Charlie scans the group. “We’ll fill you in on the ride back.”
“Splendid. Chiara here just finished her shift. I was telling her all about your beautiful villa and she said she’s never seen it,” Ansel says to Dario as if all bosses invite their employees to their places for private tours. “I told her she simply had to. Can she join us for dinner?”
Dario appears flummoxed by the request but tries to be acquiescent. “If you would like, Chiara. You’re more than welcome.”
“Grazie! Fammi prendere la borsa,” she says before flouncing away.
“I’ll help,” Ansel says, though Charlie’s certain Ansel has no idea what she just said.
Dario hits Charlie with that hapless yet winsome look again. Charlie laughs to himself. Their eye contact lasts a little longer and burns a little deeper this time around.
NINE
CHARLIE
“Where’s Chiara?” Charlie asks when he makes it to his shared room in the villa. After so much chocolate, he is in desperate need of that riposo.
Ansel whirls around like a tornado, tidying up. Stray socks and underwear fly into his bag.
He straightens and shushes Charlie. “She’s in there,” he tilts his head toward the shut bathroom door. “Can you hang on to this for me?”
Charlie accepts whatever small object is on offer. When he uncurls his hand, he holds what looks like a gold wedding band. “Are you married?”
Ansel shushes him again. “What’s it to you?”
“Nothing,” Charlie says, rolling the ring around in his palm. It looks expensive, and has a bit of heft to it. “Just…didn’t the contest rules say you had to be single?”
“Did it? I barely read it,” he says. “I saw ‘free Italian vacation’ and had my assistant write something up to enter me.”
“Your assistant wrote your entry?” Charlie asks, a bit peeved by this. He worked hard on the illustration he ultimatelysubmitted. It took him all night to get it right and then transfer the images to clean paper, which he scanned at the local library to submit electronically the next day.
“I am a busy man. A busy man who needed a vacation from both his business and his family,” he says in a sharp, low whisper. “This stays between us.” He shoves Charlie to the door so fast that Charlie nearly drops the ring. Before slamming the door in Charlie’s face, Ansel hangs one of his argyle socks on the doorknob and says, “See you at dinner.”
So much for a midday rest.
Like everyone in his family, Charlie never went to college, but somehow he’s having the formative experience of being sexiled, except in a foreign country in a lavish villa. Life is weird sometimes.
He bumbles down the stairs in search of a salty snack after all that sweet chocolate. Would they be doing aperitivos again? The enticing smells of homemade cooking waft out of the brickwork kitchen. Charlie expects only to find Paola, but Dario is in there too, wearing an undershirt and an apron, turning the pasta crank with surprisingly muscular biceps alongside the short woman.
The distinct sound of squeaking bedsprings and muffled moans come from above. They exchange a curious look, and then speak in hushed Italian.
“Non penso che funzionerà,” Dario says.
Charlie lives in tight quarters with his entire family, so conversations are expected to be overheard. He stops and listens in since he doesn’t understand what they’re saying anyway. The melodic cadence is novel and exciting to his ears.
“Basta!” Paola smacks the back of Dario’s hand with a wooden spoon. “Abbi fede.”
Their banter warms Charlie’s heart. The domestic scene only adds to Dario’s charm. Charlie could see himself with flour-coated hands kneading dough on Sunday afternoons in this kitchen alongside these two.
“Qualcuno ha attirato la tua attenzione?” Paola asks.
“Mi piace l’americano di nome Charlie,” Dario says.
Charlie perks up at the sound of his own name. Without even thinking, he launches one of the translator apps on his phone and presses the speech-to-text button.
“Perché allora sei pessimista?” Paola asks.Why then are you pessimistic?
“Non è il tipo di ragazzo che sposi.”He’s not the kind of guy you marry.
