Carol Grace – The Sicilian's Bride (страница 2)

The man frowned and gave her a long scrutinizing look that made her pulse quicken and her heart race. From what she’d seen in the airport, Italian women were so chic, so effortlessly stylish, she must look positively shabby to him in her wrinkled shirt and the plain wash-and-wear skirt she’d pulled out of her suitcase. If he even noticed.

His gaze moved to her rental car across the road. She was close enough, just across an old wooden fence, to see a hostile look appear in those incredible blue eyes. She’d imagined people would be friendly here. Maybe she was wrong.

He didn’t say a word. Hadn’t he understood her Italian? Or did the place go by another name? “La Azienda Agricola Spendora?” she said hopefully.

“You must be the American who arrived yesterday,” he said in almost perfect English. His deep voice with a slightly seductive accent sent shivers up her spine. A simple laborer he was not.

She let out a breath she didn’t even know she was holding. “How did you guess?” she said lightly. “I suppose my Italian needs some more practice.”

He shrugged as if he really didn’t care if she was an alien from another universe or if she spoke grammatically perfect Italian. “What can I do for you, miss?” The words were polite, but his tone was cool, with a sardonic edge.

Never mind. She didn’t have to make friends with everyone she met. For all she knew he was overworked and underpaid despite his ease in speaking English, and probably tired and thirsty. It was still possible she could hire him, even if he had a chip on his shoulder. She could use someone who spoke English and was a hard worker.

“My name is Isabel Morrison and I’m looking for my vineyard, the Azienda Spendora.” She couldn’t help the note of pride that crept into her voice. The words my vineyard had such a nice ring to them.

“I’ll give you a ride. You’ll never find it on your own,” he said. He reached for a shirt hanging from the branch of a tree and put it on before she could protest. How many times had it been drummed into her not to take rides from strangers? This was the kind of stranger who set off flashing detour lights in front of her. Too well-spoken, too sure of himself, too eager to take her heaven knew where.

“Really, it’s okay, I can find it. I’ve got a map,” she said, hating the hint of nervousness in her voice.

“Are you afraid of me?” he asked, looming over her with all his six-feet-something and broad shoulders, shirt half-unbuttoned, blue eyes challenging her either to admit or forget her fears.

“No,” she said a little too quickly. While a voice inside her murmured, Well, maybe just a little.

“I’m Dario Montessori and I live nearby. In fact, these are my vines.” He waved an arm in the direction of the fields behind him. “I know everyone for miles around and everyone knows me. Come along. You might meet some neighbors.”

“Now?”

“Why not? Nussun tempo gradisce il presente, as we say in Italian. Wait here. I’ll bring my car and pick you up.”

This was an order there was no resisting. Besides, she did want to meet her new neighbors. It would be silly to pass up an opportunity like this. After all, she wanted to fit into the local village life. What better way than to be taken around by a native? So she waited there until he pulled up in a red-and-black convertible with leather seats. No ordinary farmhand could touch this car with under a hundred thousand. Who was he really? Why was he going out of his way for her?

“If you’re planning to kidnap me,” she said with a touch of bravado, “Don’t bother, because I don’t have any rich relatives you could hit up for the ransom.”

He slanted a glance in her direction. The look on his face told her she’d just spouted the most absurd thing he’d ever heard. “I’ve lived here all my life and I don’t believe there’s been a kidnapping around here in one hundred years. Relax, you’re in Sicily now. As for the Azienda, I’m warning you, when you see it and the condition it’s in, I am certain you’ll be willing to sell it to me.”

“It’s funny,” she said thoughtfully, “you’re the second person I’ve heard of who wants to buy it from me. Just yesterday…”

“That was also me,” he said, turning up a bumpy, dirt road. “Your solicitor was representing my family.”

“The family that owns most of the land around here? The family that makes prize-winning Marsala and exports Cabernet all over the world?”

He nodded.

“Then you already know I’m not going to sell it.”

“You haven’t seen it,” he said flatly.

“I saw a picture of it on-line. It looks charming.”

“Hah,” he said and shook his head at her ignorance.

So he too was trying to discourage her. In the photograph the house appeared to be small, and it was located on rugged terrain at a fourteen-hundred-foot elevation. But it looked snug and was situated in a picturesque grove of olive trees and grape vines.

“That picture was taken some years ago when our family owned it. Antonio let it fall apart.”

Isabel bristled at the criticism of her uncle, although he might have deserved it. As a family member she was surely entitled to criticize him for allowing the place to disintegrate, but this man was not. At least not in front of her. “Perhaps he had reason,” she suggested.

Dario gave her a steely look that told her more than words that there was no good reason.

“Did you know him well?” she asked.

“He kept to himself. But it’s a small town. Everyone knows everyone.”

“I see,” she said. But she didn’t see. What was her uncle doing in Italy?

“He left the place in a mess,” Dario said.

“I’ll clean it up,” she insisted. “I don’t mind hard work. I know how to paint and make repairs. I’ve done it before.” She’d even done it in her San Francisco rental unit when her landlord had refused to pitch in. Here she’d have the incentive of improving her own property.

He raised his eyebrows, probably surprised by her determination. He hadn’t seen anything yet. She’d been criticized for years for being strong-willed after she left the orphanage.

“Isabel’s a very headstrong girl,” the social-service workers had agreed. She’d been moved from house to house, from foster family to foster family. No wonder no one wanted her with her bright-red hair and her stubborn disposition. No wonder she was passed over for younger, sweeter, more obedient little children. No one wanted to adopt a child with “inflexible” or “rigid” written on her reports.

It hurt to be overlooked, standing there, tall and gawky, enduring being examined and finally rejected time after time. But she got over it. Even when she was officially declared unadoptable because of her age, it had just made her more eager to grow up and set out on her own. This was her chance. She’d show them.

“Do you know anything about growing grapes?” he asked.

“Some, but I know I need to learn more,” she admitted.

“Do you know how to prime a pump, irrigate fields, fight off frost? Do you know how hard it is to fertilize volcanic soil, are you prepared to wait for years to harvest your grapes?” he demanded. He was almost enjoying this inquisition, she realized. She could tell by the way he looked at her, the way he raised his voice to be sure she caught every word.

What really annoyed her was the way he assumed she was far over her head and had no business even trying to break into his field.

“Or are you in love with the idea of growing grapes,” he continued, “and of bottling your own wine?”

She bounced out of her seat as they hit a dip in the road. “Years?” she said. “I can’t wait years. I need to make wine and make a living from it. Surely it’s possible. I’ll hire help. If it’s so hard to produce wine on the property, why do you want to buy it?”

“It is hard, even for us. But we have experience. Historically, it’s our land. Has been for centuries. For hundreds of years most Sicilian wine was shipped off the island, to be blended into other wines. But now we’re getting the attention from the world markets we deserve. Twenty-six generations of Montessoris grew grapes there before we were forced to sell it to your uncle a few years ago.”

“Forced?”

“It’s a long story and it doesn’t concern you. We had a sales slump, followed by financial problems which induced us to give it up, but we’ve recovered and now we want the land back where it belongs. To us. What difference does it make to you? You’ve never seen it, you’ve never lived on it or farmed it. You didn’t have picnics there, eat the grapes off the vines or swim in the pond. It means nothing to you.”

A pond? She had a pond? She’d stock it with fish, swim in it and watch the birds drink from it. Now she was sure she’d never give it up. She sat up straight in the leather bucket seat. “You’re wrong. It means a lot to me. A chance for me to do something different, to earn a living from the land my uncle left me.”

“Your uncle never grew a single grape there.”

“That doesn’t mean I can’t. I haven’t seen the property, but it’s mine and I plan to live there and make it my home. It’s my right to settle there, my chance to make a fresh start. Surely everyone deserves that.”

He shook his head as if she was naive and stupid. She’d been called worse. “I don’t know what you’ve been doing,” he said, “but if you want a fresh start, why don’t you buy a hotel, start a newspaper or open a café? All of those would be easier for a newcomer than making wine. Take my word for it. Viticulture takes time and patience and a feeling for the land.”