The Italians: Rico, Antonio and Giovanni

CHAPTER THREE

AT TWENTY-FIVE minutes past eight, the next morning, Ella was ready to go. As she’d expected, Rico knocked on her door at eight-thirty exactly. He was wearing pale chinos and another crisp white shirt; clearly he wore the same kind of clothes off duty as he did when he was working.

He glanced at her feet and gave an approving nod. ‘Good. Flat shoes. They’re comfortable to walk in?’ he checked.

‘Very,’ she confirmed.

‘Good. Let’s go, bellezza.’

Ella locked the door behind her and Rico ushered her out of the hotel. She tried not to be disappointed that he hadn’t taken her hand. Then again, they needed to be discreet; this was the hotel where he worked, and having a fling with a guest probably wasn’t something that the management would approve of.

Did he have flings like this with many guests? She pushed the thought aside. Even if he did, it didn’t matter. She wasn’t looking for for ever. These few days in Rome were just for her, and she was going to enjoy them. No guilt, no complications—just fun. A few moments out of her real life.

‘So where are we going?’ she asked.

‘To find beautiful views,’ he said. ‘And something a little unusual. And, this afternoon, I think we can do something fun.’

She smiled. ‘Sounds good to me.’

As they walked down the street towards the Colosseum, Rico’s hand brushed against hers. The light contact sent a tingle all the way through her. Another brush, then another, and finally he was holding her hand, his fingers curling round hers. It made her feel like a teenager, which she knew was utterly crazy; and yet she couldn’t help smiling. Today was perfect. A cloudless blue sky, the jumble of ancient and modern buildings that was Rome, and an incredibly charming, gorgeous man to keep her company as she strolled through the streets.

A man who’d given her so much pleasure last night. A man who’d made her see stars. And who might just do that again tonight …

They wandered through the streets together, until they came to a stone wall and she looked over it and saw the river. ‘Wow. I had no idea the Tiber would be so green.’

‘It’s fast-moving, too.’ He pointed out a line of ducks that were struggling to swim against the current, then finally gave up and went with the flow.

She rested her arms on the stone wall and peered into the distance. ‘Is that the Vatican?’

‘That’s the dome of St Peter’s you can see, yes—but, if you want to go there, I’d suggest going very early tomorrow morning,’ he said. ‘The queues at this time of day will be horrendous.’

‘Well, you can hardly go to Rome and not visit the Vatican,’ she said, taking a snapshot of the dome framed by the branches of the trees overhanging the wall.

He smiled. ‘OK. I’ll book us a tour for tomorrow.’

She blinked. ‘But you’re a tour guide. You’d actually take a tour with someone else? Or is that like market research for you?’

‘We need a licensed Vatican tour guide and I don’t have a Vatican pass,’ he explained. ‘But right now I have lunch in mind.’

They walked hand in hand along the Tiber. Rico stopped by one of the bridges. ‘I know I’m not officially a tour guide today, but I’d be failing in my duty if I didn’t tell you that this is the oldest bridge in Rome, built nearly two thousand years ago.’

‘You mean it’s an original Roman bridge?’ And yet it looked as firm and strong as if it had been built with the newest technology. ‘Wow. It’s amazing to think we’re walking in the footsteps of people who lived all that time ago.’

‘The more things change, the more they stay the same,’ he said softly.

Trastevere, on the other side of the river, was incredibly pretty; the houses were painted in a soft wash of terracotta or saffron, vines grew on balconies and terraces, and large pots of shiny-leaved green shrubs graced the doorways. And Ella thoroughly enjoyed their leisurely lunch in the square outside the church of Santa Maria. Sharing a glass of wine with him, seeing the desire glittering in his eyes—brighter than the golden mosaics outside the church that glittered in the sunlight.

Once Rico discovered that she enjoyed looking round the ancient churches, he smiled. ‘That’s excellent, because I was planning to take you to see something a bit unusual in another church, just across the river.’

‘Unusual’ hardly did it justice, Ella thought as she looked at the huge stone disc on a plinth in the portico of the church of Santa Maria in Cosmedin. It contained the carved face of a wild man; his mouth was open beneath his moustache, and wild hair and a beard surrounded his face. There was a crack in the stone going right to the edge from his left eye, and another crack running down from his mouth. Ancient and very, very imposing.

‘It reminds me a bit of one of the Green Men you’d see in an English church,’ she said. ‘What is it?’

‘The Bocca della Verità—the Mouth of Truth,’ he translated. ‘In medieval times, if you were accused of lying, you put your hand through the hole in the mouth. If you could take your hand back unscathed, you were telling the truth.’

‘And if you were lying?’

He shrugged. ‘Then the Mouth would eat your hand.’

‘Seriously? You mean someone stood behind the stone and actually cut off their hand?’ Very rough justice. Though she knew a couple of people who would’ve fallen seriously foul of the Mouth. Her father. How many lies had he told? To her mother, to his wife, to however many women who had made the same mistake as Ella’s mother and fallen in love with a charming, handsome and utterly faithless man.

And her ex. How many times had Michael told her he was studying at the university library, when he’d really been doing something else—or, rather, someowe else—entirely? Another charming, handsome and utterly faithless man.

Or maybe the fault had been hers. For not learning from her mother’s mistakes. For trusting Michael in the first place. Whatever; lying was the one thing Ella really couldn’t and wouldn’t tolerate. And she’d never let herself get involved with another charming, handsome and utterly faithless man again.

She pushed the thought away. ‘Wow. That’s really bloodthirsty.’

‘I don’t think anyone actually chopped off anyone’s hand. The fear of what would happen was enough to make people tell the truth,’ Rico said. ‘The stone’s actually a Roman drain cover, and the face is thought to be that of the god Oceanus.’

‘It’s certainly imposing.’ And there was a queue of tourists posing for photographs, holding one hand through the Mouth of Truth.

‘It’s touristy, yes,’ he said, following her gaze, ‘but it’s a little less common than people doing the “Friends, Romans, countrymen” speech.’ He touched her cheek briefly with the backs of his fingers, as if to let her know that he hadn’t been criticising her—merely stating a fact. ‘Shall I take your picture?’

‘Yes, please.’ She joined the queue to have her photograph taken with the Mouth, and paid her donation.

‘Would you like me to take your picture?’ she asked when he’d taken the shot.

‘No need. I live here,’ he said with a smile.

For a moment, she thought he looked a bit shifty. But that was ridiculous. What possible reason would Rico have to lie to her? No. That was sheer paranoia, brought on by thinking about the men who’d let her down so badly in the past.

He took her for a quick peek at the Circus Maximus, the ancient chariot-racing stadium; then they caught the Metro to the Piazza del Popolo and climbed up the steps to the Borghese Park.

‘I can’t believe it’s so quiet here,’ she said as they wandered along the path. ‘All you can hear is birdsong—no noise from the traffic, no sirens blaring from the police cars or the ambulances.’

‘I come here whenever I need some peace,’ he said. ‘We could walk round, or we could take a riscio.’

‘What’s a riscio?’

He gestured to people passing them. ‘A pedal cart for four with a sunshade on top. They do two-seaters, as well.’

‘A side-by-side tandem, you mean?’

‘Something like that.’ He smiled. ‘We can see a bit more of the park, this way. And it’s fun.’

She wasn’t so sure about that five minutes later, when they were heading towards a roundabout and, however she turned the wheel of the riscio, she couldn’t get the pedal cart to change direction. The notice in the middle of the car warned about needing to brake downhill, and the risk of the cart toppling over. Where was the brake? Panic flooded through her.

‘The steering’s only connected on my side, bellezza,’ he told her, reaching out to squeeze her hand. ‘Turning your wheel won’t make any difference.’

Ella was practically hyperventilating. How could he be so calm? ‘There’s a road train over there and we’re going the wrong way round the roundabout!’

‘We drive on the right in Italy, so we go round the roundabout the opposite way to how you drive in England,’ he reminded her. ‘It’s fine. We’ll give way to the road train. There’s nothing to worry about. Just sit back and enjoy it.’

‘Enjoy …?’ she asked wryly, beginning to wish they’d just walked.

‘Ella, trust me.’

Ha. He’d unconsciously zeroed in on the one thing she wasn’t sure she’d ever be able to do again. Trust someone.

‘I won’t let you get hurt,’ he said, gently touching her cheek with the backs of his fingers. ‘I promise. And I never break my promises.’

She didn’t know him well enough to know whether he was spinning her a line. But she’d go with it, for now.

Once they were round the roundabout and she got used to the way the cart moved, she found that she actually was enjoying it. Just as Rico had promised, they could see more of the park this way; and they could stop wherever they liked to take a closer look at a fountain or a sculpture.

By the time their hour was up, Ella was relaxed and had even agreed to swap places with Rico and steer the riscio herself.

‘Not so bad, was it?’ he asked, sliding his arm round her shoulders.

‘No, it was fun, once I’d got used to it,’ she admitted, putting her arm round his waist.

They walked back past a bunch of teenagers on rollerblades negotiating a line of tiny, tiny cones. Ella was amazed at how they skated in and out without knocking any of them over, their feet crossing each other, and yet they didn’t trip or fall.

The fascination must have shown on her face, because Rico said, ‘Dare you.’

‘Me? But I …’ She hadn’t been on roller skates for years, let alone rollerblades.

‘Dare you,’ he repeated.

Well, these few days were all meant to be about having fun. ‘You’re on.’ It was hard enough to skate in a straight line at first, and she knew there was no way she’d be able to negotiate that double slalom of cones. But then the man in charge of the cones took pity on her and gave her a wider-spaced course.

‘Wow, I actually did it!’ she said at the other end.

‘You were magnificent,’ Rico said, kissing her.

‘And now it’s your turn.’

‘Mine?’ He looked surprised.

‘You challenged me. Now prove that you can do it.’

The expression in his eyes grew heated. ‘What are the stakes?’

She shrugged. ‘You tell me.’

He leaned forward and whispered in her ear, ‘If I do it without knocking over a cone, you let me do whatever I want to you tonight. If I fail, I’m completely in your hands.’

She shivered with pleasure. ‘That sounds good to me.’

He licked his lower lip. ‘Right now, I’m not really sure whether it would be more fun to win or to lose.’

‘Do it properly,’ she told him. ‘I don’t like lying and game-playing.’

‘OK, Ella bellezza.’ He kissed her swiftly, then put on the rollerblades.

She wasn’t surprised that he managed to skate the same course that she did with relative ease. The man in charge of the cones winked at her and set up a more demanding course with a double slalom.

Rico spread his hands, grinned—and then showed off thoroughly. He was as graceful as a ballet dancer as he moved through the slalom course, his body all clean, flowing lines; Ella was aware of how many other women in the gathering crowd were giving him admiring looks.

He almost knocked over the very last cone, which teetered but stayed where it was. He skated round to Ella, then swept into a deep bow before taking her hand, turning it over and kissing the throbbing pulse in her wrist. Desire skittered through her.

‘You’ve done that before, haven’t you?’ she asked, not wanting him to see how much of an effect he had on her.

‘Now and then. Though I’m a bit out of practice.’ He took off his skates and handed them back. ‘Come on. Let’s go and chill out.’

They ended up by the lake, watching the fountain in the middle.

‘I can’t believe how blue the water is. It’s so pretty here,’ Ella said. ‘What are the trees?’

‘Lilacs.’

‘They’re not like English lilacs. They don’t smell the same, either. But they’re lovely. This is really special.’

This was where Rico always came to chill out, because it was one of the few places in Rome where you could enjoy nothing but the sound of birdsong; but the park had become almost background scenery to him over the years. The delight in Ella’s face as she looked around made him see the place anew. She was right. It was special.

They lay in the dappled shade under the lilacs, holding hands and looking up at the sky. He leaned over and stole a kiss. ‘So how come you’re in Rome on your own?’

She shrugged. ‘It was just the way it worked out. Now was the only time I could go, and my best friend’s a teacher—she can’t take time off in term time.’

‘And you have no family who could go with you?’

For a moment, she looked sad. ‘No.’

‘And your ex?’ That was still bugging him. The man who’d made her doubt herself so much. ‘Is that why you were booked in the honeymoon suite? And he let you down?’

‘No. I planned the trip after we split up.’ Her mouth tightened. ‘And he’s staying permanently ex, no matter how many flowers or grovelling letters he sends me.’

Flowers and grovelling letters? ‘Maybe he realised he’d made a mistake, breaking up with you,’ Rico said.

‘Actually, he didn’t dump me. I was the one who walked out,’ she told him, lifting her chin. ‘As for making a mistake … that’s a charitable conclusion.’

‘One you obviously don’t share.’

She gave a huff of mirthless laughter. ‘He probably heard on the grapevine that I won the lottery. Not millions and millions, but a decent amount—enough to give me six months’ sabbatical from my job.’

Hmm. So was this the reason why she said that money didn’t matter? Rico propped himself up on one elbow so he could look at her properly. ‘And you’re using the money to travel?’

‘A little bit. Actually, I only booked the honeymoon suite because it overlooks the Colosseum. I know it’s pathetic, but …’

He pressed a finger to her lips. ‘No, it’s not pathetic at all. If you wanted a room with a specific view, it doesn’t matter what the room’s called. Only the view counts.’ He smiled at her. ‘So where else are you planning to visit?’

‘Just Rome, for now. It’s the one place I’ve always wanted to see.’

‘Is there anywhere else on your travel wish list?’

She shrugged. ‘Vienna, but I don’t have time right now. When I get back to London, I’m going to be up to my eyes.’

‘Back in the job you described to me as “safe”?’ He stroked her face. ‘Maybe this money’s a chance for you to change your life, find a different job—something you really love doing.’

‘That’s exactly what I’m going to do,’ she said. ‘This six months’ sabbatical—I’m setting up my own business. If I can make a go of it, then I’ll resign properly and concentrate on my business. If I fail, then I still have a safe job to go back to.’

She hadn’t let her win go to her head. And she was planning to change her career the sensible way, with a back-up plan. As an entrepreneur himself, Rico knew that meant there was a much better chance of her business succeeding. ‘So what’s your new business going to be?’

‘You won’t laugh?’

Why on earth would she think he’d laugh at her? He frowned. ‘Of course not.’

She took a deep breath. ‘I make cakes.’

‘Like cupcakes?’

‘Yes, but mostly I make celebration cakes—birthday cakes, wedding cakes, that sort of thing. I’ve done it for years for friends and colleagues.’

He could see in her expression that it was what she loved doing. Which begged another question. ‘You didn’t think about making that your job when you left school?’

‘I did, but accountancy was safe.’ She grimaced. ‘We struggled a bit with money when I was growing up. So I wanted to have a safe job, one where I knew I wouldn’t have to struggle for money all the time—I even trained on the job rather than doing a degree first, so I didn’t have a mountain of debt when I finished studying.’

He’d never been short of money, but he could understand where she was coming from. ‘But what you really wanted to do was to decorate cakes.’

She nodded. ‘I’ve done some part-time courses. I did a week’s intensive course on sugarcraft, the year before last—how to do embroidery and lace-cut work and stencilling.’

He smiled. ‘Embroidery? That sounds more like fashion than baking to me.’

‘No, it’s a special sort of icing.’ She sat up and took out her mobile phone. ‘Like this one—I made this last month for a friend.’ She handed the phone to him.

He studied the photograph of the wedding cake with its delicate lace. ‘You made that?’

She nodded shyly.

‘Wow. Forgive me for being rude—I’m sure you’re very good at your day job—but you’re absolutely wasted there with a talent like this.’

She blushed. ‘Thank you.’

‘So you’re going to work from home?’

‘Sort of. I’ve rented a professional kitchen with a small flat above it. I moved in a couple of weeks before I came to Rome.’