“There was a young maid who worked for the prince’s family. She showed me the herb. Made me pay a forfeit for some silliness or other by eating a leaf. I put it on my tongue, and I immediately knew it was something I’d never tasted before. At first I thought it strange. But I couldn’t get that taste out of my mind.”
Isabella nodded. Everyone was the same, instantly in love with the magic.
“So the next time I was on the grounds, I went to that hill again and picked some of the herb, took it home and tried it in some recipes.” He snapped his fingers in the air. “Instant success. Everyone loved it.”
How exciting that must have been for him. She smiled, loving him. Growing up without a mother, she’d always felt extra close to her father. His happiness was hers, sometimes too much so.
“Did they have a lot of parties in those days?” she asked, curious to know everything she could about Max’s upbringing.
“Yes. Whole caravans of people would come from Rome or from Naples and stay a week.”
She shook her head with wonder. “Why don’t I remember any of this?”
“These things ended when you were a young child.” Luca sighed. “After Prince Bartholomew’s beautiful wife killed herself, the parties never resumed. In fact, he began to spend all his time in Rome after that.”
“Killed herself!” She sat up straighter and stared at her father. He had to be talking about Max’s mother. An icy hand gripped her heart. “What happened?”
“I don’t know the details. They said she jumped from a balcony.” He shook his head. “Poor thing. She was a film star, you know. She worked with Fellini and Antonioni. She was quite good. It was a tragedy.”
What a series of tragedies in Max’s family if all these stories were true. First his mother commited suicide, then his young wife drowned. And what about his own accident, the one that had done such damage to his face? She still didn’t have the details on that.
It was no wonder he had troubled eyes as they rode across his estate lands. He’d come by them naturally, it seemed. She looked over at him now and found him looking back at her.
“Just a little further,” he called to her from the back of his horse.
She nodded. “Your grounds are so beautiful. You should do something with them.”
He looked out over his hills. “You think so? What do you suggest?”
She wanted to throw out her arms to encompass it all. “I don’t know. You should share this with the world. Maybe put in a hotel, a spa, a destination resort.”
He turned to look at her again, grinning. “Isabella, what a middle-class mind you have. Must everything make you money?”
“No, but…”
She flushed, realizing he was teasing her, and she dropped her defensiveness and returned to a light-hearted mode.
“Hey, it’s the money-making middle class that makes the economy hum for everyone,” she reminded him. “Let’s have none of your upper-class arrogance.”
“The idle rich,” he muttered dismissively.
“Exactly.”
But she was laughing.
“You think I’m lazy, don’t you?” he said, as though it was a revelation to him.
“Not at all. I just think you don’t have an eye out for profit. The spice of life.”
He shook his head. His eyes were warm. For the moment, his troubled look had faded. “Tell me this, Isabella,” he said. “You’ve said your restaurant was in trouble because you couldn’t get the best ingredients. Is this going to make that big a difference? Will all be well now?”
She hesitated, tempted to fudge the truth a little. This was such a subject of frustration for her. But when she looked at his face, she knew she could never be less than frank with him.
“No,” she said simply. “All will not be well. My father is a wonderful man and a good cook, but he can’t run a business to save his life. We are in big trouble financially, and in all sorts of other ways. I’m not sure we’ll last much longer no matter how much good food we cook up.”
He nodded. From what she’d told him and a few things he’d heard from Renzo, he’d had a feeling that was the case.
“Maybe your father should let you take the reins,” he said dryly. “You are the one who seems to have a passion for business.”
That brought her up short, but she realized, very quickly, that he had a point. She had the instincts, though not the training. If only Luca would give her a chance…
“So what could I do to make a profit?” he asked her. “Besides turning my ancestral estate into a…what did you call it? A destination resort.” He gave her a mock glare. “Something, by the way, that I would never do.”
She took his question quite seriously. “Well, to begin with, you could renovate your vineyards. How about that? Wine sells very well these days.”
He was laughing at her. It was obvious he wasn’t taking this as seriously as she was. “Isabella, Isabella, what about the nobility of the grape?”
She made a face. “Nobility is a pose,” she said. “Something that looks nice for special occasions, but is shed in a moment when it’s no longer working for you.”
He threw back his head and laughed aloud. “I can see you have big plans for me. What in particular?”
“I was thinking after seeing your abandoned vineyard…” She hesitated. Did she really want to tell him her thoughts? But why not? If not now, when?
“Well, you could hire my friend Giancarlo. The way some people restore businesses that have been run badly, he restores vineyards. I’m sure he can get you up and running in no time.”
He gazed at her as though he wasn’t sure just how seriously to take what she was saying. “So I can sell my grapes?”
“Why not? Or how about your own winery? With a tasting room? Then you could run tours from the village. People love to tour wineries. A little wine tasting, a small bistro on the premises…”
He was laughing at her but she didn’t care. “You could run my restaurant,” he said with a grin.
“Thank you.” She made a pretend curtsy from the saddle. “I’d love to.”
What a great idea. She fairly shivered with excitement over it. To think of running a restaurant for Max! Of making the special sauce for tourists who would come from far and wide…
But she quickly brought herself back down to earth. It was a pipe dream and she knew it. He refused to come face-to-face with strangers. He wouldn’t even let vineyard workers on his land. How could he stand to have tourists? It wasn’t going to happen.
They crested another hill and there below them was the field where the basil grew. She leaned forward in the saddle and sighed with relief. She’d had a dream during the night that she’d arrived here only to find the earth scorched and not a plant in sight. At least that hadn’t happened.
But that dream had cast a pall on her morning. She’d thought of it with dread as she was preparing the picnic lunch to take with her. Was it a sign? Should she be prepared for the worst?
Susa