A Place in the Sun(29)

He protested, of course. Well, first he turned his back to ignore me, so I had to sort of cut across to stand in front of him and repeat myself twice, and then when he couldn’t pretend like he hadn’t heard me anymore, he protested.

“I haven’t got the time.”

“Oh, busy night planned at the villa? Going to read some fiction?”

He eyes cut to me, and I leveled a stare at him and didn’t budge. Not an inch. God, it was difficult. My spine nearly buckled under the sheer amount of disdain he focused on me. I fought against my better judgement and arched a brow as if to say, Your powers don’t work on me.

“There’s a place just outside. I’m sure they’ll give us a table and we can eat really quickly. I won’t even chew and you don’t have to bother talking. These last few days with you have shown me how adept I am at one-sided conversation.”

He dropped the bin bag he’d been holding and clapped the dirt off his hands.

“Fine. We’ll go up to Massimo’s restaurant.”

I didn’t quite believe it. I mean, my mouth was hanging open. I had an argument prepared on my tongue, but he’d agreed.

Holy hell!

I grinned, quite pleased with myself for talking him into a meal with me.

He told me to give him a few minutes to finish up and I promised I’d meet him outside. I stopped in the bathroom on my way to the front door to fix my hair and make sure my boobs were settled correctly in my bra. It wasn’t a date, exactly. I mean Gianluca had literally shouted This isn’t a date! through the bathroom door enough times that it was now burned in my brain, but I still wanted to look nice if I had to sit across a table from the man.

I’d picked a light sundress that morning and was glad for it as we walked outside. Gianluca locked up. The sun was still high in the sky, burning bright orange. The cool breeze felt good on my bare arms and legs after being stuck in the musty building all day. I twisted my hair into a bun at the base of my neck and smiled over at Gianluca as we set off along the main road. He didn’t notice. People waved at him as we passed and he was always polite, but distant. I got the feeling they would have enjoyed a long conversation with him, but he kept us moving along.

“I figured you must be hungry,” he said, holding the door open for me once we arrived at Massimo’s restaurant.

“Oh! Well, thank you. I am pretty starved after all the work we’ve done today.”

He grunted in response and I knew he wanted to mention that I hadn’t done much, but that’s because it took nearly half my energy just to stand in a room with him, enduring the weight of his grumpiness. It was doing a number on my knees.

A waiter directed us to a small table in the corner, set up right near the kitchen. Massimo came out to greet us, a bit shocked to see us sitting there at first, but he played it off.

“Only the best vino for my two favorite customers,” he joked right before flitting off and returning with a dusty bottle of red wine. It looked ancient and the moment it hit my lips, I had to stop myself from guzzling down the entire glass in one go.

“It’s so good,” I moaned, sipping slowly and watching to see if Gianluca was enjoying it as well.

He hesitated for one long, excruciating moment before offering a reply.

“It’s from his family’s vineyard, up near the farm.”

My brows nearly hit my hairline. “Are you serious? They produce wine there too?”

“It’s common here in Vernazza. Most families own a piece of the terraced hills. They build their homes in the center and then they grow grapes and olives, whatever they want, really. Massimo has a massive plot of land so he grows all sorts of things.”

I could tell my eyes were wide with wonder, because Gianluca was watching me with a curious little expression—not really the way a woman hopes to be looked at by an attractive man. It was more like he was looking at an alien from another planet.

“It’s just so different than London. Sure, we have an estate with gardens, but it’s all flowers for show, no food. It’s all very…two dimensional.”

He nodded, understanding what I meant. “It’s different here.”

Either they’d laced the wine, or we were having a normal conversation wherein I said words, Gianluca seemed to hear them, and then responded in kind. It was a bloody miracle. Gianluca didn’t do small talk and the fact that he was even sitting there with me at a restaurant was an unbelievable amount of progress. I wanted to see how far I could push it before he closed up again and told me to bugger off.

“How is it different?” I asked, keeping my gaze on my wine glass. I felt like I’d been tossed into the bear cage at the zoo and any sudden movement might spook the beast.

He sipped his wine and stared off over my shoulder. “Everyone is growing and producing, fishing or harvesting things so that if they wanted to, they’d never have to leave. Have you been shopping in the local markets?”

“Yes, but my hotel room doesn’t have a kitchen or anything, so I’ve been sticking to fruit.”

“Shame. You really ought to try the vegetables they sell at the market on Tuesday mornings.”

“I’ve seen that market! Katerina sells her clothes there too, right?”

A waiter dropped off a fresh loaf of focaccia bread and then dropped down some oil and vinegar. Gianluca mixed them up on a small plate and we got to work tearing off pieces of warm goodness to dip into the mixture.