Last of the Summer Vines

by Romy Sommer

  And that was when the penny dropped.

  Tommaso hadn’t just hired Ettore to do handiwork. He’d hired Ettore to keep an eye on me.

  Did he suspect that there was something more sinister behind the vandalism than bored teens taking advantage of our minimal security? Did he think I was in danger? Or worse, that I might be involved?

  I sat down hard in the chair beside the kitchen table. Surely not. Not after we fell asleep together on the sofa, watching Buffy kicking ass.

  And he couldn’t possibly know that the Fioravantis were our creditors.

  But when he’d introduced Ettore, he hadn’t looked me in the eye, and the warmth and friendliness I’d felt from him last night were absent. Was that due to the strain, or because he’d found out my secret?

  I moved around the kitchen, banging cupboard doors and pots, my thoughts circling. He didn’t know … I was imagining it … of course he wasn’t so friendly today; he was stressed.

  I was driving myself crazy. I needed to stop these thoughts, and there was only one way I knew how to do that. I pulled out the dough board and began to make the most complicated recipe in my repertoire: chocolate soufflé.

  It worked. The concentration required to get the soufflé exactly the right delicate consistency took all my attention, and it was late afternoon when I pulled the fluffy, light soufflés from the oven. Four perfect little rounds of heaven.

  I made espressos, set a tray, and carried the tray out to Ettore, who was now atop a ladder, unbolting a shutter from the wall with a confidence and speed I certainly hadn’t had when I’d done the job.

  ‘Would you like coffee before you finish for the day?’ I asked.

  He scuttled down the ladder at surprising speed, moving with a lightness I hadn’t believed possible for so big and heavy a man, and his dark eyes lit up when he saw the soufflés. We sat together on the terrace, and the ecstasy in Ettore’s expression when he reached the molten chocolate heart of the soufflé made me giggle. This was why I loved baking: the enjoyment it brought to others. Selling to the trattoria was all well and fine, but I missed seeing the pleasure in someone’s eyes as they savoured something I’d created.

  When we were done, Ettore moved to pack up his tools.

  ‘How long until the exterior will be finished?’ I asked. I’d been practising the question in my head all the while he’d been eating.

  ‘Shutters.’ Ettore held up two fingers. ‘Stucco – ten days. Maybe more.’

  ‘Two weeks?’ I supposed I should be glad of the help. And he’d been nothing but polite. But I hoped my nerves survived two weeks.

  Ettore shrugged. ‘Roma non fu fatta in un giorno.’ Even I understood that one: Rome wasn’t built in a day.

  He strapped his tool box onto the back of the little Vespa and hopped on. ‘A domani!’ And with a cheerful wave he was gone, putting away down the drive towards the main road.

  With a sigh, I headed back into the house. I needed wine.

  The next day, Ettore brought a boombox on the back of his Vespa, and while he worked, he played opera. And he didn’t just listen. Sneaking out of the kitchen mid-morning, my hands still full of flour, I tiptoed around the house to eavesdrop. Balanced on an upstairs wrought iron balcony to remove the upper storey shutters, Ettore was singing along with the music, in a rich, golden baritone that soared above the recorded aria. The sight of the muscle-bound, bald man singing opera brought on a fit of giggles, and I had to hurry back to the kitchen before he heard me.

  By the third day, I was no longer scared of him. Beneath the intimidating exterior, I suspected he might be a teddy bear – or at least I hoped so. Though I still wouldn’t want to meet him alone in a dark alley late at night.

  When he offered to show me how to lay stucco, I accepted. Working side-by-side, accompanied by Puccini, we stripped off the old stucco from the walls, and laid a fresh layer. We made good progress – if a strip several feet wide could be considered good progress for a half day’s work. It was hard work, with the sun beating down on us, and soon I’d built up both a sweat and a sunburn. If only Cleo and Kevin could see me now.

  Since Ettore worked faster without my ‘help’, I decided I was more useful in the kitchen, keeping his prodigious appetite fed.

  With someone as easily pleased as Ettore to cook for, I experimented not only with new pastries and cakes, but also with traditional Tuscan foods. Cooking Tuscan-style was good for the soul. There was no need for clever ingredient combinations, or complex preparations or artistic presentation. Tuscan food was just simple food cooked well. It was all about the flavour, rather than fancy combinations and elaborate displays.

  Not the sort of food I’d have eaten back home in London, where my diet consisted of instant microwave dinners, or meals out in the kind of restaurants where presentation was considered more important than sustenance.

  Wow. I hadn’t thought of London in days. I looked around the castello kitchen, with the afternoon sun edging in through the windows and the terracotta tiles cool beneath my bare feet, and tried to conjure up a picture of my chrome and white kitchen back in Wanstead, with all its sleek, modern appliances. The memory took an effort.

  London seemed a world away and a lifetime ago. This, with Ettore’s voice rolling rich and lovingly through the unknown words of an aria, and the scents of basil and rosemary and lemons heavy on the warm, still air, felt more solid and real than my life in England.

  Chapter 19

  Non sono tutte rose e fiori

  (It’s not all sunshine and roses)

  A strong wind rose, blowing up suddenly from the coast and sweeping inland. Before I went to bed, I checked all the windows and doors to ensure they were tightly fastened, but still I couldn’t sleep. The wind howled beneath the eaves, thrashed at the umbrella pines on the slope above the house, and battered at the windows. The frames rattled, and the loose tiles on the roof above lifted and clattered. I hoped the owls had found someplace safe to shelter.

  The shutters on the west side of the house had not yet been removed, and one blew loose, banging against the wall with frightening force. I lay in bed, the duvet pulled up under my chin, and listened to the creaks and groans of the old house, as it protested the abuse.

  The loose shutter banged again, hitting the wall in a furious volley as the wind picked up. The sound came from below my bedroom, perhaps from the “salon”, as John had called it, though I preferred to think of it as the den. If I got myself a television, it would be the perfect place for watching Buffy marathons.

  Geez, I was losing it. I didn’t need to buy a television. I already owned one. In Wanstead.

  Now there was rain too, hammering against the windows. What if the shutter broke the window? What if I woke to shattered glass and a soaked carpet? The Persian carpet in the salon was one of the few valuable items I’d kept.

  Reluctantly, I left the comfort of the warm bed, and made my way downstairs through the darkness. Lightning illuminated the salon for a split second before I fumbled for the light switch, and soft, comforting electric light flooded the room. Through the deluge beyond the window I could see the shadow of the shutter as it flew wildly in the wind, twisting this way and that. I unlatched the window and leaned out into the tempest to grab at it. The wind flung rain at me, hitting me in the face with its sharp claws.

  Drenched, and struggling to see with the rain and wind buffeting me, I wrestled with the shutter. But the wind was too strong and swept it out of my hands. I’d need a rope to secure it, but I’d tidied away all the ropes and other odds and ends from the house into the garden shed, and there was no way I was going out in this storm to fetch any of it.

  Another flash of lightning struck closer by, and I jumped back. Then another gust of wind grabbed at the shutter, and the matter was taken out of my hands completely as the rusted hinges gave way, and the shutter took wings and careened out into the darkness. I hoped it didn’t inflict any more damage along the way.

  Sopping now from the rai
n blowing in through the open window, I battled with the window to get it closed and latched again, then sank back in relief.

  Another crack of thunder had me bolting for the stairs and my bed. I had to change into dry clothes first, and the only other pyjamas I had was the red lace-and-silk negligee Cleo had laughingly packed in for me all those many weeks ago. Not the warmest clothing I had, so once dressed I dived back into the bed and dug myself deep under the duvet, pulling it up over my ears. It wasn’t thick enough, though, to drown out the howl of the wind or the hammering of the rain. Wind whistled down the chimney, the sound eerie in the big, empty house. The storm was so loud, so furious, that sleep was impossible.

  I pressed my eyes closed and tried to think happy thoughts. I tried to imagine my office in London, the bustle and thrill of being a part of such a vibrant company. The high of big deals and champagne celebrations, the lure of partnership.

  But the pictures didn’t work the way they used to. The image in my head seemed blurry and distorted, and didn’t give me the feelings of calm and joy it used to.

  Maybe it was the howling wind making it difficult to focus. Would the roof tiles hold against the wind? I knew some of them were loose. Perhaps I should have asked Ettore to start up there, rather than with the walls?

  An ominous creaking rose above the sound of the wind, a noise that sounded like the screech of the warped front door but magnified a hundred times over. My eyes flew open, just in time to hear the most awful rumbling, thundering sound I’d ever heard, followed by a crash which shook the house. And then I watched as the beamed ceiling above me parted, and a monster crashed in.

  I screamed.

  Rain streamed in, and not just water, but a rain of leaves and bits of roof tile. I covered my face with my arms, too terrified now even to scream.

  After an eternal, heart-stopping moment, the creaking seemed to settle, and I opened my eyes to stare straight up into a massive tree branch. No, not just a branch. An entire umbrella pine had crashed through the roof and come to rest, still quivering, mere feet from my face.

  I sucked in a breath to still the panic. I was alive. I was unhurt. That was all that mattered.

  I was also trapped beneath the splaying branches. A hysterical giggle of relief bubbled up.

  The wind still howled, the rain still fell, but I didn’t care. I laughed.

  ‘Sarah?’ Footsteps sounded on the parquet of the hall outside, and then my bedroom door was flung open. ‘Sarah? Are you okay?’

  Tommaso skidded to a stop, panic in his voice. My laughter ended on a hiccough. ‘I’m fine. I just don’t know how I’m going to get out of here.’ I had to shout to be heard over the caterwauling of the wind.

  ‘The power’s out,’ he shouted back. ‘The tree must have brought the cables down. Wait there!’

  As if I had any other choice.

  I had no idea how long I lay in the dark, listening to the wind, and the creak of the branches, pinned in the bed beneath an increasingly sodden duvet, scratchy leaves brushing at my face and bare arms, before Tommaso returned with a hacksaw.

  ‘This house seems determined to collapse on us.’ My voice sounded wobbly.

  ‘Well, it was your turn to have something collapse on you.’

  The giggle started to bubble up again and I only just managed to suppress it. I didn’t want Tommaso to think I was hysterical. ‘I think the house is trying to tell me that it wants me to leave.’

  ‘Or maybe it’s trying to keep you here.’

  Now that it had made its point, the wind and rain eased. The dark clouds, only just visible through the branches above my head, blew off to the east at a rapid rate, and wan starlight flickered above the canopy of branches.

  I closed my eyes and listened to the sound of the hacksaw as Tommaso tunnelled a path through the dense foliage to reach me. The room smelled overwhelmingly of pine resin.

  ‘How can I stay when I don’t even have a roof over my head?’ The giggle was back. It took more effort this time to suppress it. I was shivering, too.

  ‘Let’s worry about that once you’re out of there.’ His voice was closer now.

  It was at least another twenty minutes before I could see Tommaso through the gap he’d managed to saw through the tangle of broken branches. He kept talking as he worked, keeping me calm with innocuous chatter about television shows, and spin-offs, but I have to admit I didn’t pay much attention. He was bare-chested. The waxing moonlight gave me just enough glimpses of bare male torso to keep me entranced and prevent me from turning hysterical again.

  Tommaso was breathing heavily now with the strain, and I hiccoughed back another laugh. If I’d ever pictured a man in this bedroom, half-naked and panting hard, this was most certainly not how I’d have imagined it.

  When the gap was big enough for me to crawl through, I rolled over onto my hands and knees. The massive branch overhead scratching at my back and shoulders, I crawled commando-style across the bed towards Tommaso. He helped me out the last bit of the way, his big, strong hands hooking beneath my armpits to drag me out in the most undignified manner imaginable. Not that I could have maintained my dignity anyway, not with my hair plastered to my face, and the silk negligee plastered to my body.

  ‘Nice togs,’ he commented.

  I was beyond blushing.

  Once free of the branches, I scrambled to my feet and looked around. Only about half the ceiling had caved in. The dresser and armoire were mercifully undamaged and protected from the rain by the remaining shelf of ceiling.

  ‘You’re shivering.’ Tommaso pulled me in close against his chest and wrapped his arms around me. He wore nothing but boxers, and his hair was a mess, with leaves and twigs sticking out of it. His chest was warm, his arms safe, and I didn’t want to move.

  ‘We need to get you warmed up.’ He rubbed my back.

  But I wasn’t cold. In shock, maybe, but I’d never felt warmer and safer. ‘My dressing gown is in the armoire.’

  ‘That thing? I’ve seen it. It wouldn’t protect you from a mosquito, let alone a storm. Let’s get you back to my place, and you can have a warm bath. You can sleep in Nonna’s room the rest of the night.’

  I retrieved the gown anyway. I needed it for more than the cold. I hadn’t missed the heated look he’d cast over the wet negligee, or the way his gaze lingered on my chest, which under different circumstances would have had a good shot at winning a wet T-shirt contest, and I certainly hadn’t missed the odd answering tug I felt low in my own stomach.

  On our way through the house, we checked on the other rooms, using Tommaso’s big torch to light the way. The only bedroom that hadn’t sustained any damage was my father’s. The bulk of the tree had fallen into my room, but on its path down it had damaged the ceilings of the four other bedrooms too. Gaps showed through between the tiles, where the rain sneaked in.

  I was going to have one hell of a mess to clean up in the morning. If it wasn’t morning already.

  With Tommaso’s arm still wrapped around me, we followed the bobbing torchlight down the stairs, through the kitchen and across the yard. I could have walked perfectly well on my own, but somehow that encircling arm gave me a support I hadn’t known I needed. Maybe being a damsel in distress wasn’t quite so bad after all.

  The cottage, mercifully, still had power, so while I showered in the compact bathroom, surrounded by all the masculine reminders that this was very much a man’s home, Tommaso boiled us a pot of tea. When I was warmed, and my fingers and toes were tingling as they returned to life, I wrapped myself in the enormous fluffy bathrobe I found behind the bathroom door, and headed downstairs.

  We sat together at the kitchen table, and the tea warmed me from the inside out, reaching places even the hot shower hadn’t managed to warm.

  ‘Better now?’ he asked.

  I nodded. He’d made the tea exactly the way I liked it: strong, with just a dash of milk. When I looked up, he was staring at me, expression thoughtful.

  ‘What?’
I asked defensively.

  ‘You sleep with your hair tied up. Don’t you ever let it down?’ A ghost of a smile lifted his full mouth. ‘Literally as well as figuratively?’

  I absently stroked my freshly re-braided hair. ‘My hair gets tangled so easily, it’s just easier to keep it up.’

  He shrugged, changing the subject to talk about getting in electricians and needing roof tiles, and my thoughts began to drift.

  Once the tea had settled my nerves, Tommaso fetched a pile of fresh bedding, and helped me make up the bed in what had once been Nonna’s room. The bedding was grey and masculine, just like the set in my own room in the castello, confirming what I’d long suspected: it was he who had made up the bed for my arrival, and provided the milk.

  By the time I settled into the freshly made bed, and lay looking up at the beamed ceiling, I was too tired to sleep. With the adrenalin rush fading, my body ached but my mind was still alert. And the image it kept replaying, over and over, wasn’t my life flashing before my eyes, or the sustaining vision of my corner office. It was Tommaso, bare-chested, hair tousled, sopping wet, bedraggled, his heart racing against my cheek as he’d pulled me in for that relieved hug.

  Chapter 20

  Non vendere la pelle dell’ orso prima di averlo ucciso

  (Don’t sell the bearskin before you’ve caught the bear)

  In the light of day, with the last of the rain falling drip, drip, drip through the gaping ceiling, the damage looked even worse than it had in pitch darkness. Broken tiles were strewn everywhere, and the bedrooms I’d cleared and cleaned were now littered with leaves, branches and puddles. I could only pray that the furniture hadn’t sustained irreparable damage. I sighed. I’d have to bring Bernardo in to work his restoration magic.

  ‘Today we stop plastering,’ Ettore said, his deep voice a rumble. ‘And we fix.’

  I eyed the hole above my head. Even I knew that roof repairs weren’t going to be quick or cheap. Two weeks of Ettore in my space had just turned into a month. At least. Thank heavens I was developing a liking for opera.