“Do you know anyone else who’s trying to convince Carletto to sell Le Giuggiole to a Russian billionaire so he can build a golf club?”
She delivers the information so bluntly that I just sit there, stunned, like the time at Eton when Harring hit me between the eyes with a ball during a tennis match. He never had a great sense of the court ... “Wha ... huh?”
She closes the ten feet that separate us in two steps, her face an inch from mine. I confirm: beautiful eyes. Angry as hell but dazzling.
“Did you or did you not come here to convince Carletto to sell the property to one of your clients?”
14
Elisa
I actually wouldn’t have minded joining Michael for a pizza, but as Mamma always says, if I hit a wall with my head, it would be the wall that cracks, so I refused to compromise: penance first. I set him up on three dates with the Cozzis and only after he’s atoned for his sins will I grant friendship benefits.
For Giada and me, the Cozzis were a real problem in high school: a cohort of snobs and bigots that showed blatant contempt for us.
In truth, they harbored a poorly concealed envy toward Giada: There wasn’t a boy in school who wouldn’t have thrown himself at her feet.
While toward me they were downright disrespectful—though I was the one stupid enough to get myself pregnant at sixteen.
Those three managed to embody a true living punishment.
I’m sure that in London Michael is surrounded by hordes of Kate Middleton clones—beautiful, tall, pure, and light—but as long as he stays here, he’ll have to deal with Belvedere, and Belvedere doesn’t overlook a single man under forty. There’s a toll to be paid.
These memories, however, don’t have any power over me when I’m off in my peaceful little corner: like now, in the annex’s garden, reading Kinsella’s latest novel—which I went to pick up in Florence especially,just so I could have a signed, limited-release edition—lying in the hammock stretched between two olive trees, equipped with a miner-style headlamp and a bowl of watermelon cubes resting on my stomach.
Giada is out and about with Carletto, Linda is studying in the library, and Mamma is watching a rerun ofIl Ciclonewith Donatella. So I have a moment of total peace that I intend to savor until the last second. If my exhaustion doesn’t catch up with me first, I might even be able to finish this book in one night.
It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve fallen asleep in the hammock with a book on my face.
Tf-tf-ft-tf-tf-tf.
A flutter tickles my head.
Tf-tf-ft-tf-tf-tf.
“Renato, are you still awake? Go to your birdhouse. Be a good boy,” I order, as the parrot pirouettes happily on top of me.
“Golf in Chianti,” he croaks. “Golf in Chianti.”
Huh? “Renato? What are you saying?”
“Golf in Chianti,” he repeats. Then I understand him. “Golf in Chianti.”
“Renato, come here,” I say, holding out my right arm as a perch. “Say it again.”
“Sergei Bogdanovic.”
“No, the first thing you said.”
“Sergei Bogdanovic, Sergei Bogdanovic,” he croaks again with conviction before flying off.
What on earth was that?
“Golf in Chianti and Sergei Bogdanovic,” I repeat, while feeling a little stupid for listening to a parrot with multiple personalities. “Golf in Chianti and Sergei Bogdanovic ... Bogdanovic ... Bogdanovic,” I muse. “Bogdanovic!” That’s why it sounds so familiar; it was the name Michael said this morning on our roof during his call.
I leave Kinsella in the hammock together with the watermelon and go up to the attic, which, despite the open skylight, is still boilingfrom the day’s heat. I intercept the network signal and type the wordsBogdanovicandgolfin the search bar.
Two million results. Not bad. But the first one tells me all I need to know.
