“Thanks, so do you.” She sits on the sofa, sending a waft of her crazy-making scent in my direction. “It’s very ... intimate here,” she observes.
“I just wanted a quiet space. It’s not a date.”
“Of course.”
“I took the liberty of ordering the tasting menu. The chef’s cuisine is quite unique, so you can have a taste of everything and eat what you like. You must be rather hungry, I imagine.”
“I’m dying,” she replies with a shy smile.
To be brutally honest, I asked for the tasting menu only because it has six courses, and I’d like the dinner to last as long as possible.
“There are some things I need to tell you,” I begin.
“Me too,” she replies. “About Linda.”
“We can agree that Linda is the absolute priority, but first there’s one thing you need to know: I postponed the deal between Bogdanovic and the Bingleys until mid-November so that you have time to make an offer. I can’t assure you it will be accepted, but at least you have a shot.”
“I don’t have a loan yet. The bank wants orders as collateral. That’s why I’m here at the fair, to find new customers. Anyway, thank you.”
We fall silent as the waiters serve the appetizers, after which I hurry to speak again.
“Listen.” I reach across the table to squeeze her hand, which, to my surprise, she doesn’t withdraw. It does, however, remain limp in my grasp. “I never wanted to be the bad guy in this story. I know how much you care about the vineyard. I’m sorry if I gave you the opposite impression.”
“You didn’t try very hard to prove yourself wrong, though.”
“Neither did you. I must say that you leave a lot to be desired when it comes to communication,” I reply, regretting my comment a second later when Elisa glances away, depriving me of the precious eye contact we’ve maintained so far. “I think I can understand why you hid something as big as Linda’s birth from me. May I hazard a guess that my brother wasn’t exactly honorable toward you?”
“Is that a sugar-coated way of asking me to tell you how it went?”
Basically. “Only if you want ...”
“It’s a story I don’t even like to tell to myself. It was painful and humiliating, and I’m not even sure I can get it straight.”
“Call me a masochist, but I really would like to know.”
“I met George in Florence, during his year abroad. Lucia and I were window-shopping on Via de’ Tornabuoni, fantasizing about what we’d buy if money were no object, and we almost collided with George as he was coming out of Gucci. You and the Bingleys hadn’t been to the estate in three years, and he was quite struck by how different I looked. He insisted on buying us dinner at the Palagio, then driving us home in his Maserati.”
“My brother always loved living large and showing it off,” I comment.
“The next day he reappeared to invite Lucia—my unwitting chaperone—and me to visit Sammezzano castle. It has so many little passages that make it easy to get lost and is full of little nooks where you can hide. He wanted to play hide-and-seek, and of course Lucia disappeared right away and George found me just as quickly, only instead of saying I was ‘it,’ he pressed me against the wall and kissed me.”
Elisa can’t imagine, but I’m gripping my fork so hard right now I could crumple it in my palm.
“Am I boring you?” she asks me.
“No,” I say through clenched teeth, my jaw tightening. “Go on.”
“I wasn’t even seventeen, and it was the first time in my life I’d gotten any male attention. I felt so flattered and wanted more. Let’s just say I didn’t exactly make him chase me.” She stops when the second course arrives, waiting for the waiter to leave us alone again. “I made it clear from the start that I liked him. He kept visiting Le Giuggiole every day to take me somewhere, and I always left the house with a different excuse. Lucia stopped coming; we’d made her feel like a third wheel. And so we went from taking innocent strolls around pleasant places to locking ourselves up in his car, on the back seats, exploring the bases one by one until, on what was supposed to be his last night in Italy, I saw fit to mark the occasion by giving him my virginity. Never for a second did he make me doubt his intentions toward me: He was always thoughtful, kind, gallant. He said he planned to come and visit me every weekend and holiday ... I was so inexperienced, I never could have suspected it was just an act. He insisted on not using any protection: ‘Condoms bother me. I can’t feel anything. You can’t get pregnant your first time, I’ll be careful ...’ Telling him no seemed impolite, and so I just trusted him.”
“He was very good at selling himself for what he wasn’t. That angelic face of his didn’t hurt.”
“When I found out I was pregnant, still thinking he was Prince Charming, I called him, certain he’d jump on the first flight to Florence to swear eternal love and raise the fruit of our passion together. Instead he wanted nothing to do with it. He told me it was my problem. If I wanted to get rid of it, he’d pay for the surgery, but if I kept the baby I would have to fend for myself. He ordered me never to call him again, and if I dared let you or the Bingleys know that I was pregnant, he’d claim that I was only trying to set him up for money. After that, he changed his number, and I never saw or heard from him again.”
I look at Elisa, and I see so much dignity in her that I want to scream. “My brother was always unworthy of the oxygen he breathed. He probably knew that you’d rather cut out your own tongue than look like a gold digger, and he had no qualms about exploiting your weak point.”
The waiters take the plates away, and for the third time, hers is untouched. “Now you know everything.”
“I’m sorry I was so horrible when you told me Linda was my brother’s daughter. I couldn’t bear to think of you as one of his victims.”
