“So thrilled to meet you.” She extended her hand to shake his, but he kissed her just as Valentina had.
“I’ve heard so much about you from my family,” he said. “We’re going to be celebrities on American television. Maybe this will help my art.”
“Art?”
“Well, it’s a little side thing that I do.”
“Don’t be humble, Dominico. What you do is really quite magical.”
“I’m on pins and needles,” Sophie said as she sat down across the table from him. “Do tell.”
“I’m an artist, and my medium is flower petals.”
Sophie thought for a minute. Once she saw a piece of artwork that was a giant butterfly, all composed of individual butterfly wings. Thinking about the poor butterflies that died for the cause had made her sort of sick to her stomach. Flower petals, though—she could get behind that.
“What exactly do you do with them?”
“In different parts of Italy, there are festivals in which Infiorate artists ply their craft. Using only the petals of flowers, we execute large-scale mural carpets along roadways and sidewalks, depicting all sorts of imagery. Often it has to do with religious things because many times the festivals linked to it are tied to Catholic holidays. It is Italy after all.”
“I’d love to see your work. I guess it doesn’t last long, does it?”
“That is the nature of the beast. It remains elusive. It will never hang in the Uffizi. But there are always photographs, videos on YouTube, that sort of thing.”
“Better yet, you can see him at work at the Infiorate di Santa Romeo, which will be in a few days. Dominico’s been hard at work preparing for this, which is why you didn’t meet him until now.”
“Grazie mille,” Sophie said as a staffer gave her a cappuccino and cornetto. “This sounds exciting—I’ve never been to a festival in Italy and I hear they’re amazing. All the religious leaders parading around with big staffs and carrying relics of saints, like preserved fingers and noses and such.”
Valentina laughed. “When you put it that way it sounds a bit creepy.”
Dominico arched his brow. “Valentina, they parade through villages carrying things like eight-hundred-year-old earlobes that someone at some point claimed belonged to a person who was burned at the stake or impaled by buffalo horns or Lord knows what other torture in the name of the Lord. You gotta admit, it is a bit macabre.”
Valentina shrugged. “You got me there. Anyhow, Sophie, you have to come to the Infiorate di Santa Romeo. It’s so much fun. There will be beautiful floral artwork, food galore, and of course wine. We don’t do anything without wine. You can include something about it in the show!”
“I am definitely going to do that. It sounds so interesting and unique. I’m sure the audience will love it.”
“What’re they going to love?” Gisele strolled in arm in arm with Tomasso.
“This very cool thing we’re going to in the village. Did you meet Dominico? Tomasso’s brother makes these amazing murals with flower petals. We’re going to make it part of the show.”
“Sounds awesome. Hey—you hear anything yet from Justin this morning?”
“Luckily I’m not down the same corridor that he is—or you for that matter. I’m sure I’d not have slept a wink if I had been.”
Sophie chose not to disclose that she’d hardly slept a wink as it was.
“Now, now. Tomasso and I are discreet. I was just wondering—Justin and Gareth seemed to hit it off so instantly.”
“Um, yeah. They certainly were fogging up the windows last night on the way home.”
Gisele giggled. “I had hoped that was you and Lorenzo. We gave you every chance possible.”
Sophie frowned. “You mean you did that on purpose?”
Gisele shrugged. “Well, not me exactly. Tomasso.” She pointed a thumb at her boyfriend who was pouring an espresso from the nearby Nespresso machine.
“He was trying to get us together? Why?”
“Well, apart from it would be nice for you to have someone to do things with while you’re here... Let’s just say that Tomasso and Lorenzo have a history between them. They like to prove each other wrong, and often there is money on the table.”
“So they made some bet that involved me?”
“Not you,” Tomasso said. “Women in general. My brother prides himself on being certain he will never settle down. So much so he’s willing to put a lot of money on the line to prove it. I figured I’d give him a little rope to perhaps hang himself with.”
“Oh, great, then I’m basically part of some stupid game between brothers? Thanks but no thanks.”
“It wasn’t working anyhow—no need to get all upset about it.” Gisele took a sip of her fresh-squeezed orange juice and licked her lips.
Sophie rolled her eyes. Wasn’t working indeed.
“What wasn’t working?” Lorenzo strolled into the room. His hair was damp, and bits of it curled around the nape of his neck in that sexy way that makes a girl want to twirl her fingers in it. He had on a sage-green T-shirt and blue jeans. She wanted to find a quiet corner and touch him all over. But she didn’t. Because now she knew she was just a joke between the brothers. She wanted nothing to do with that.
“Apparently Tomasso thought I would somehow sway your beliefs about relationships. Or something like that.”
Tomasso was slicing his throat with his finger, indicating for Sophie to shut up.
Lorenzo squinted. “Oh he did, did he?”
She shrugged, not knowing what else to say.
“I’ve got one word for my brother, and maybe you could be so kind as to pass it on to him.”
“Yeah, sure, I guess.” Sophie had no idea how deep she was into this brotherly spat.
“Fottiti. Go ahead and pass that on to him.”
“Fottiti?” she said out loud as Fabiana entered the room.
Chapter Twenty
“What is going on in here? I walk in expecting a cheerful breakfast and people are hurling vulgarities at each other? You all should be ashamed of yourselves.”
Sophie leaned over to Dominico. “Um, what exactly does fottiti mean?”
He grinned. “You sure you want to know?”
She nodded, frowning.
“Go fuck yourself.”
Sophie cringed. She’d just shouted “go fuck yourself” in front of her genteel hostess. If she could melt into a puddle beneath the table, she would.
“You boys know that is not acceptable talk at my table. And while we’re at it, I’d like to know who left that whole tray of tiramisu on the kitchen counter last night?” She looked around the table for the offending culprit. Sophie finally understood what a volcano must feel like right before it erupts, with molten shame forcing its way up through her body, leaving its scarlet trail across her face.
“Mamma, what are you talking about?” Valentina said. “I put it away myself last night after dinner.”
“Yes, well, this morning I found it on the kitchen counter. Whoever helped themselves to it didn’t take care to be particularly neat with it either. It almost looked like someone put their face right in it and started eating away like a dog in a bowl of kibble. Not to mention there was tiramisu on the ground and on the counter. This is not a zoo, people. You need to be respectful of others.”
Sophie tried to make eye contact with Lorenzo, but he refused to look her way.
“Maybe it was someone from the camera crew out on a late-night bender,” Lorenzo said.
Sophie glared at him. How dare he blame her crew? Then again, shame on her for not owning up to the crime herself. She couldn’t, though. Nevertheless, Lorenzo should man up and take responsibility for the whole thing. After all, it was his fault things got out of control. And that they were both so horny they didn’t even think to put it away or clean up after themselves. Well, sure, she bore some responsibility as well, but he should cover for her out of respect for her status as a thoroughly humiliated houseguest who could ne
ver admit to his mamma that she didn’t clean up her mess because she was desperate to fuck the woman’s son.
Argh! She tried so hard to do everything by the book. This show was her baby. She had to get it right. Diddling with the woman’s son was so not getting it right. She had to end this thing she’d started with Lorenzo and end it suddenly.
As soon as the awkward breakfast was done, she cleared her throat. “Uh, Lorenzo. I have a few things to discuss with you. About the show. Maybe you and I can sit down now to figure that out?”
The man looked like a desperate weasel trying to squirm out of the beak of a hungry hawk. Which didn’t thrill Sophie one bit. After all, only hours ago he’d been buried so far inside her it was hard to tell where one of them stopped and the other began. Surely he wasn’t going to play that stupid “on second thought” game, was he? Like what boys in tenth grade would do. Impossible that a man of his age would do that. Right?
He escorted her down the hallway and they tucked into a large storage room that held cases of wine set aside for family use.
“How could you have let that happen this morning?” Sophie hissed at him.
“What?”
“Uh, for starters, telling me to tell your brother to go fuck himself. That was so not cool. And for it to happen with your mother coming into the room. Do you know how badly that reflected on me? And then the tiramisu. Need I say more about the tiramisu?” She paused, flashing back to last night and the moment when the food went from a simple dessert to an instrument of sexual foreplay. She shook her head. Must. Stay. On. Message.
“It’s not my fault you shouted it out in front of Mamma. You should have known better!”
Her eyes grew large, and her unrequited outrage hung in the air like the overwhelming scent of ozone before a summer storm.
“Oh, really? I should have known you were going to make me a pawn in your stupid fraternal war, just like your brother made me one by dangling me in front of you like a pork chop to a starving mongrel? What is wrong with you people that you treat your guests in such an offensive way?”
“Lighten up, cara. This is what families do.”
“Don’t cara me.” She drilled her finger into his chest. The same chest she’d fondled only hours earlier. “And maybe your family does, but I can promise you I come from one seriously messed-up family, and even we don’t do things like this.”
The scowl on his face spoke volumes.
“And another thing. You could have grown a pair and stayed the night rather than sneaking out like some college girl avoiding the Sunday morning walk of shame. I thought you were old enough and mature enough to handle whatever it was that seemed to be happening between us. Clearly while I thought you were a man, you must really be all boy inside.”
“Wait a minute, lady. I don’t know where you got the idea that just because we had some fun in bed we were anything more than a fantasy fuck. Everyone knows this about Lorenzo Romeo: I do not do relationships. Period. Don’t come looking for your happily ever after with me. Of course I’ll be more than happy to make you happy—even ecstatic—for an hour or two in bed, but for life? That’s not my thing.”
“Well, fine,” Sophie said. “Don’t flip your shit on me. You can go ahead and be a stone-cold, selfish prick for all I care. I have one thing to say to you. It’s something I learned from someone I can assure you is exceptionally good at it, being that I saw him in action my first day here. I hope you’ll take it to heart: fottiti.”
With that she turned and stormed out of the storage room, in a small way glad she wasn’t going to have to pretend she wasn’t interested in him only to keep up the ruse. Because the fact was, she hated the man and wanted nothing to do with him ever again.
Chapter Twenty-One
The nice thing about Italians, Sophie thought, is that they take a good, long break in the middle of the day. It’s civilized. By all accounts, it’s a great time to have a much-needed lunch, take a nap, or catch up on a long, leisurely session of sex. It’s the Italian way.
Sadly she was decidedly not catching up on sex with anyone, although she was thinking she might have to schedule ten minutes with that exceedingly loud battery-operated boyfriend of hers because right now tension was running high. Though not of the sexual variety. More like the “he’d better not get near me while I’ve got a baseball bat in my hand” type.
The rest of the day had been strained at best, though mercifully, Lorenzo made himself mostly scarce. He never even appeared at dinner, thank goodness. Out of sight, out of mind. Well, not really, but she could pretend as much.
Although Sophie was an American worker, while in Italy she was working Italian hours. Midday was time to chill out. She and Gisele had changed into bikinis and were lathering up their sunscreen poolside when Justin and Gareth arrived.
“Well look at the two of you,” Gisele said. “I don’t think I’ve seen you once since dinner the other night.”
“Gareth’s been taking me around the Tuscan countryside, giving me the grand tour.”
Sophie raised her eyebrows. “Oh really? Sounds serious. Do I have to give Gareth the talk about how I keep a shotgun by the front door, and if he shows up for a date he’d best be respectful?” She winked at them.
“Ignore Soph, Gareth. She can be a bit of a smart-ass.”
“Bit?” She laughed. “I’d say I’m one hundred percent Grade-A smart-ass, thanks. And I say that with pride.” She gave him two thumbs-up. “But I’m glad you guys are having fun. At least someone is.”
Justin pouted. “Awww, you’re not, Soph? You seemed to be having fun at dinner the other night.”
She rolled her eyes. “Not hardly.”
“You mean to tell me you and loverboy didn’t get it on after you sat on his lap the whole way home? I saw what you left behind after you got out of the car.”
Gisele held her hand to her mouth. “No! Seriously?”
Justin nodded. “Hot Rod Lincoln poking out of that boy’s pants. I admit to a fleeting moment of jealousy that it wasn’t mine for the taking.”
“It wasn’t mine either so stop it!” Sophie tried to get away from the conversation by digging for a book in her bag.
“Wait, you mean to tell me you didn’t end up doing squat thrusts in the cucumber patch?” He gave her a pronounced wink.
“You aren’t serious. When you use phrases like that no one can take you seriously. Please reword that for human consumption.”
“Well did you play a rousing game of hide the salami? Give the dog a bone? Hide the bishop? Hanky-panky? Load the clown into the cannon? Shagging? Rumbusticating?”
“Is this some sort of thing where you try to wear down the suspect and eventually they spill their guts and admit to the crime?”
He nodded. “Pretty much.”
“Okay, fine. I’ll admit it. But you three are sworn to secrecy. And Gisele, that means you can’t breathe a word of it to Tomasso, either, now that I know he’s been trying to manipulate this whole thing. I want everyone to mind their own business and keep me the hell out of anything to do with the Romeo men. Or boys, as it is with some of them.”
Sophie squirted some more sunscreen into her hand and began to rub it into her legs.
“Can’t you talk and rub at the same time?” Justin said, anxiously.
“You are so impatient! Fine. I’ll sunburn in order to yield to your titillation pleasure.” She wiped the remaining lotion from her hands onto the towel so she could focus. “So the last thing on my mind was anything to do with him. I mean you guys saw him—he was obnoxious to me at dinner. To be honest, he’s been obnoxious ever since I first had to deal with him.”
She mentally wrestled with whether to start at the true beginning, but decided she didn’t need to further humiliate herself on that one.
“And sure, he’s been a jerk to me, although I’d be lying if I didn’t admit there was some weird chemistry going on between us. Sort of disturbing, because not like I encouraged it. So the other night, I went
into the kitchen to put my leftovers in the fridge, when what to my wondering eyes did appear but a huge pan of tiramisu that was calling my name.”
Gisele squinted. “Tiramisu? The same one that Fabiana was asking about?”
Sophie groaned. “Ugh. Yes. One and the same.”
Justin rubbed his hands together in glee. “The plot thickens.”
“Let me tell you, she makes a seriously mean tiramisu. I’m just sayin’,” Sophie added.
“Maybe we’d have known that but somebody left it out on the kitchen counter all night!”
Sophie held her finger to her lips for Gisele to be quiet. It appeared that only a few laborers were in the garden nearby but she didn’t want to take a chance. Lord only knew what kind of spies Lorenzo had planted around the place and she didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of being the object of her a) conversation and b) lust. Shame the latter wasn’t going so well as of yet.
So there I am stealing a few fingers full of tiramisu—”
“You were sticking your hands right in there?”
“Yeah, well I knew you weren’t going to have a chance to have any so what did it matter?” She cracked a smile. “Look, I was being a total gorging pig. And Lorenzo busted me. And in my defense, I’d had few glasses wine that night.”
“And prosecco.” Justin held up a finger as if to make a fine point.
“And limoncello,” Gisele added.
“Ditto for the grappa,” Gareth piped in. Sophie groaned. It was a wonder she hadn’t passed out cold.
“Ugh, don’t remind me. But Lorenzo was there and, guys, you know he smells amazing, right? And let’s just say that I had it on good authority that he’s got a smokin’ hot body. He’s somewhat impossible to not lust after, on a certain level. Besides, the tiramisu was delicious, so I held up a scoop for him. Which he licked obligingly off my fingers.”
“Say no more. This is going to be beyond what my delicate ears can handle. I only hope that you didn’t end up with tiramisu where the sun doesn’t shine.” Justin laid on a thick Southern accent as he pretended to fan himself like a virginal plantation mistress.
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