diciotto
Now pacing the apartment with Francesco’s phone in hand, Lucia was unable to calm her nerves. ‘Do we tell him it’s the mask?’
‘Well, by rights, if Nicolò really is the one , he should know that already. Don’t say anything.’ Francesco ran his hand down the length of Foscari’s spine to placate him, but the dog continued to squirm in excitement.
‘Yes. I guess so.’ Lucia’s green eyes darted across her apartment restlessly, not settling on anything in particular.
‘Ask him when he will next be in Venice. From there, decide your next move,’ Francesco suggested.
Lucia typed one-handed, re-read her response, then hit send .
After a tense wait, a response arrived. Lucia read out: ‘ Friday 7 March. My father’s birthday weekend .’
‘ Perfetto !’ Francesco stood and propped Foscari at the top of his makeshift grammar-book staircase. ‘This gives you time to chase up Claudio. To eat pasta, play tennis, whatever. And then either cancel Nicolò, or arrange a meeting.’
With a confident nod, Lucia agreed. ‘ D’accordo .’ There was something so incredibly powerful about that kiss. She felt she owed it to herself to know the man behind the lips.
‘Have you eaten?’ Francesco was now peering into the fridge at the covered tray Mariella had left her.
Hopping down his stairs, Foscari danced circles around Francesco’s feet, hoping he might be gifted a morsel.
‘Olivia gave me a bowl of zuppa . But I could still eat.’
Withdrawing the tray, he peered under the aluminium foil cover. ‘ Cotolette .’
Lucia’s eyes softened. ‘Hard to believe just a few hours ago we weren’t speaking.’
‘I know . . . Will you be ok tonight? I can stay if you need me to.’
‘ Grazie , but go. We’ll be fine here.’
‘ Va bene . But I’m taking one of these for the road.’ He pinched a golden crumbed cotoletta from the tray, and dropped a kiss to her forehead, missing the bandage. ‘And I really am sorry.’
Lucia stood by the stove where she had popped the tray of cotolette . She cut one for Foscari and dropped the little cubes of crumbed veal into his bowl by the en suite door. His tail wagged contentedly as he devoured every last trace.
Lucia didn’t bother with a plate or fork, instead eating the cutlets cold and whole with her fingers until she felt sated.
Just as she bent down to check on Foscari’s meal-time situation, she felt something hard in her jeans pocket. Fishing it out, she saw that it was Benedetta’s business card.
Lucia sighed, remembering she hadn’t yet brought up the book deal offer with Francesco.
Tiziano had promised her €100,000 if the ball turned a profit. She had a preapproved loan for €50,000. That left her with seventy-three days to find the remaining €30,000 she would need. Benedetta’s offer was still completely unthinkable, even if it meant securing the school. She shook her head and added the business card to the pile of paperwork on her desk. She would tell Francesco about it tomorrow.
Suddenly, Foscari turned sharply and tilted his head, cocking one silken ear in the direction of the calle -facing window. He yapped, listened again, then yapped more fervently.
Lucia watched him bolt to his little staircase and trot to the window seat. Pressing his wet nose to the glass, his yaps morphed into barks.
‘ Cosa c’è, amorino ?’
Lucia pulled the sheer Burano lace from the window, and the sight of the illuminated windows directly across from hers made her stomach churn. Then, the lights went out, and Lucia’s lungs seemed to seize in her chest. She couldn’t look away.
Dropping a hand to catch Foscari’s chin, she whispered, ‘ Bravo , Foscari. Bravo .’
His tail wagged and he dropped his little bottom to the seat, leaning into her warm and comforting pats.
Lucia suddenly bent forward. La Commedia’s main door had opened.
‘ Ma no !’ she breathed, and moved closer to the glass. It was the sight of a leather-gloved grip catching La Commedia’s door that had caught her attention.
An intense curiosity ran through her.
‘Stay here!’ she called to Foscari.
Lucia wrenched open the tight front door and burst onto Calle del Leone.
The gelid night air caught in the back of her throat. It was so jarring that Lucia felt as if she had been disrobed and thrust onto the street as a sacrifice to the winter.
Catching her breath she looked up, but the door to La Commedia was closed once again.
What? How did I miss him? That was twenty seconds, at most!
She scurried to the door and gave the brass knocker a solid clap. But the only acknowledgement she received was the reverberating echo of her futile attempts from within.
Peering down the calle to her right she saw no one. To her left was just dark empty space over the bridge and across the water. She let out a frustrated sigh, and it bounced off La Commedia’s crumbling facade.
She turned to look up at the third floor of her own apartment, and there, by the window, she could just make out the top of Foscari’s head bobbing up and down. His yips and yaps were muffled by the glass, but still audible to her trained ear.
What could she do?
She wanted to take hold of something. To grip and sink her fingers into something material. Something real. But in this moment, nothing felt real at all. Everything was fleeting and conditional. Her life was suspended between potential and possibility, for better or worse.
Her evening with Francesco had been a welcome distraction, but now, alone in the dark, cold calle , she remained the victim of the cruellest kind of limbo.
The unknown of all the events throwing her life into chaos.
She trudged back to La Scuola Rosa’s door. Running her fingers over the glossy paintwork, she eventually allowed her forehead to rest against it, careful to avoid her bandage.
When is the universe going to give me a brea—
‘Locked out?’ came a voice from behind her.
Lucia turned, surprised to find a man, likely in his mid-thirties, standing by La Commedia’s door. He was dressed properly for the weather in a long tailored coat, flat cap and leather gloves, and was holding a small food parcel. Even with his coat on, Lucia could make out the defined lines of his torso; broad strong shoulders gave way to a narrower middle.
She stood up a little straighter. ‘It’s you, isn’t it?’ she asked, stepping forward with wide eyes.
‘ You who?’
‘The man. The person.’ She took another step, noticing the cinnamon tint to his brown eyes. She swallowed.
‘I am both a man and a person.’ Locks of his wavy chestnut hair peeked out from the side of his hat as he adjusted it.
‘The person who’s been in . . . in there.’ She indicated the building behind him.
The man looked up at La Commedia. ‘Well, considering that this is where I live—’
‘Live?’ Lucia asked, looking up at the broken downpipes, green waterlines, and cracked windows. ‘But it’s falling apart.’
‘That’s a bit harsh.’
‘What are you doing here?’
The man’s brows pinched together. ‘I was hungry, so I left to get some breakfast. And now,’ he pointed to the locked door, ‘I’m coming home.’
‘You mean dinner? It’s after ten.’
‘That’s my business.’
Despite herself, Lucia huffed. ‘ Your business? What happens in the back calli of Venice is everyone’s business. And what happens across from my home and my school is absolutely my business.’
The man let his gaze rest on her. ‘You don’t get out much, do you?’
‘Excuse me?’ Who was this stranger to probe her like that? So sarcastic and childish. ‘ My life is—’
‘None of my business?’ He pressed a melodramatic hand to his chest and winked at her. ‘Funny that. Goes both ways.’
Lucia frowned in exasperation. His eyes really were a beautiful colour.
Ugh. Why must he be so handsome!
Lucia noted how his accent seemed slightly askew. It was Venetian, yes. But there was something pulling down his vowels that she just couldn’t place. Her trained language teacher ear had heard it immediately. For the moment, she put this curiosity aside.
‘Whatever it is you’re doing in there,’ she pointed up to the windows, ‘is of great concern to me.’
His eyes widened disingenuously. ‘Why?’
Stone-faced, she asked, ‘Are you working for Vittorio Gatti?’
His brow furrowed. ‘I don’t know who that is.’
She swallowed past the anxious lump that had balled itself in her throat. ‘Do you work for one of the papers? Are you a journalist?’
‘What papers?’ His head dropped slightly to the left, as if to size her up more cautiously. ‘Am I breaking any laws?’
Back up a bit now, Lucia. Take a breath. Just hear him out.
‘Am I doing anyone any harm? Am I leaving a mess? Causing noise pollution?’
Lucia fumbled for words. ‘ No . . . but . . .’
‘ Fantastico !’ His face exuded the glow of moral victory. ‘Then, I’ll take my “literally last of the day” wilting cornetti upstairs, and get on with my life. Ok? And you can get on with the rest of yours.’ He withdrew a long ornate key from his pocket, turned it in the lock, and opened La Commedia’s door just enough so that he could dip behind it.
As he was about to pull it closed, Lucia lurched forward, shoulders tensed. ‘ Aspetta ! I didn’t catch your name. To introduce myself properly.’
‘Because I didn’t give it to you.’
Lucia’s jaw clenched. ‘I’ve been keeping an eye on you. And I’ll continue to do so, you know.’
His perfectly chiselled chin, dotted with stubble, poked through the door’s opening. ‘You assume I haven’t been doing the same. Buonanotte .’
He shut the door, and Lucia heard him deadlock it from the inside.
She let out an exasperated groan.
Not a reporter. Not working for Gatti. Just the next best thing: a sarcastic but very good-looking man-child.
Shaking her head, she practically dragged her feet across the pavers back to her side of Calle del Leone. Stopping in the doorway of the school, she cast her eyes to the ink-blotted night sky. ‘If anyone up there is listening, I’d like that ,’ she gestured to La Commedia’s illuminated windows, ‘taken care of, please.’