16
LUCA BELLANDI
I spent the small hours drawing up rules.
The first draft read like a contract amendment. I crumpled it up. On my second attempt, I wrote down what I could commit to until the auditors delivered their report, then crossed out two conditions whose only purpose was to control Gabriela.
That left meetings with the door open, another team member accompanying us on business trips, and no interference in the independent assessment. I added that we wouldn’t kiss again until we had the results. It was the only line I had to rewrite. By the time I finished, I was due in the garden.
At seven, I found her kneeling beside one of the surviving rosebushes. She wore work pants, mud-covered boots, and a blue shirt with the sleeves rolled up. Her hair was in a loose braid.
I remembered her mouth beneath mine, the sound she’d made when I kissed her neck. I folded the sheet of paper. I wanted that night again; the rules changed nothing.
“We need to talk,” I said.
Gabriela looked up.
“Nothing good ever follows those words.”
“I want us to agree on how we’ll handle these next ten days.”
“Professionally?”
“Both.”
She took off her gloves and stood.
“I’m listening.”
“I want to wait for the report before I kiss you again.”
“Yesterday you said you’d want to kiss me today.”
“I do. I’m trying not to make your job any harder.”
Gabriela glanced at the folded paper.
“Then don’t pretend nothing happened.”
“I won’t. We can keep the door open for meetings. Take someone from the team on business trips.”
Gabriela tilted her head.
“Are you writing a rulebook to keep yourself from kissing me?”
“For ten days. Until we have the report.”
She held out her hand, and I gave her the paper. Gabriela read it through before handing it back.
She walked over to the table where the garden plans lay and picked up a pen.
“No kissing and no private meetings. Even when they’re your idea.”
I ignored the dig.
“The project comes first.”
“It always has.”
Gabriela signed a work order.
“I accept your terms.”
I should have been relieved.
“Just like that? No argument?”
“Do you want an argument?”
“No.”
“Then keep your end of the bargain. I’ll take care of mine.”
She picked up her gloves and went back to the flower beds. I stood on the stone path with the uncomfortable sense that I’d lost a negotiation I’d initiated.
At nine, Gabriela held the structural meeting with the door open. At eleven, she asked Paola to stay for a discussion about the garden. At noon, she went with Carlo to see a local supplier. I watched her leave with the folder she usually set on my desk, then forced myself back to work.
She returned at one and sat down to lunch between Paola and Adrien, who was back for a site visit. I was at another table with Sofia and two investors. I heard her laugh and lost track of the conversation.
“How are the rules working out?” Sofia asked beside me.
I turned slowly.
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“Paola asked me to sit in on the rosebush meeting because the two of you don’t want to be alone together. It wasn’t hard to work out.”
“You could have said no.”
“And miss my chance to choose the roses?”
Sofia took a sip of water.
“Gabriela seems perfectly at ease.”
“She’s working.”
“And you look ready to buy Switzerland just so you can send that young man home.”
Adrien leaned over to show Gabriela something on his phone. Their shoulders touched.
“Moreau leaves tomorrow.”
“Are you sure?”
“It’s on his schedule.”
“Of course.”
Sofia smiled down at her plate.
At two, Legal sent over the contract amendment and the agreement engaging the independent team. Gabriela and her lawyer had reviewed all three candidates and chosen a firm with no ties to the group. The assessment was due on her thirtieth day.
I read the terms: the appointed team would assess Gabriela’s work; my personal preferences could not override its professional judgment. She’d already signed. I signed too. The same email contained the formal withdrawal of her resignation and confirmation that she would stay through the assessment.
I replied, “Received and agreed.” Gabriela wrote back, “Noted.” I filed the reply with the contract, though I kept staring at the screen.
I tried to work in my private office. I read the same page four times. On the fifth, I gave up and returned to the site, ostensibly to check the schedule.
Gabriela was in the upper gallery, talking to a restorer. Light fell through the windows onto her face. She gestured as she explained a correction to the frescoes. I stopped on the floor below and watched her. This wasn’t just desire. Desire I could manage.
She brushed a strand of hair off her forehead with the back of her hand and adjusted a sample.
The restorer disagreed; before answering, she asked him to move it closer to the window.
I waited for the outcome of their small dispute as though I had a stake in it.
Then she glanced down and saw me. For a second, her professional expression slipped.
Then she turned back to the restorer. I stayed a moment longer, waiting for her to look at me again.
At ten that night, I left my office and saw a light in the project room. The door was ajar. Paola had gone home. I was about to remind Gabriela of the time when I heard her voice.
“I know, Cris. I wish I were there too.”
She stood at the window with her back to me, speaking Portuguese into her phone. I followed the conversation, knowing I should either make my presence known or leave.
“I can’t just walk away from the project. . . . No, it’s not just about the money.”
She paused, then laughed.
“You’re impossible.”
Her voice was intimate. Affectionate. The same name had come up in the call about her debts. I stayed by the door.
“I promise I’ll come back to Lisbon as soon as I can. I love you too.”
Something hard and irrational clenched in my chest. Gabriela hung up, turned, and saw me.
“How long have you been there?”
“Long enough.”
“For what?”
“Who’s Cris?”
She set her phone on the table.
“That has nothing to do with the project.”
“The one who helps you with the Lisbon office?”
“He helps with a few things.”
“And you love him.”
Gabriela raised her eyebrows.
“Were you listening to my conversation?”
“I heard you when I got here.”
“And you stayed.”
I couldn’t deny it. I took my hand off the doorframe.
“Cris is my best friend, Luca.”
I stepped inside but left the door as it was. Gabriela folded her arms.
“Is there something you want to know, or is this an interrogation?”
“His name.”
“Christofer Sampaio. We’ve been friends since we were eleven.”
“And here I am, demanding an explanation.”
“Here you are.”
Backing down didn’t make the jealousy go away. Still, I moved away from the table. Gabriela unfolded her arms.
“He was there when my father died. He helped negotiate the debts, lay off staff, and clear out the apartment. If you treat him being there for me as a threat, there won’t be room for you.”
I pictured Cris beside her at the funeral. That didn’t help.
“Understood.”
“You don’t have to like him.”
“Excellent. Because that would be impossible right now.”
Gabriela almost smiled. It was the first crack in the formality she’d maintained all day.
She picked up her folder and came toward the door. I stepped aside.
“I should have left when I realized you were on the phone.”
“You should have.”
She handed me the work order that still needed my signature. I checked the amount, signed, and gave it back. She took her time putting it away.
One end of the ribbon securing her braid had come loose. I raised my hand, stopping short of touching her. Her eyes followed the movement.
“Your ribbon’s coming out,” I explained.
“You can take it.”
I slipped it free, careful not to pull her hair. Gabriela reached behind her neck and loosened the braid. I kept my fingers closed around the ribbon.
“Until the report comes in,” she reminded me.
“I remember.”
She stepped past me and pulled the door wider.
Before leaving, she turned back.
“For the record, Cris kissed me once. We were sixteen, and it was so bad we laughed about it for a week. I’m telling you because I want to. Not because you’re entitled to an answer.”
Gabriela disappeared down the hall. My relief was out of all proportion, and I was ashamed of having needed to hear that.
A draft scattered the papers on the table. I set the ribbon beside the computer and bent to pick them up.