But was Carly one of them?
Michelangelo turned back toward the café, where Carly still sat inside, looking over the notes he’d given her.
‘Mr. Ricci! We meet again.’
He whirled around like someone caught looking in the windows of a women’s underwear store. ‘Alaina.’
The opera diva snaked her arm through his. ‘I’ve been looking all around for you.’ She glanced to the café. ‘Just ate lunch?’
Oh no. This could be disastrous. If Carly decided to come out at that particular moment, Alaina would know they’d eaten together. She’d have a fit—she might even complain to Ms. Maxhammer he’d been philandering with the women in the orchestra.
‘Yes. But I wouldn’t recommend their food. Too stale.’
A woman sipping a latte overheard him and stared down at her drink.
Alaina raised both eyebrows. ‘Is that so? I was just about to go in and get a coffee.’
‘No, no, no.’ He pulled her away from the door. ‘You don’t want to do that.’
She creased her painted eyebrows in confusion. ‘What do you mean?’
‘For you, may I present only the best of the best of Italy.’ He clamped down on her grip of his arm. ‘Let me show you the best place for coffee.’
‘Well, then.’ She smiled. ‘Only you would know.’
Hoping Carly didn’t see them leaving together, he directed Alaina as far out of sight as possible toward another café down the street. Ironically, the coffee at that one had a lighter brew. But, looking at the way Alaina stared into his eyes, he didn’t think she’d notice.
Chapter Ten
Life Away
Carly hid her black clothes underneath a bright-pink scarf and floral blazer. The orchestra members were supposed to be having a night out on the town, and she didn’t want anyone knowing she’d snuck off for another gig, with another orchestra, with Michelangelo.
She’d spent the day memorizing the notes she’d taken with Michelangelo yesterday at lunch and watching Italian television shows while the rest of the orchestra went on a tour of the local marketplace. He’d even called her room on his break, speaking Italian, to make sure she was absorbing the information. He’d given her an exact time when he’d pick her up in a red Fiat out front.
Alaina had gone shopping for a better dress, and knowing her, that would take all day. Thank goodness she hadn’t come back yet. The less the opera diva knew, the better. She’d probably want to rehearse again, and Carly had had enough of Bach’s silly rendition of love.
Making sure the hallway was clear, Carly snuck from her room and took the stairs down to the main lobby. Three floors weren’t bad, but after walking all over the Vatican City, her feet ached. Such is the price for a flourishing career.
Melody and Wolf sat on the guest sofas right before the double doors, chatting with Bertha, Trudy, and Al. At least one of them would notice her leaving all by herself. Then she’d have to come up with some excuse, not to mention the fact they might catch her getting in Michelangelo’s car.
Great.
Carly closed the door and leaned against the wall in the stair shaft, trying to calm her racing heart. Maybe if she waited it out, they’d go away.
She checked her watch. Five more minutes and Michelangelo would pull up to the curb, expecting her to get in. She had to be at the Cesari Amento in thirty minutes, ready to play.
An older couple came down the stairs speaking feverishly in Italian, and Carly whipped out her phone, pretending to read an e-mail. As they passed, she picked up a few key phrases about hailing a taxi and eating out at some restaurant. The haze of foreign phrases had cleared some, thanks to Michelangelo.
The couple walked into the lobby and Carly checked again before the heavy fire door snapped shut.
Laughing, Wolf and Melody headed toward the entrance. Bertha and Trudy hailed an elevator, and Al leaned against the main desk, flirting with the dark-haired woman receptionist, who wasn’t buying it.
Carly snuck out and hid behind a large ceramic pot almost as tall as her with exotic ferns splaying out on all sides. Her fingers brushed a picture of a young couple sitting beside a pond. Strangely, the woman and man had the same hair color as her light-blond ponytail and Michelangelo’s dark waves. Blinking the resemblance away, she watched as Melody and Wolf disappeared outside.
Carly waited another two minutes and bolted for the door.
Sleek black limos, brightly colored taxis, and other luxury cars lined the circular drive. Melody and Wolf slipped into a taxi to the right, so she turned left. Come on, Michelangelo, where are you?
A corner of red poked out from behind their tour bus to her left. Carly dashed down the sidewalk and spotted Michelangelo’s Fiat expertly hidden behind the large tour bus. Edda waved at her from the bus driver’s seat as she passed.
Carly scanned the walkway to make sure no one noticed. She approached the Fiat, opened the passenger door and slipped in.
Inside smelled of a hint of masculine aftershave and mint. Michelangelo turned to her with a smile spreading across his luscious lips. He wore a tailored suit, bringing out the curve of his chest and arms. ‘Quite an outfit for a gig.’
‘It’s my disguise.’ Carly unwrapped her pink scarf and pulled her arms out of her blazer, stashing her clothes in the back. ‘Edda’s in on this, too?’
‘Let’s just say she wanted me to have a night out.’
‘She won’t tell Ms. Maxhammer?’
‘Naw. What’s to tell?’
He was right. They weren’t going on a date. He was just chauffeuring her to her gig. End of story. ‘Okay.’ She settled back into her seat and watched the nightlife of Rome flash by in bright lights.
‘So, why this gig? What’s so important about it?’ Michelangelo cast her a curious sideways glance.
Carly debated how much to tell him. He had agreed to teach her Italian and drive her there, so he deserved some explanation. ‘If you want to succeed as a freelance musician, you take every gig offered to you.’
‘Even in your free time?’
‘Ha! Musicians don’t have free time.’
He turned a corner, weaving smoothly around the traffic. ‘Sounds like a busy life.’
‘It is. I spend most of my free time practicing for concerts, or driving to gigs on the weekend.’
‘Do you enjoy living this way—as you Americans would say in the fast lane?’
Carly shrugged. No one had asked her that before. ‘I’ve lived like this ever since I decided to pursue music in high school. It’s the only life I’ve known.’
‘Ah. Sounds like you need to spend a day on a vineyard.’ His lips curled suggestively.
Carly shifted in her seat. Was that an invitation? She decided to play it cool. ‘Why’s that?’
‘There’s nothing like it in all the world. Once you’re there, time disappears. Honking cars, people rushing to work, the constant cell phone calls—it’s all replaced by buzzing bees, light winds, and the smell of fresh blossoms.’
‘I thought you said running a vineyard was stressful.’
He considered her response, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel. ‘It is at times, but it’s also extremely rewarding.’
Carly recalled the prickle of goose bumps on her skin when she performed a piece of music. ‘Guess I’d say the same thing about music.’
‘We are at an impasse, then?’ He glanced over with a smile.
Wait a sec. Something didn’t add up. If he enjoyed the vineyard so much, why did he leave it? ‘So why did you leave the vineyard to become a tour guide?’
Michelangelo stiffened and focused on the road ahead.
Carly checked the road, but the traffic was light. Seems she’d hit a nerve.
He rubbed his chin, darkened by light stubble. ‘You don’t truly appreciate something until you are away from it.’
‘Interesting.’ Carly thought back to her jobs in the States. Did she miss them? Her constant e-mail checking was more out
of necessity than any type of wistful remembering. Then again, she had one of her orchestras over here with her. So, it wasn’t the jobs in particular, it was the music.
Michelangelo pulled up to a hotel swankier than theirs, with stone statues of men in togas and white Roman columns strung with ivy. He parked in front of a fluorescent-green Lamborghini and waved the luggage boys away. ‘Let me give you my phone number, and you can call me when you’re done.’
‘Okay.’ Carly put his number in under MR, just in case anyone saw her phone. Alaina had turned off her alarm the other day; she wouldn’t put it past her to skim through her contacts.
‘Remember what you learned. Call me if you run into any problems.’ He leaned over, and Carly froze in shock.
Michelangelo placed a gentle kiss on her cheek, his lips brushing her skin light enough to send jolts of electricity through her body. ‘For good luck.’
So, he kissed me. Don’t make a big deal out of it. People kissed on the cheeks all the time in France, right? So was this any different?
She collected her purse and her oboe bag. ‘Thank you.’
Michelangelo winked. ‘My pleasure.’
Chapter Eleven
Panic Attack
As Carly slipped through the glass doors of the Cesari Amento, Michelangelo touched his lips, remembering her sweet, soft, skin. He couldn’t resist kissing her, yet every logical thought he had screamed to him to let her be.
She’d come too close to the truth tonight, asking why he left his winery to be a tour guide. If he wasn’t careful, she’d put two and two together, and then he’d have a lot of damage control to do.
He checked his watch. She’d be done in about three hours, so he had enough time to go back to the hotel and create an alibi.
His phone vibrated, and he checked the caller ID. Ms. Maxhammer.
A vision of poor Edda being tortured by a dominatrix-clad Ms. Maxhammer for information on his whereabouts came to mind.
It couldn’t be that bad.
He pulled over and answered. ‘Hello?’
‘Michelangelo? This is Ms. Maxhammer.’ Apparently she wasn’t aware of caller IDs or was just used to using her name like in the good old dial-up days. Whatever the case, she didn’t sound like her normal, cheery self.
‘Hello, Ms. Maxhammer. How are you? Is everything okay?’
‘Thank goodness I got a hold of you. We have a situation. Please meet me in the lobby as soon as you can.’
Michelangelo looked at his watch as his heart sped into overdrive. ‘I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.’
Obviously it didn’t concern his flirtations with Carly or she’d ask to see him privately. Although he was relieved, he also worried that somehow his tour had taken a dire turn.
He made it in ten minutes and threw his keys to the valet. Ms. Maxhammer stood with a crowd of other orchestra members whispering to each other just beyond the front desk. Everyone’s faces were drawn, and one of the violinist’s wives had tears running down her cheeks.
They parted before him, and he ran into the circle. ‘What happened?’
Ms. Maxhammer leaned on her cane with a grim expression on her face. ‘It’s Trixie Sanders.’
Trixie? Oh yes, the emo girl who asked him that rude question in the Basilica. ‘What about her?’
‘No one’s seen her since the tour of St. Peters. She and her brother were supposed to meet us back here for dinner.’ The violinist’s wife, Trixie’s mother, grabbed his arm. ‘You have to do something.’
A jolt of concern slashed Michelangelo’s chest. Yeah, Trixie looked tough, but she was just a little girl in a strange city where boys hid in alleys and stole purses, and worse. At that age, kids thought they lived forever, and all too tragically they were proven wrong. He scanned the crowd. ‘What about her brother?’
‘I’m here.’ Darin moaned from the sofa behind them. Michelangelo approached him. ‘Do you have any idea where she went?’
‘I already told them I don’t.’ He wrapped a string from his torn jeans around his finger. ‘It’s not my fault.’
‘You were supposed to watch her.’ His mother clutched a picture of a much sweeter Trixie—before the dark makeup, blue hair, and black leather—to her chest.
‘Yeah, you try telling her where to go and what to do.’ Darin shouted way too loudly for the lobby.
‘All right.’ Michelangelo put his hands up to stop the argument. What was the normal protocol in a situation like this? He had to come up with something fast. ‘The police won’t start looking until she’s been missing for twenty-four hours. This means we need to search this hotel and the surrounding area.’
He gestured for everyone to circle around him. ‘You, you and you check every level of the hotel. You two over there, go next door to the restaurant and see if anyone’s seen her. You four, split up in twos and walk down the street in both directions and go in every building you can.’
‘What are you going to do?’ For the first time since he’d known her, Ms. Maxhammer looked her age. The wrinkles in her face closed in around her eyes, and her cheeks looked dark and sunken in the dim light. He wanted to put his arm around her, like he used to do with his own grandma, and tell her everything was going to be all right. But he couldn’t promise anything.
‘I’m the only one here with a car.’ His mind skimmed through all the possible local hangout spots. ‘I’ll check every open bar and nightclub within a five-kilometer radius, then keep fanning out.’
He turned to Trixie’s parents and placed a reassuring hand on each of their shoulders. Seeing that scraggly thief had triggered all of his memories of Ricco. Many nights he’d looked for Ricco once his father had thrown him out on the street. ‘I’ll do everything in my power to find her. You stay here in case she comes back.’
Trixie’s mom nodded. Her husband held her close and buried his face in her hair. ‘Thank you.’
‘No need to thank me.’ Michelangelo nodded to Ms. Maxhammer, then left for the valet.
If I was a hundred-pound emo teenage girl with problems with authority, where would I go? He waited for the valet to retrieve his car, thinking of all the ‘cool’ hangout joints.
Emo. Hmmm. He pulled out his phone and Googled emo bands Rome with today’s date. Panic Attack was playing at the Serpent. He Googled the band’s website. They had the same sideswept hair as the guys on her shirt. But didn’t all those bands look the same?
The club was twenty minutes from the hotel, and a good hour’s walk from where he’d last seen her. Michelangelo ran his fingers over the band’s faces on his screen. He’d told everyone inside he’d fan out slowly, but a gut feeling told him that’s where she’d be.
The valet drove his Fiat right up to the curb, and Michelangelo remembered he’d given his last ten euros to the boy.
‘Put five euros on my room number for your tip. I’ll sign the receipt when I get back.’ Michelangelo hopped in and sped toward the Serpent.
Driving through the streets of Rome on a Friday night was like trying to push a pen through a rock. Michelangelo wove his small Fiat around the trucks, swerving as a pedestrian rode a bicycle the wrong way. He knew all of the shortcuts and how to beat most lights. It took him forty-five minutes to reach the nightclub and find a parking spot a block down. He paid the entrance fee with his credit card and walked into the prismatic light spread by a gigantic disco ball.
A slow backbeat emanated from the stage, where a young man sang some sort of whiny ballad about love. A few angst-ridden teens in layered sweatshirts and skinny jeans gave Michelangelo wary looks as he passed. He was way overdressed in his suit, making him look like some type of talent agent or mafia member.
Should have left the overcoat in the car. Some good he’d be in an undercover operation. He ditched the coat on the back of a chair, unbuttoned his shirt, and messed up his hair. Now he looked like some Italian soap opera stand-in, which was more approachable than a mafia hitman.
He scanned the crowd.
Groups of teens loitered by the stage, some of them dancing, and others kissing. Couples sat in booths lining the walls eating fries and drinking beer. Trying not to look too weird, or too old—because a twenty-six-year-old was like ancient history to these kids—he walked the circumference of the room.
Maybe he’d been wrong. A sick feeling spread through his gut. Maybe something had happened to Trixie and she hadn’t run off. His pushed those thoughts away. Just keep looking.
An oily haired boy wearing a black sweatshirt with an ear full of metal earrings leaned against a column in the corner of the room, blocking the view of the girl he was talking to. He laughed, moving to the side, and lo and behold, there Trixie was, sipping what looked like a margarita.
Bingo. Michelangelo texted Ms. Maxhammer, hoping she’d be able to understand how to open it. He didn’t want to cause a scene or draw attention to himself by speaking on the phone. Surprisingly, she texted him back saying they’d be there as soon as possible and to keep Trixie in sight.
The boy put his arms around Trixie, leading her toward a shady hallway backstage. Michelangelo followed them, feeling as though he was in a James Bond movie. They turned into a back room filled with smoke of all kinds and people making out on sofas. A memory of Ricco rolling marijuana in the back of the distillery flashed though his mind.
This had gone too far. No minors drinking and doing drugs on his tour.
Michelangelo approached the pair, cutting in before the boy could offer Trixie anything. ‘Excuse me, but I’m going to have to remove this young lady.’
The boy stared at him in confusion, then turned to Trixie. ‘Your older brother?’
Trixie crossed her arms, looking as though she could melt him on the spot with her gaze. ‘No. My chaperone.’
The boy grinned teasingly. ‘Busted.’
Michelangelo stood in between them, blocking the boy with his back. ‘Your parents are on their way. Either they can catch you in here, or outside waiting to be picked up.’ He shrugged. ‘It’s up to you.’
An American Girl in Italy Page 8