“With another beautiful woman to inspire us,” he said, “the work will go faster.”
She glanced surreptitiously toward the villa, but alas, Ren was nowhere to be seen.
Tracy showed up as Isabel was finishing her shift. Her eyes danced with excitement. “I just heard from Giulia, and the house we’re renting in town is going to be ready for us in three days.”
“I’m so glad.”
“It’ll be hard being away from Harry so much, but we’ll talk on the phone every night, and he can work eighteen hours a day if he wants without feeling like he has to hurry home at night or I’ll bitch at him. Best of all, when he flies down on weekends, we’ll have him all to ourselves, no cell phone.”
“I think it’s a good plan.”
“As we get closer to my due date, he’s going to work from here. The kids are over the moon, knowing they don’t have to go back to Zurich. They’re picking up Italian a lot faster than I am, and they’ve gotten attached to Anna and Marta. You’ll be here for another month, and Ren’s going to be around for almost three weeks. We’ll be so much happier here.”
Three weeks. He hadn’t told her. She could have asked, but she’d hoped he’d say something instead of acting as though the future didn’t exist for them, even though it didn’t. Ren was hardly the serial womanizer the media depicted him to be, but different times in his life seemed to be marked with different relationships. Years from now he’d remember her only as his Tuscan affair. She didn’t like how vulnerable she’d made herself, but she hadn’t figured out any other way to live.
Tracy had stopped talking long enough to regard her with amusement. “You’re the only person I’ve ever met who can do manual labor and not get dirty.”
“Years of practice.”
Tracy gestured toward the olive grove, where Andrea was smoking a cigarette as he finished his turn with a metal detector. “I made an appointment with Dr. Wet Dream for next week. Anna said he’s a wonderful doctor, despite his playboy reputation. I might as well enjoy myself while my feet are in the stirrups.”
“Let me add some more good news, then. I think it’s time to lift the sex ban.”
Tracy rubbed her stomach and looked thoughtful. “Okay.”
This was hardly the reaction Isabel had expected. “Is there a problem?”
“Not exactly.” She reached under her knit top to scratch. “But… would you mind not telling Harry you lifted the ban?”
“Your marriage is about open communication, remember?”
“I know, but-oh, Isabel, I love the talking. Last night we talked about whales-and not the shape of my body either. We were trying to think of how many species we could name. And the scariest movie we could remember from when we were kids. He let me tell him about this argument I had with my roommate in college that still makes me mad, and all this time I thought chocolate ripple was his favorite ice cream, but it’s butter pecan. We listed every present we could remember that we’d ever given each other and whether we really liked it or not. Even though I’ve been walking around with my legs crossed all week because I’m so horny I can’t stand it, I don’t want to give up the talking. It’s not just my looks after all. He loves the whole package.”
Isabel felt another pang in the vicinity of her heart. For all their emotional disorder, Tracy and Harry shared something precious. “I’m lifting the ban,” she said. “As far as telling Harry, let your conscience be your guide.”
“Great,” Tracy said glumly.
Tracy exchanged a few words with Andrea, then set off for the villa. She worked with the girls on their reading for a while and tried to give Jeremy a history lesson, but she had trouble concentrating. What was she going to do about Isabel’s decision to lift the sex ban?
She was still wrestling with the problem that night as she and Harry walked hand in hand back to the farmhouse. She was a spoiled rich girl, and she hated moral dilemmas, but her marriage wasn’t going to work if she didn’t have the courage to face the challenges straight on. As they entered through the kitchen door, she decided this would be a good time to use a few of the new skills Isabel had been teaching them, so she took both his hands and looked him straight in the eye.
“Harry, there’s something I’m supposed to tell you, but I don’t want to. I have a very good reason, and I’d like your permission to withhold the information.”
She knew he’d want some time to think this over, and she was more than happy to study his dear, familiar face while she waited.
“Does it involve life and death?” he finally asked.
Now she was the one who needed to think. “Almost, but not quite.”
“Is it something I want to know?”
“Oh, yes.”
“But you don’t want to tell me.”
“I really don’t. Not right now. Soon. Very soon.”
He lifted one eyebrow ever so slightly. “Because…?”
“Because I love you so much. I love talking to you. Talking is important to me, and once you know this thing that I don’t want you to know yet, I’m afraid we won’t talk so much, and I’ll start thinking you only love me for my face.”
His eyes lit up. “Isabel lifted the sex ban!”
She dropped his hands and stomped away. “I hate honest communication.”
He was chuckling as he caught up with her. He scooped her into his arms and kissed her forehead. The baby kicked between them. “Hey, you’re not the only one who loves talking. And you know by now that I’d love you if you were as ugly as my Uncle Walt. Let’s make a deaclass="underline" For every minute we spend naked, we’ll triple that time in conversation. Which, with the way I’m feeling now, means a lot of conversation.”
She smiled into his neck. Just the smell of his skin made her blood rush. But what if they slipped back into old patterns? They’d had a brutal lesson in what it took to make their relationship work. Maybe it was time to trust in the tough new fabric of their marriage.
“First you’ve got to make out with me,” she said. “Clothes on. No hands below the waist.”
“Deal. And the first one who breaks down has to give the other a full-body massage.”
“You’re on.” What the heck. She loved giving him full-body massages.
He grabbed her and pulled her onto the couch in front of the fireplace, but she’d barely leaned into the cradle of his shoulder before she groaned. “I have to pee. I always have to pee. If I ever even mention getting pregnant again, leave me on a mountaintop to die.”
He laughed and hoisted her up. “I’ll come along.”
As Harry followed his wife upstairs, he couldn’t think of one thing he’d done in his life that made him deserve this woman. She was tempest to his calm, quicksilver to his base metal. He followed her into the bathroom. She didn’t protest when he took a seat on the side of the tub. Until Isabel and her lists, Tracy hadn’t known that he made excuses to join her when she was on the toilet simply because he loved the intimacy of it, the everyday coziness. Tracy’d laughed like hell when he’d tried to explain it, but he knew she understood.
“Favorite vegetable?” she said. She hadn’t forgotten how much he wanted her, and she was making sure he remembered her concern. “Never mind. I know. It’s peas.”
“Green beans,” he replied. “Not cooked too much. A little crisp.” He reached over and cupped her calf. He knew now that he had to say what he was feeling instead of assuming that Tracy already understood what was so obvious to him.
“I love the talking, too, you know.” Honesty compelled him to add, “But right now I’m a lot more interested in sex. God, Trace, it’s been so long. Do you know what you do to me? Just being with you?”
“Yes, because you’ve told me.” They smiled at each other, and a few moments later headed for the bedroom. Once inside the door she gave him her coquette’s sly gaze. “What if you get me pregnant?”