“I don’t care. I just want to be with you,” he replies, kissing my forehead.
And I fall asleep like this, to the rhythm of his breath and his fingers caressing my hair.
Pulling up in front of the annex in the Cinquecento—a name that has less to do with the model of the car than the five-hundred-degree temperature inside it—Michael and I exchange a very long kiss, one loaded with promises, unspoken words, hope, trust, and everything else there can be after the kind of night we just spent together, the kindwhere nothing and everything happens at once. You can make love just by talking, and Michael knows how to give me a mental orgasm with a single word.
Who would have thought that a woman’s G-spot was actually in her head?
“I’d better go before my mother calls the police,” I say, breaking off the kiss reluctantly. “Harvest starts today. Good thing I have plenty of spare calories to burn.” This morning Michael woke me up with a tray of pastries that he personally picked up from the best pastry shop in Florence. He knows how to spoil a woman on her period.
“How long does the harvest usually take?”
“With fifteen people, it takes about ten days; we have to do three passes to collect the best bunches as they ripen,” I explain.
“I’ll come too,” he replies.
“To harvest grapes?”
“Yeah,” he insists.
“It’s not like in the movies. It’s not some cheerful romp,” I warn him.
“And what makes you think I want to go on a romp? I think I’ll like it, plus you yourself said I have to see how Chianti is made so I can value the property appropriately.”
He doesn’t even blink. “Of course, but I hardly meant you should become a laborer.”
“Shall I call you ‘boss’?” he asks me, giving me a playful kiss on the tip of my nose.
“Yes, and you’ll have to follow my orders.”
“It will be my pleasure.”
We say goodbye with a plan to meet at the stables, before I go inside with two objectives: to change and take a painkiller.
In the kitchen I’m surprised to find Giada, already awake.
“Good morning. Why are you up so early? Are you coming to the vineyard too?”
“I’m not, if you can imagine that. I just heard from Charles ...” Her tone, combined with her dangling sentence, doesn’t bode well. “Itexted him to see if he wanted me to pick him up at the airport tomorrow, but he said he’s not coming.”
I feel bad for her. “What do you mean, he’s not coming?”
“He says he has tentative commitments in London, and it wouldn’t make sense for him to come here before going to Hong Kong, so he’s not.”
“And when will he come?” I ask.
“He doesn’t know.” Giada shakes her head disconsolately. “I’m starting to think he doesn’t love me anymore ... if he ever did. I think I’ve been fooled again.”
“Oh, Giada, don’t say that.” I rush over to where she’s sitting on the worn sofa to hug her. She may be my big sister, but when she’s sad, she seems more like a stray puppy. “If you want, I can ask Michael whether Charles is just having a hard time going back to work or if maybe he met someone else.”
“Don’t bring Michael into this. I’ll just look desperate. It was so stupid of me to fall into his arms in less than twenty-four hours! Typical of the male hunter: Once he catches his prey, he’s no longer interested. Will I ever learn?” Giada is a champion self-pitier. “You should learn from my mistakes: Never give it away like bread. Even though after last night, it’s probably wasted advice.”
“Actually, it’s not.”
She cocks her eyebrow at me. “What do you mean?”
“I got my period.” I won’t add the minor detail that Michael and I traded wild sex for sappy cuddles, lest I put the final nail in the coffin.
“There, good girl, hold back. Women can think straight until they have sex, then they lose their minds; men, on the other hand, are disconnected from their brains until they fuck, and then they regain a cruel lucidity.”
