Chapter 3
Chapter Three
Gino plucked a bottle of red from his vast collection and showed the label to his hostage. “Is this to your liking?”
She didn’t even look at it. “You’re a man of expensive taste. I’m sure I will like all your wines.”
Uncorking it, he poured them both a glass, wondering again how everything he’d envisaged had turned on its head.
When he’d formed his plans for holding Francesca for a week, he’d pictured himself spending his first evening having to coax a terrified woman into eating and drinking.
He’d pictured her cowering whenever he got within three feet of her; envisaged himself constantly reassuring her that he wouldn’t harm her, that she had nothing to worry about, that it would all be over soon.
Never had he imagined he would crack open his wine collection within twenty minutes of bringing her into his home, especially as when they’d stepped into his apartment he’d imagined locking her in one of the bedrooms and carving a hole in the door to shove food and water through for her.
Of course, this had just been dark imaginings, not something he would do, just as shoving her into the boot of his car had been nothing but dark imaginings.
As infuriating as she was, he’d pledged to keep Francesca from harm during her forced stay with him, and to do that, he needed to keep her close.
If he could do something about her mouth, then life would certainly be easier for him, and so he’d hit on her mention of wine making her head fuzzy. Let her drink all the wine she wanted!
She took a small sip.
He raised an eyebrow in question.
“It’s good.”
“Good?”
“Nice.”
“I thought you were a wine connoisseur, Miss Marino.”
She grinned. “I’m a tour guide, Mr Vicario.”
“For wine tourists.”
“I’ve only been working at the chateau for two weeks.
The tourists know more about wine than I do.
I’ve been taught all the right things to say, but really, when it comes down to it, does it matter what hints of cherry or whatever a wine has?
For me, and I would say for most people, the only question is whether the wine tastes nice. This wine is nice.”
“I’m glad you approve. Are you hungry?”
Her pretty light brown eyes sparkled with amusement. “Wine and food? If I didn’t know better, I would think this a date.”
He fixed her with a stare that, in normal people, would wipe the smile from their faces. His hostage only laughed.
Filling his lungs with needed air, he turned and headed to the kitchen. He didn’t need to check that she was following him. He could hear the light tread of her footsteps behind him, despite the clumpiness of her shoes.
“Nice kitchen,” she commented. “Have you locked the knives away?”
“I thought you were allergic to pain.”
“Yes, but as far as I’m aware, you’re not.” She said this with such sweet matter-of-factness that he came within a breath of laughing.
Removing the lasagne from the fridge, he looked at her. “Would you even know what to do with a knife if you were able to use one on me?”
Her lips pulled together and wriggled as she contemplated this. “You’re so much bigger than me that you’d overpower me before I was able to stab you, so I think I would have to throw it at you when you weren’t expecting it.”
“Have you thrown a knife before?”
“No, so if you could pass me some, I’ll start practising.”
This time, he couldn’t stop the small rumble of laughter rising up his throat, and was glad his back was turned to her so she couldn’t see him smother it.
He put the lasagne into the microwave to heat.
“Did you make that?” she asked.
He opened the fridge for the salad stuff. “No.”
“Who did? One of your goons?”
“My housekeeper.”
“What’s her name?”
“Carmita.”
“Nice name. Are you married?”
He took a knife from the self-sharpening block. “No.”
“Girlfriend?”
“No.”
“Children?”
“No.”
“Siblings?”
“No.”
“Can I call my mother?”
“No… What?”
“She’ll be worrying about you.”
That made him look at her. While he’d been busying himself with dinner, Francesca had hauled her petite frame onto the counter facing him.
Smiling, her slim, golden legs gently swinging, she took a sip of her wine and shrugged.
“I really should call home. I would have asked before, but I wasn’t in a rush to hear I told you so.
” At his stare, she added, “My parents are very protective of me. My father more than my mother. He hates her side of the family and the danger they put us all in. If he could wrap me in cotton wool and keep me at home for the rest of my life, he would. You would not believe the fight it took for him to agree to me getting a job.” Her eyes suddenly narrowed.
“I bet he’s the one who stopped me from being involved in those marriage talks. He’ll be trying to fight it.”
Gino put his attention back on the salad he was preparing. “From what I understand, the only requirement of you now is your compliance.”
“It’s been agreed?”
“The talks are still on-going but yes, it’s been agreed in principle.”
“How do you know all this?”
“Spies, Miss Marino.”
“Spies embedded in my family?”
“Embedded in its network.”
“Who are these spies?”
“You think I’m going to share their names with you?”
“It was worth asking in case you slipped up and gave them to me without thinking.”
“I never do anything without thinking.”
“That I’m here means my mother is right, and I don’t do enough thinking.
Not serious thinking. I knew you were gangsters as soon as you got out of your car, but instead of recognising the potential danger and preparing to defend myself, I was thinking about my car and how I was going to get it out of the space you’d boxed it in without damaging it. Could you really kill me?”
Francesca’s ability to skip from one conversation to another without a pause was something Gino was already getting used to, but this made his stare whip to her.
“It can’t be easy to stop a heart from beating,” she said in that matter-of-fact way she had. “Psychologically. I’m sure the act itself would be easy for a man your size when it’s being committed against a woman my size, but could you really bring yourself to do it?”
Drizzling olive oil over the lettuce and cherry tomatoes, he pointedly said, “If it gave my ears a rest, I’m sure I’d find it easy.”
“You joke, but in reality, I think you would find it hard.”
“Who said I was joking?” The microwave pinged. Gino removed the dish and placed it on the breakfast bar, then put the salad bowl beside it. “Lasagne, Miss Marino?”
“I ate just before you kidnapped me, so only a small portion for me, please. Are your goons joining us?”
“No.”
“Can I call home?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because this isn’t a holiday camp.” He got plates out.
“Even prisoners are allowed calls home.”
Clenching his jaw, he cut her a quarter of the dish and served it up for her. “Your dinner, Miss Marino.”
She jumped off the counter. “We’re not eating in the dining room?”
“This isn’t a date,” he reminded her sharply as he placed the remainder of the lasagne on his plate.
“I don’t know. Two single people sharing a meal over a glass of wine, all alone except for the armed guards patrolling the apartment…” She topped up both their wine glasses with a mischievous smile. “That sounds like a date to me.”
“Well it isn’t.” Pulling a stool out at the end of the breakfast bar, he slid onto it. “Now be quiet and eat.”
There were three remaining stools. She hoiked herself onto the one closest to his so she was sitting at a diagonal from him, and dug in.
Her silence lasted half a minute. “This is really good,” she said appreciatively. “You said your housekeeper made it?”
He grunted.
“Where is she? Don’t your domestic staff live in? No, let me guess, they do live in, but you’ve given them the evening off? Or even the whole week off?”
He wouldn’t respond. Let her talk all she wanted. She would soon shut up without a receptive audience.
“Well, if I don’t get to meet your housekeeper, can you please let her know her lasagne’s nearly as good as my mother’s? As in the woman you won’t let me call to put her mind at ease that I really am safe and well and that you’re not pulling my fingernails out.”
“I tell you what, Miss Marino,” he snapped. “If you can make it through the rest of the meal without saying another word, not one, I will allow you to make a short call to your mother in the morning.”
Her mouth opened then closed again. Eyes wide with animation, she put her fork down, mimed zipping her lips, then mimed making a call.
“Yes,” he agreed tersely. “Not one more word, and then in the morning, you can speak to your mother.”
Beaming, she held her hand out to him. When he ignored it, she tapped his arm.
Dear God, even in silence she was annoying. “You want me to shake on it?”
Still beaming, she nodded.
With an exaggerated sigh for no reason other than it felt like an exaggerated sigh was needed, he clasped his fingers around her small hand and gave it a quick but firm shake, releasing it immediately.
By the time he’d finished eating, Gino wished he’d made their deal contingent on Francesca keeping still, too.
And not humming. It was like she had music playing in her head, her slender shoulders wiggling as if in time to a beat only she could hear, no words coming out of her mouth but some kind of vaguely melodic sound broken only when she swallowed her food and wine.
The only positive he could take was that she’d now drunk two glasses of wine and would surely be ready to fall asleep at any moment.
With both their plates empty, he stacked them and carried them over to the sink. “Time for bed, Miss Marino.”
She dropped down from the stool with a salute. “I’m intrigued to see where you’re planning to sleep me, so lead the way, Mr Vicario.”
He should have made the deal contingent on her keeping quiet for the rest of the night.