Breathing Room

by Susan Elizabeth Phillips

  He groaned and grabbed his knife. “You got a lot more out of Giulia than I got out of Vittorio, I’ll give you that. But the statue disappeared three years ago. Why did everyone have to wait until now to dig up this place?”

  “The town’s priests kept the statue in the church office. . . .”

  “And isn’t it charming the way paganism and Christianity can still coexist?”

  “Everyone knew it was there,” she said, rinsing out a bowl, “but the local officials didn’t want a rebellion on their hands by reporting it, so they looked the other way. Paolo had done odd jobs at the church for years, but no one made the connection between him and the statue’s disappearance until he died a few months later. Then people started remembering that he didn’t like children.”

  Ren rolled his eyes. “Definitely suspicious.”

  “Marta always defended him. She said he didn’t hate children. That he was just imbronciato because of his arthritis. What does ‘imbronciato’ mean?”

  “Grouchy.”

  “She pointed out that he’d been a good father to his daughter. He’d even flown to the States years ago to see his granddaughter when she was born. So people backed off, and other rumors started to fly. I guess it got fairly ugly.”

  “Any guns?”

  “Sorry, no.” She wiped up a small section of the counter. “The day before I arrived, Anna sent Giancarlo down here to clean up a rubbish pile that had gotten out of hand. And guess what he found tucked in a hole in the wall when he accidentally knocked out one of the stones?”

  “I’m holding my breath.”

  “The marble base the statue had always stood on. The same base that disappeared the day the statue was stolen.”

  “Well, that does explain the sudden interest in the wall.”

  She dried her hands. “Everyone in town went crazy. They made plans to take the wall apart, only to have the fly in the ointment show up.”

  “You.”

  “Exactly.”

  “Things would have been a lot easier if they’d just told us the truth from the beginning,” he said.

  “We’re outsiders, and they had no reason to trust either one of us. Especially you.”

  “Thanks.”

  “What good would it do for them to find the statue if we spread the word that it was here?” she said. “It’s one thing for local politicians to turn a blind eye to a priceless Etruscan artifact sitting around in a church office, but officials in the rest of the country weren’t going to be quite that cavalier. Everyone was afraid the statue would end up locked away in a glass case in Volterra right next to Ombra della Sera.”

  “Which is where it should be.” He whacked a clove of garlic with the flat of his knife.

  “I did some snooping while you were working out, and look what I found.” She retrieved the yellowed envelope she’d discovered in the living room bookcase and spread the contents on the kitchen table. There were several dozen photographs of Paolo’s granddaughter, all carefully identified on the back.

  Ren wiped his hands and came over to look. She pointed toward a color photograph showing an older man holding a baby on the front porch of a small white house. “This is the oldest photo. That’s Paolo. It must have been taken when he went to Boston not long after his granddaughter was born. Her name is Josie, short for Josephina.”

  Some of the photographs showed Josie at camp, others on vacation with her parents at the Grand Canyon. In some she was alone. Isabel picked up the final two. “This is Josie on her wedding day six years ago.” She had curly dark hair and a wide smile. “And this one with her husband was taken not long before Paolo died.” She flipped it over to show him the date on the back.

  “It doesn’t seem like the collection of a child hater,” Ren admitted. “So maybe Paolo didn’t take the statue.”

  “He was the one who built the wall, and he was also the one responsible for the rubbish pile.”

  “Not exactly hard evidence. But if the statue’s not in the wall, I wonder where it is?”

  “Not in the house,” she said. “Anna and Marta have searched it from top to bottom. There’s talk of plowing up the garden, but Marta says she’d have noticed if Paolo hid it there, and she won’t allow it. There are lots of places near the wall or the olive grove, maybe even the vineyard, where he could have dug a hole and hidden it. I suggested to Giulia they bring in some metal detectors.”

  “Gadgets. I’m starting to like this.”

  “Good.” She whipped off the tea towel she’d wrapped at her waist. “Now, that’s enough talk. Turn off the stove and get naked.”

  He yelped and dropped his knife. “You nearly made me slice off my finger.”

  “As long as it’s just your finger.” She grinned and began unbuttoning her blouse. “Who says I can’t be spontaneous?”

  “Not me. Okay, I’ve got my breath back.” He watched the buttons open. “What time is it?”

  “Almost eight.”

  “Damn. Company’s coming any minute.” He reached for her, but she frowned and dodged.

  “I thought Giulia and Vittorio canceled on us.”

  “I invited Harry.”

  “You don’t like Harry.” She took another step back and began fastening up her buttons.

  He sighed. “What gave you that idea? He’s a great guy. Would you mind leaving a few of those open? And Tracy’s coming, too.”

  “I’m surprised she accepted. She wouldn’t even look at him today.”

  “I didn’t exactly tell her I’d invited him.”

  “And isn’t this going to be a pleasant evening?”

  “It couldn’t be helped,” he said. “Things bottomed out between them this morning, and Tracy’s been dodging him ever since. He’s pretty upset.”

  “He told you all this?”

  “Hey, guys share. We have feelings, too.”

  She lifted an eyebrow.

  “Okay, maybe he’s a little desperate and I’m the only one around he can talk to. The guy’s a total screw-up when it comes to women, and if I don’t help him out, they’re going to be here forever.”

  “Yet this total screw-up managed to stay married for eleven years and father five children, while you—”

  “While I have an idea I think you’ll like. An idea, by the way, that has nothing to do with the Battling Briggses, other than the fact that we have to get rid of them to pull it off.”

  “What kind of idea?” She leaned down to pick up some mushroom stems he’d dropped on the floor.

  “A little sexual costume drama. But we need the villa to do it justice, which means that the whole family and their baby-sitters have to go.”

  “A costume drama?” She let the stems fall back to the floor.

  “A sexual costume drama. I’m thinking nighttime. Candlelight. A thunderstorm if we’re lucky.” He picked up her glass and rolled the stem in his fingers. “It seems the unscrupulous Prince Lorenzo has caught sight of a feisty peasant woman in the village, a woman no longer in the first blush of youth—”

  “Hey!”

  “Which makes her all the more appealing to him.”

  “Darn right.”

  “The peasant woman is known throughout the land for her virtue and good works, so she fights off his advances, despite the fact that he’s the best-looking dude in the region. Hell, in all of Italy.”

  “Only Italy? Still, you should always put your money on a virtuous woman. He doesn’t have a chance.”

  “Did I mention that Prince Lorenzo is also the smartest dude in the region?”

  “Oh, well, that definitely complicates things.”

  “So what does he do but threaten to burn the entire village if she won’t submit to him.”

  “The cad. Naturally she says she’ll kill herself first.”

  “Which he doesn’t believe for a minute, since good Catholic women don’t kill themselves.”

  “You do have a point.”

  He drew a descriptive arc with his knife. “The scene
opens on the night she delivers herself to the prince’s deserted, candlelit villa. The same villa, coincidentally, that sits at the top of this hill.”

  “Amazing.”

  “She arrives in the dress he sent her that afternoon.”

  “I can see it. Simple and white.”

  “Bright red and slutty.”

  “Which only makes her virtue more apparent.”

  “He wastes no time in preliminaries. He drags her upstairs—”

  “Scoops her up in his arm and carries her upstairs.”

  “Despite the fact that she’s not exactly a featherweight—but luckily he works out. And once he gets her into his bedroom, he makes her take off her clothes slowly . . . while he watches.”

  “Naturally he’s naked as he watches, because it’s very hot in the villa.”

  “And even hotter in that bedroom. Did I tell you how good-looking he is?”

  “I believe you mentioned it.”

  “So the time comes when she’s forced to submit to him.”

  “I don’t think I’m going to like this part.”

  “That’s because you’re a control freak.”

  “And, coincidentally, so is she.”

  He bowed to the inevitable. “Just as he’s ready to force himself on her, what should she catch sight of out of the corner of her eye but a pair of handcuffs?”

  “They had handcuffs in the eighteenth century?”

  “Manacles. A pair of manacles lying just within her reach.”

  “Convenient.”

  “While his lust-glazed eyes are focused elsewhere”—Ren’s own lust-glazed eyes focused on her breasts—“she reaches behind him, grabs the manacles, and snaps them around—”

  “I knocked, but nobody answered.”

  They pulled apart and saw Harry standing in the doorway looking miserable. “We used to do that thing with the handcuffs,” he said glumly. “It was great.”

  “Ah.” Isabel cleared her throat.

  “You could have knocked,” Ren grumbled.

  “I did.”

  Isabel grabbed a fresh bottle of wine. “Why don’t you open this? I’ll get you a glass.”

  He’d barely finished pouring when Tracy came in. She bristled with hostility at the sight of her husband. “What’s he doing here?”

  Ren pecked her cheek. “Isabel asked him. I told her not to, but she thinks she knows everything.”

  In another lifetime Isabel would have defended herself, but she was dealing with insane people, so what was the point?

  “This seemed the best way,” Harry said. “I’ve been trying to talk to you all day, but you keep running away.”

  “Only because you make me sick.”

  He flinched but persevered. “Come outside, Tracy. Just for a few minutes. There are some things I need to say to you, and I have to do it privately.”

  Tracy turned her back to him, wrapped an arm around Ren’s waist, and rested her cheek on his arm. “I should never have divorced you. God, you were a great lover. The best.”

  Ren glanced over at Harry. “Are you sure you want to stay married to her? Because right now I’ve got to say I think you could do a lot better.”

  “I’m sure,” Harry said. “I’m very much in love with her.”

  Tracy lifted her head like a small animal sniffing the air, only to decide that what she smelled was unpleasant. “Yeah, right.”

  Harry hunched his shoulders and turned to Isabel, the shadows in his eyes making him look like a man with nothing left to lose. “I’d hoped to do this privately, but apparently that’s not going to happen, and since Tracy won’t listen, I’ll tell you, if you don’t mind.”

  Tracy seemed to be listening, and Isabel nodded. “By all means.”

  “I fell in love with her the moment she dumped her drink in my lap. I thought it was an accident. I’m still not sure whether to believe her that it wasn’t. There were all kinds of good-looking guys at that party tripping over each other to get her attention, but it hadn’t occurred to me even to try, not just because of her physical beauty—and God knows she was the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen—but because of her . . . because of this glow she had. This energy. I couldn’t take my eyes off her, but at the same time I didn’t want her to know I was watching. Then she dumped her drink, and I couldn’t think of one thing to say.”

  “He said, ‘My fault.’ “ Tracy’s voice caught on a little hitch. “I dump the drink, and the idiot says, ‘My fault.’ I should have known right then.”

  He still paid no attention to her, focusing on Isabel instead. “I couldn’t think. It felt like my brain had gotten a shot of novocaine. She was wearing this silver dress that dipped low in the front, and she had her hair up, except it wouldn’t stay up and these curls had fallen down her neck. I’d never seen anything like it. Anything like her.” He gazed into his glass. “But as beautiful as she was that night . . .” His voice grew thick. “As beautiful as she was then . . .” He swallowed. “I’m sorry. I can’t do this.” He set his glass on the counter and disappeared through the garden door.

  Tracy’s eyes were bleak, but she shrugged as if it didn’t matter. “See what I have to put up with? The minute I think he’s finally ready to talk, he shuts down. I might as well be married to a computer.”

  “Stop acting like an ass,” Ren said. “No guy wants to spill his guts in front of an ex-husband. He’s been trying to talk to you all day.”

  “Big deal. I’ve been trying to talk to him for years.”

  Isabel glanced toward the garden. “He doesn’t seem like a man who’s too comfortable with his feelings.”

  “I’ve got a news flash for both of you,” Ren said. “No man is comfortable with his feelings. Get over it.”

  “You are,” Tracy said. “You talk about how you feel, but Harry has terminal emotional constipation.”

  “I’m an actor, so most of what comes out of my mouth is bullshit. Harry loves you. Even a fool can see that.”

  “Then I’m a fool, because I’m not buying it.”

  “You’re not fighting fair,” Isabel said. “I know it’s because you’re hurt, but that doesn’t make it right. Give him a chance to say what’s on his mind without an audience.” Isabel pointed at the door. “And listen with your brain when you talk to him, because your heart’s too bruised right now to be reliable.”

  “There’s no point! Don’t you understand? Don’t you think I’ve tried?”

  “Try again.” Isabel gave her a firm push toward the door.

  Tracy looked mulish, but she went outside.

  “I already want to kill them both,” Ren said, “and we haven’t even had the appetizers.”

  Harry stood by the pergola, hands shoved in his pockets, the frames of his glasses picking up the last rays of sun. Tracy felt that familiar dizziness that had first plagued her twelve years ago, right before she’d dumped her drink in his clueless lap.

  “Isabel made me come out here.” Tracy heard the hostility in her voice, but she’d begged him once today, and she wasn’t going to do it again.

  He pulled his hand from his pocket and braced it on the side of the pergola, not looking at her. “What you said this morning . . . Were you just throwing up another one of your smoke screens? About being fat and having stretch marks, when you know damned well you get more beautiful every day? And saying I don’t love you when I’ve told you a thousand times how I feel?”

  Words uttered by rote. “I love you, Tracy.” No emotion behind them. Never, “I love you because . . .” Just, “I love you, Tracy. Don’t forget to buy more toothpaste when you go to the store.”

  “There’s telling and there’s believing. Two different animals.”

  He slowly turned to her. “It’s never been my love in question, not from the beginning. It’s always been yours.”

  “Mine? I picked you! If it had been up to you, the two of us would never have happened. I found you, I stalked you, and I reeled you in.”

  “I wasn’t
that big a prize!”

  Harry never yelled, and just the surprise of it silenced her.

  He pushed himself away from the pergola. “You wanted kids. And I had ‘Daddy’ written all over me. Don’t you get it? For you, it wasn’t about us. It was all about your need to have kids. About me being the father you wanted for them. Someplace in my subconscious I always knew that’s what you were after, but I kept fooling myself. And it was easy to do when there were only Jeremy and Steffie. Even when Brittany came along, I could pretend it was still about us, that you wanted me for me. I might have been able to keep on pretending, but then you got pregnant with Connor, and you walked around with this cat-that-ate-the-canary smile on your face. Everything was about being pregnant and the kids. I tried to swallow it, to keep on pretending I was the great love of your life and not just your best source of sperm, but it got harder. Every morning I’d look at you and want you to love me the way I loved you, but I’d done my job, and you didn’t even see me. And you’re right. I did start shutting down. So I could keep going. But when you got pregnant this time and you were so happy, I couldn’t even go through the motions. I wanted to, but I couldn’t.” His voice broke. “I just . . . couldn’t.”

  Tracy tried to take it in, but so many conflicting emotions were barreling through her that she couldn’t begin to sort them out. Relief. Anger at him for being so obtuse. And joy. Oh, yes, joy, because it wasn’t completely hopeless after all. She didn’t know where to begin, so she decided to start small. “What about the toothpaste?”

  He stared at her as if she’d grown a second pregnancy from her forehead. “Toothpaste?”

  “The way I don’t always remember to buy toothpaste. And the way it drives you crazy when I lose my keys. You told me if I screwed up the checking account one more time, you were going to take away my checkbook. And do you remember that dent in the fender of your car that you thought happened when you took Jeremy to Little League? I put it there. Connor threw up in my car, and I didn’t have time to clean it up, so I took yours instead, and I was yelling at Brittany in the parking lot at Target and drove my shopping cart into it. What about that, Harry?”