblet in your office as sixteenth century without a moment of hesitation. You’ll know more than you ever need to by then. Not to worry. And, if it makes you feel any better, the artist will be accompanying you, and you’ll be spending most of your time translating for him.”
“Okay. That I know I can do. I just don’t want to let you down.”
“You won’t. By the way, where did you get the glass beads you’re wearing?”
“A Christmas present from Marco.”
“They go so beautifully with your eyes—which I’m sure Marco intended. Did you tell her who designed them, Marco?”
“No. It’s the color that was important.”
“Nonsense. He’s just being modest and doesn’t want you to know how valuable they are. Well, I won’t tell you either. Finding out who made them can be your first assignment,” he concluded as the taxi pulled up to the dock in front of the hotel.
She should have been pleased that Silvio sounded confident of her potential, but as he took her hand and helped her out of the boat, she felt some of the pleasure drain out of the evening. Not that she was averse to New York, but somehow she thought she’d be spending all her time in Venice. Marco, though, seemed to have no problem flying to Paris, London, New York, or Iceland at a moment’s notice. This was the life she was choosing, she reminded herself, and she just was going to have to get used to it.
The hotel dining room sparkled with thousands of white Christmas lights, and the Bellini cocktail Silvio insisted on her having raised her spirits, as did the conversation over dinner. Silvio was, as Marco had said, extremely knowledgeable, and Olivia felt that in the course of the excellent meal (one she was glad she wasn’t paying for), she’d already doubled her knowledge of Venetian art.
And while she felt pressured to learn everything she possibly could about Murano glass, Silvio said she was to have the week to herself. “It is Christmas, after all. The staff will be with their families, and the office will be very quiet. All I want you to do now is soak up the culture. Your first stop should be the Accademia. It’s one of the finest art galleries in Italy, if not the world. Enjoy it.”
Just then, his cellphone beeped. He glanced at the display and smiled. “Please excuse me. I must make a personal call. It may take a moment; it’s rather complicated.”
“I think you’re off the hook,” Marco said after Silvio left.
“What do you mean?”
“He’s dating a married woman.”
“How can you tell?”
“For Silvio, ‘complicated’ means married, and he must be smitten, because he usually likes to keep things very simple.”
When Silvio returned, he was smiling even more widely. “Where were we? Ah yes, to la dolce vita,” he said, raising his glass to them.
The sweet life indeed. She didn’t know how she felt about Silvio dating a married woman, but at least now she didn’t have to worry about her boss hitting on her and could just concentrate on her job. She looked around the luxurious restaurant, the white-draped tables, the silverware sparkling under Murano glass chandeliers, the beautifully decorated Christmas tree. Handsome waiters glided between the tables of richly dressed patrons, handing out luscious plates of food and pouring glasses of wine.
Her eye caught a man standing at the window, looking out to where the tower of San Giorgio Maggiore was lit against the night sky. Tall, his dark hair just brushing his collar, he stood with his back to her, and unlike the other patrons dressed in black dinner jackets, he was wearing a black leather jacket. Alessandro Rossi. It had to be!
She watched him, wondering what she would do if he turned around and saw her sitting there. Feeling a rising sense of excitement, she set down her glass, ready to wave should he look her way.
Finally, the man did turn and said something to a couple sitting at the table behind him.
It wasn’t him.
“Your plague doctor again?” Marco asked.
“No,” she said. “Just someone I thought I knew. But then I only just arrived here, so how could that be?” She smiled and raised her glass again. “La dolce vita.”
And if there was the tiniest hint of disappointment in her tone, she was sure she had concealed it well.
Chapter 6
When Alessandro arrived home from his office, he poured himself a Scotch and took it out onto the narrow balcony of his apartment to watch a vaporetto pull u
p under the lights on the Sant’Elena dock. No one got off the water bus, but a few people got on, probably on their way over to Lido Island to pick up groceries.
This was the quiet end of Venice. It was only a ten-minute walk along the riva from San Marco, but very few tourists came this way. In the spring, when the leaves were on the trees in the park outside his windows, he couldn’t see the dock or the lagoon beyond, although occasionally above the trees he could glimpse the smokestack of an especially tall cruise ship.
It stunned his colleagues that he chose to live in such modest surroundings. But the apartment was convenient enough to his job, and unlike the palazzo on Giudecca Island that his father had bought him as a wedding present, it contained no memories of Katarina. There were, of course, the boxes of files stacked in a corner that related to her disappearance, but she’d never passed through its doorways, never sat in the little kitchen with a morning cappuccino, never waved to him from the balcony. It had only four rooms, and the furniture was functional and simple. Only his Fazioli grand piano gave an indication that he was anything other than a cop on a cop’s salary.
Occasionally, on weekends and holidays, he went to the family home on the Brenta River outside Padua, a thirty-room Palladian villa of long, cool marble halls and enormous frescoed rooms that opened onto terraces where he could watch the swans drift on the quiet waters of the pond. He sometimes couldn’t believe it was his home, and the first thing he’d do on arriving was walk through the rooms like a tourist wondering what it must be like to live in such splendor. And yet it was his family’s, the place he’d spent his summers as a child. The Rossis had owned it for more than four hundred years, and it pained his father that Alessandro might never have children to pass it down to. Of course, he and Katarina had talked about having children, but they’d thought they had lots of time.
As the vaporetto pulled away from the Sant’Elena dock, Alessandro took another sip of Scotch. It had been a long day, and it had left him more restless than usual. And while he told himself it was because it had been a waste, it was also because of that woman, Olivia Moretti. Beyond those violet eyes, he wondered, what impulse had made him give her his card? Was he finally ready? It had been almost four years. He remembered Olivia blushing as he picked up her lingerie. Did she know he was picturing her in it?
Midnight in Venice Page 4