Giulia picked up the statue and held it in her arms. “It’s only been a little more than a week since I got the list from her. How were you able to get this so quickly?”
“I asked a friend of mine to go to her house and pick it up. He shipped it to me at my hotel in Rome two days ago.” His friend also had efficient methods of bypassing customs.
“She did not mind giving it back to us?”
“She has two children now, and she knew how important it was.”
Vittorio grabbed Ren and kissed his cheeks. “I know I speak for everyone in Casalleone when I say that we can never thank you enough for what you’ve done.”
From then on it was a free-for-all. From men and women, old and young-he was smothered with kisses. From everyone but Isabel.
The statue made its way from one set of hands to another. Giulia and Vittorio glowed. Tracy shrieked good-naturedly as Harry tried to draw her closer to it. Anna and Massimo gazed with pride at their sons and with love at each other.
Ren was too miserable to enjoy any of it. He kept glancing at Isabel, trying to see if she understood that, at least in this one thing, he hadn’t failed her. But she didn’t seem to be getting the message. Even as she smiled and laughed with the others, he felt her anger scorching him.
Steffie leaned against his side. “You look sad.”
“Who me? Never been happier. Look around. I’m a hero.” He wiped a dab of chocolate from the corner of her mouth with his thumb.
“I think Dr. Isabel’s mad at you. Mom says…” Little pucker marks formed in her forehead. “Never mind. Mom’s cranky. Daddy told her she has to be patient with you.”
“Here, have a breadstick.” He pushed it into her mouth to shut her up.
Anna and the older women started herding the crowd to the tables. As the statue was passed from one family to the next, the toasts began, all of them directed at him. An unaccustomed tightness gripped his throat. He was going to miss this place, these people. He hadn’t planned it, but he’d somehow managed to grow roots here. Ironic, since he couldn’t come back, not for a very long time. Even if he waited until he was an old man to return, he knew he’d still see Isabel walking in the garden, her eyes shining just for him.
She’d seated herself at the opposite end of the table, as far from him as she could get. Andrea sat on one side of her, Giancarlo on the other. Neither could take his eyes off her. She was like a film running on fast forward. Her curls skipped about her head as she gestured. Her eyes flashed. Everything about her was charged with energy, but only he seemed able to feel the anger behind it.
The excitement had stirred appetites, and the soup quickly disappeared. The wind developed a chilly edge, and some of the women reached for their sweaters, but not Isabel. Her bare arms glowed with angry heat.
Oversize bowls of linguini with a red mussel sauce appeared on the table, along with a creamy risotto, and everyone dug in. This was the kind of occasion he most enjoyed, surrounded by friends, good food, great wine, and yet he’d never been more miserable. Giulia and Vittorio stole a kiss. Judging from the expression on Tracy’s face, Harry was groping her under the table. Ren wanted to grope Isabel.
Clouds rolled in, and gusts of wind rattled the trees. Isabel’s angry energy kept her from sitting still, but every time she jumped up to grab a serving platter, he expected it to shatter in her hands. One person after another demanded her attention, drawn to her as if her skin had been magnetized. She splashed wine on the tablecloth when she refilled glasses. She knocked the butter dish to the ground. But she wasn’t drunk. Her own glass had barely been touched.
The sun settled lower in the sky, the clouds darkened, but the town had its statue back, and the mood grew more festive. Giancarlo turned up the music, and some of the couples began to dance. Isabel leaned against Andrea’s side, listening to him as if each word coming from his mouth were a drop of honey she wanted to lick up. Ren cracked his knuckles.
As the bottles of grappa and vinsanto appeared, Andrea rose. Ren heard him address Isabel over the music. “Come dance with me.”
The canopy snapped in the wind. She stood and took his hand. As they began walking toward the loggia, the points of her fiery skirt sparked at her knees. She tossed her head, and her curls flew. Andrea’s eyes nudged her breasts as he lit his cigarette.
Just like that, she plucked it from his mouth and stuck it between her own lips.
Ren jumped up so quickly he knocked over his chair. Before she could cough out her first inhalation, he’d covered the ground between them. “What in the hell do you think you’re doing?”
She took a mouthful of smoke and blew it in his face. “Partying.”
He shot Andrea the look he’d been saving up all afternoon. “I’ll have her back to you in a few minutes, pal.”
She didn’t fight him, but as he dragged her away, the heat of her skin made his fingers burn. He ignored the amused expressions of the people they passed, and towed her behind the farthest statue. “Have you lost your mind?”
“Fuck you, loser.” She hit him with another cloud of smoke.
He wanted to wash her mouth out with soap, except he was the one who’d done this to her. Instead of kissing all the anger out of her, he drew himself up like a pompous asshole. “I’d hoped we could talk, but you’re obviously not in a mood to be rational.”
“You’ve got that right. Now, get out of my way.”
He never defended himself, but this time he had to. “Isabel, it wasn’t going to work. We’re too different.”
“The saint and the sinner, right?”
“You expect too much, that’s all. You keep forgetting I’m the guy who has ‘No Redeeming Social Value’ tattooed across his forehead.” He clenched his hands at his sides. “A reporter found me when I was in Rome. He’d heard a rumor about us. I denied everything.”
“You want a Boy Scout badge?”
“If the press finds out that we’ve had an affair, you’re going to lose what little credibility you have left. Don’t you understand? It’s all gotten too complicated.”
“I understand that you make me sick. I understand I gave you something important, and you didn’t want it. And I understand I don’t ever want to see you again.” She flicked the cigarette at his feet, then stalked away, her dress flaming around her in a bonfire of rage.
For a few minutes he stood there trying to get his equilibrium back. He needed to talk to someone with a clear head-get some advice-but a glance toward the loggia told him that the wisest counselor he knew was dirty dancing with an Italian doctor.
The wind cut through his silk shirt, and his sense of loss nearly brought him to his knees. Right then he understood. He loved that woman with all his heart, and walking away from her was the biggest mistake of his life.
So what if she was too good for him? She was the strongest woman he knew, tough enough to tame the devil himself. If she put her mind to it, she’d eventually whip him into shape. Hell no, he didn’t deserve her, but that only meant he’d have to do everything in his power to keep her from figuring that out.
Except Isabel was smart about people. She wasn’t some emotionally needy female who was taken in by a pretty face. What if the things she said about him were true? What if she was right, and he’d grown so used to seeing himself through an old, worn-out lens that he couldn’t see the man he’d become?
The idea made him dizzy. The freedom that a new view of himself could bring opened up too many possibilities to think about right now. First, he had to try to talk to her again, tell her how he felt, and he had a sinking feeling she wouldn’t make it easy.