Last of the Summer Vines

by Romy Sommer

  From Beatrice’s description, I’d imagined him with worldly-wise, pleasure-loving, looking-for-casual-sex holidaymakers – women like Geraldine – and Fiorella certainly didn’t fit that picture.

  Beatrice made a disparaging sound. ‘Picking up women for sex isn’t the same as real interest. And Fiorella is just perfect for him. She’s the complete opposite of Gwen.’

  The knife I’d been using slipped through my fingers. It clattered on the kitchen table, and I frowned at my own clumsiness. ‘Who’s Gwen?’

  ‘Tommaso’s ex-wife. You didn’t know her?’

  I shook my head and poured out the tea. ‘I didn’t even know he was married.’ Chalk that up to yet another thing my dear old Dad hadn’t thought important enough to mention.

  ‘Well, not anymore, obviously. They married years ago, when they worked together in some fancy hotel chain in Edinburgh. They had big plans to open a guest house here together, but she never came. She was very independent and career-focused and didn’t want to give up city life to live in the middle of nowhere, so they divorced.’

  Career-focused and independent. Just like me.

  Which explained a lot. But I wasn’t going to let him off the hook that easily. Just like my father, given the choice between sharing his life with someone and his precious vines, Tommaso had chosen the vines. And any woman who wasn’t willing to give up everything to support that dream was pushed aside. I don’t know why that made me angry, but it did.

  After Beatrice left, I made up the bed in the spare bedroom for my guest. Fiorella’s overnight bag was already there, but there was no sign of Tommaso. No doubt he’d returned to the winery.

  I toyed briefly with the idea of moving my things out of his cottage and back into my own room, now that the roof was repaired, but then I had a vision of Tommaso inviting Fiorella back there after dinner, to the place where we’d watched Buffy marathons and played Rummikub.

  Since Fiorella didn’t seem the type of woman Tommaso should seduce and walk away from, I left my things where they were. In the interests of protecting the sweet young woman from his wiles, of course. It had absolutely nothing to do with the extremely irrational jealousy that had started to bubble inside me.

  For the first time ever, I set the table in the dining room – which also gave me a chance to peek at what Fiorella was doing. She had daubed solvent across a section of the fresco, and the results of the chemicals reacting with the pigments, and the simple effect of a little additional brushwork, were magical to witness. Beneath her brush, the colours seemed to spring to life.

  Tommaso returned from the cellar earlier than usual, and he showered and changed before he joined us for dinner. He brought wine. ‘This is our most exclusive vintage of the Angelica,’ he said, filling Fiorella’s glass.

  For now, I added. With eight thousand litres of wine lost, the next bottling of the Angelica was going to be way more exclusive.

  Fiorella had worked until dark and hadn’t changed her clothes, only removing her white coat and gloves for dinner, but she still managed to look effortlessly elegant. Hot from the kitchen, with my hair plastered to my neck and my cheeks flushed, I was acutely aware that I did not appear to my best advantage beside her – even though I’d changed into the teal-coloured dress I’d worn to Porto Ercole. The same dress which had made Luca look at me as if I were edible.

  Tommaso barely even seemed to notice I was there.

  After an appetiser course of olives, marinated artichoke hearts, and parcels of soft goat’s cheese wrapped in salami, I served a first course of ravioli stuffed with pecorino and smoked prosciutto, followed by the hearty ribollita stew over little cakes of polenta, and finished off with slices of the peach strudel.

  If only Cleo could see me now, a domestic goddess, and a world away from instant frozen meals and takeaway vindaloos. The nearest Indian restaurant was over an hour’s drive away, in Arezzo. I’d looked it up on Google.

  ‘You are an excellent cook,’ Fiorella said politely.

  ‘I definitely won’t be eating this well after you leave,’ Tommaso added.

  ‘You’re leaving?’ Fiorella’s eyes widened. ‘But aren’t you two…?’ Her question trailed off as she looked between us.

  ‘No, we are definitely not.’ Tommaso’s denial was unequivocal, and I felt as if a bucket of ice had been thrown over my head. Did his denial have to be quite so emphatic? There’d been a time he’d flirted with me the way he flirted now with Fiorella. He might have forgotten, but I hadn’t.

  That last summer, when I’d just turned seventeen, I’d felt so grown up, so ready to take on the world. A place at a prestigious university in the bag, and an end in sight to being passed from parent to parent like a hot potato. And all those new emotions and sensations coursing through me…

  Since he’d gone away to university, Tommaso had started working out, and he was no longer the bookish boy I’d grown up with, but a man. Years at an all-girls boarding school made me keenly aware of that. Three years older and worldly-wise, and yet he’d still treated me as an equal. I’d felt so mature. For the first time in my life, I’d felt desire, and desirable.

  My father hadn’t seen the changes, but Nonna had. ‘Your mother wasn’t much older than you when she came to Tuscany and met your father,’ she’d said, and the warning had rung as clear as a bell. Don’t lose your head. Don’t do anything you might regret for years after.

  And I so nearly had.

  There was that one night we’d walked alone through the vineyard. It was late summer, and the harvest was nearly over. Only the last fruit still hung on the vines, and the air had a ripeness about it, that last blush of summer heat before the nights started to draw in. The moon had been high, and Tommaso had taken my hand as we strolled between the vines. It had no longer been the casual touch of childhood friends, but a super-charged touch…

  ‘Sarah? Are you okay?’

  I blinked, and I was no longer walking through the vineyard holding his hand, but looking at him across the gleaming dining table.

  ‘Shall I put the moka pot on for coffee?’ Tommaso asked, as if repeating himself.

  I pushed away from the table. ‘No, I’ll do it.’

  I couldn’t get away to the kitchen fast enough. As soon as I had the coffee brewing, I opened the freezer. But Tommaso and I had finished the last of the ice cream during a recent marathon of Lucifer, having already run through all seven seasons of Buffy. So I hid in the pantry and dug out the rich dark chocolate I usually kept for baking. The chocolate melted on my tongue, making everything seem right again.

  What had gotten into me? I hadn’t allowed myself to revisit that memory in years. And certainly not since I’d been back in Tuscany. I’d believed it safely buried where it belonged.

  After stuffing my face with another few blocks from the chocolate slab, I returned to the dining room far more composed. I served the coffee with a platter of cheeses and fruits, then as soon as I could politely do so, excused myself. I stacked the dirty dishes in the sink, but didn’t bother to wash them, and hurried to Tommaso’s cottage, showering and getting into bed as quickly as I could. Then I lay in the dark, unable to sleep, listening for his footsteps in the yard beneath the window. He followed not too long after, and I breathed a sigh of relief.

  I lay awake, listening to the soft sounds of his movements through the paper-thin walls. As I had too many other nights, I listened as he showered, then heard the gentle snick as his bedroom door closed. I let out a breath I hadn’t even known I was holding.

  The small rustling movements faded into silence. Still unable to sleep, I pulled on my dressing gown, and snuck down to the kitchen. Maybe it was the after-dinner coffee keeping me awake. Maybe a glass of warm milk would help. Geraldine had always given me warmed milk when I couldn’t sleep.

  The microwave pinged, and I took the steaming mug out and headed back up the stairs. I’d nearly reached the top when the bathroom door opened, spilling out hot steam and light.

 
Tommaso emerged from the tiny bathroom, towelling his head dry. Another towel wrapped snugly around his hips. Everything else was bare. His torso, his muscled arms, his legs with their dusting of dark hair.

  I swallowed, and inadvertently spilled scalding milk all over my fingers, though I scarcely noticed the burn.

  ‘Can’t sleep?’ he asked, his voice low and rumbly. I’d have called it his sex voice, if I had any idea what he sounded like when he whispered sweet nothings into a woman’s ear.

  I nodded. ‘It’s hot tonight.’ It was August, so that might even be true. Though right at that moment, I could have stood at the Arctic and still have been burning up.

  Since Tommaso didn’t seem in any hurry to move, I averted my gaze, climbed the last few steps, and brushed past him, my arm grazing a firm bicep in the narrow hall.

  ‘Sogni d’oro,’ he whispered. Sweet dreams.

  I kept putting one foot in front of the other until I was safely in Nonna’s old bedroom, with the door firmly shut. I sagged against it. I had to be falling ill. I hadn’t felt this hot and bothered and stupid since I was a girl.

  Pull yourself together. You’re not a girl anymore. You know exactly what this is. It’s that holiday thing. This is nothing more than the chemistry that happens when you’re away in an exotic place and in close proximity to a member of the opposite sex. It’s not real, and you’ll get over it, just the way you got over Luca. Just the way you got over Tommaso the last time.

  Chapter 23

  Amore e gelosia nacquero insieme

  (Love and jealousy go hand in hand)

  We didn’t have our usual intimate breakfast in the cottage kitchen next morning. Instead, I laid out a buffet of eggs, bacon, toast, tomatoes and mushrooms in the dining room. I was only half-pleased that the formality and bigger space of the dining room meant I didn’t have to look directly at Tommaso.

  Usually, he didn’t linger over breakfast, eager to get to the cellar, but it was only when Fiorella insisted she needed to start work, that he took himself off to the winery.

  ‘I can’t do another night like that,’ I complained to the bathroom mirror, examining the bags under my eyes.

  The problem wasn’t that I was jealous of Fiorella. Okay, well maybe I was just a little jealous. The problem also wasn’t that I disliked her. As much as I wanted to, it was impossible. Once she relaxed a little, Fiorella made the perfect guest. She’d complimented the food, and chatted happily, giving equal attention to both me and Tommaso – though the same could certainly not have been said of him.

  No, the problem was that she was so right for Tommaso, in ways I never would be.

  She’d grown up in Rome but would just as happily live in Tuscany (it housed Florence, after all, and she loved Florence). Her family was obscenely wealthy (hence the sporty BMW) so marriage with her might put an end to the winery’s financial worries. Her career was a hobby rather than a necessity, and she’d told me quite unconscientiously over the ravioli that she wanted marriage and children.

  She was the kind of woman who wouldn’t mind giving up her career for her future husband’s passion.

  Listening to their animated conversation about the importance of doing what you loved, of following your heart, it would have been obvious to anyone how much they had in common.

  While I was the outsider, the practical one who’d chased security and financial stability rather than my passions. Because if there was one thing I’d discovered on this ‘garden leave’ it was that I wasn’t passionate about my job. Dedicated, determined, disciplined? Sure. But I had certainly not followed my heart when I’d chosen a career in finance. I didn’t even know what my heart wanted. And if I did, I still wouldn’t trust it, fickle things that hearts were.

  I stared now at the mirror. Maybe financial security and a mortgage were my passions. Those counted, right?

  And just because I was thirty-five and still single didn’t mean there wasn’t a Mr Right out there for me. When I got back to London, I’d pay more attention to my work-life balance. I’d even go speed dating with Cleo.

  But I still had six weeks left in Tuscany, and I did not plan to spend even one day of those six weeks being a spare wheel to Tommaso and Fiorella. They say that misery loves company – so I called for backup. ‘I think the occasion of the castello’s first guest in decades deserves a dinner party,’ I said to Beatrice. ‘Will you join us?’

  While Ettore took over re-stuccoing the house’s façade – to my immense relief – I cooked. And baked. And cooked some more. And in between cooking, I moved all my things out of Tommaso’s cottage and back into my own room in the castello.

  The best way to avoid temptation was to stay as far away from it as possible – not a lesson I’d put into practice much since I’d arrived in Tuscany. And I didn’t think my fickle heart would cope with another late night, barely-dressed encounter.

  When we gathered on the terrace for a pre-dinner drink that evening – me, Beatrice, Fiorella, Beatrice’s older brother Aurelio and his wife Silvia, Daniele and Ettore, now dressed in smart trousers and a crisp white shirt that concealed his tattooed arms – I was more than ready for a drink.

  ‘We have something wonderful to celebrate today,’ Beatrice said, raising her glass of apéritif, a negroni cocktail I’d prepared. ‘Today the trattoria got two new Google reviews; the first praised the perfection of the bruschetta we served with the zuppa, and the other said ours was the best zeppole he had tasted in his entire tour through Italy. That is all thanks to you, Sarah.’

  The others raised their glasses in salute, and I basked in the glow of their praise. Financial advisers never got much praise. We certainly didn’t get Google reviews.

  ‘You can’t be persuaded to stay?’ Beatrice asked hopefully.

  I laughed as I shook my head. ‘In six weeks the German buyers will be here, and I’ll be back in the office.’ My chest tightened in a way I hadn’t felt in months. But that couldn’t be stress at the mere thought of work, surely. I was looking forward to going back to the office. To the bustle of London streets, and the after-work drinks with Cleo in the trendy little bars around Cheapside, to the packed pub on Wanstead High Street on Friday nights, and strolling through the park on Sunday mornings…

  Yet somehow all I could picture was rain and cold.

  ‘You are selling the castello?’ Fiorella asked, her big dark eyes rounding in surprise.

  I nodded. ‘To a German couple who’ve made a very generous offer. They want to take occupation in October already.’ Florian and Yusuf had cooed over the photos I’d sent them so far – though I’d had to get a little creative with the angles to show the castello in the best light. ‘They’re even taking it fully furnished.’

  Fiorella frowned, then looked around. ‘Tommaso is late.’

  ‘Tommaso is often late. When he’s working in the winery, he loses track of time.’

  But he wasn’t working late tonight.

  When he finally joined us on the terrace, a collective gasp whispered through the assembled guests.

  Daniele was the first to find his voice. ‘You clean up good.’

  Everyone laughed, Fiorella smiled like a cat that had just discovered a great big bag of catnip, and I threw the entire contents of my cocktail down my throat.

  ‘I’ll serve dinner, then,’ I said.

  By the time I joined my guests in the dining room, carrying a platter of appetizers that included phyllo-wrapped asparagus and rolls of bresaola beef stuffed with soft mozzarella, I was better prepared for the sight of a clean-shaven Tommaso.

  He did indeed clean up good, and I wasn’t the only one who’d noticed. Fiorella sat as close to Tommaso as she could at a twelve-seater table that was set for only eight. Her shyness was gone tonight, and her eyes sparkled. When she addressed Tommaso, she unconsciously reached out to touch his arm. He didn’t move away.

  My first – and only – dinner party at the castello was a failure before it had even begun. Sure, the crystal and silverware gl
ittered in the romantic candlelight, reflecting the sparkling chandelier overhead. The heavy scent of lilies filled the air, and the antique ivory tablecloth and napkins added sophistication. The dining room looked as I’d always imagined it would – magnificent. Wine flowed, and food was passed around, and my guests laughed and chatted, relaxed and happy.

  But I couldn’t wait for it to be over.

  I didn’t need him to shave off his beard and trim his hair to see how attractive he is, I thought. And promptly knocked over my wine glass, spilling wine like blood across the antique linen and into the asparagus.

  ‘Are you okay?’ Tommaso asked from the far end of the long table, as I scrambled to my feet. ‘Do you need help?’

  ‘I’m fine. Just fine. I don’t need any help.’ I hurried to the kitchen for dish cloths, though I knew it was futile. No dish cloth was going to clean up the mess I’d made.

  I was such a fool. No holiday romance, indeed! I’d been so busy resisting a repetition of Geraldine’s biggest mistake, of being seduced into unprotected sex, pregnancy and single parenthood, that I hadn’t realised there was an even greater danger: the danger of falling in love.

  Angrily, I slammed the door shut on the oven’s warming drawer. Why couldn’t I have fallen in love with Luca, who was easy-going and fun, and who actually wanted me around? No, I had to go and fall for Tommaso – complicated, difficult Tommaso who couldn’t wait for me to leave.

  I hadn’t been able to walk away from him unscathed the last time, and I doubted I’d be able to walk away unscathed this time.

  But walk away I must.

  We had no future together. We were on such different paths. If I really loved him, I’d want him to be happy, wouldn’t I? I’d want him to find a woman he could share his life with. Instead, I wanted to scratch her eyes out.

  I carved the roasted lamb with aggressive slices. And didn’t I deserve the same – someone to share my future? Someone who would put me first, for a change?