Too Close to the Sun (12 page)

A waiter came by. They ordered sparkling
water—his preference—and French wine—hers. A bit of a slap at him.
Small-minded, she knew, but nastily satisfying.

"How is your family?" he asked.

"A week ago I would've said fine. But then my
father had a heart attack."

"Oh, no." Vittorio's features twisted in what
looked like genuine concern. "Gabriella, I'm sorry. How is he?"

"He's still in the hospital. Better, but
weak. His heart is pumping at only half the strength of before."
That was a malady she understood, as a matter of fact. It took a
long time for a battered heart to get back to full strength. If it
ever did.

"And your family?" she asked in turn, just to
be polite, because she hadn't been too keen on Signor and Signora
Mantucci. And they had never been other than chilly to her, at
least once her romance with their son began to blossom.

Vittorio began to recite the latest Mantucci
doings. Food was ordered and presented and cleared; their
superficial chatter continued. After a time they moved on to what
was new with his family's winery, which she was curious about. She
learned that he was assuming more responsibilities as his father
aged. As was right and proper for the eldest son, who was now
settled. Now married.

Around them the crowd ebbed and flowed, the
ebbing never lasting long because this was a popular eatery with
delectable fare. Darkness fell beyond the small curtained windows,
the deep velvet darkness of the valley, where city lights couldn't
dim the firmament's sparkle.

Interestingly, the name of one person never
passed Vittorio's lips, one person who certainly loomed large in
his life. For a very long time, in fact, she'd loomed large even in
Gabby's, though the two women had never met.

Their entrees had just been cleared when
Gabby popped the question. "How's your wife?"

Vittorio nodded as if he'd known this would
come up. He leaned his elbows on their small table and linked his
long fingers, studying them with apparent fascination. His wedding
band glowed in the candlelight.

He raised his head to meet her eyes. "Chiara
is pregnant."

Gabby understood of course that Vittorio had
sex with his wife. She'd forced herself to understand that it had
even happened more than once. Certainly it hadn't been as frequent
or as wonderful as their own lovemaking—surely it was more pro
forma than that—but she'd inured herself to the fact that it had
happened, was happening, would continue to happen.

She hadn't forced herself to consider the
likelihood of a child.

Or to fully comprehend that she would not
bear the tender little creature who would inherit Vittorio's dark
long-lashed eyes or ready smile, or the soft, soft hair that stayed
curly even when it was sopping wet. But that sad truth was
stampeding across her brain now. Chiara would bear that child.

"When is she due?"

"August."

And she would bear it soon.

Gabriella didn't allow herself the indignity
of counting backwards to calculate exactly when the dastardly
impregnation had happened. It had happened—that was all that
mattered.

Vittorio was talking. "Gabriella, there's
something I want to say to you."

She looked away from him and tried to steel
herself anew. This, too, had the sound of something real, and she
was rapidly hitting her limit of real for the evening.

"I am so sorry for how I hurt you," he told
her. "Not a day goes by when I don't think of you or feel so bad
for what I did to you."

He paused for a response. She stared at their
tablecloth, stained now, not perfect and white as it had been
before.

He went on. "I should never have let it go so
far."

That hurt. She raised her eyes. "Are you
telling me you would prefer that it had never happened, Vittorio?
You'd rather take it back?" She'd never wanted that, not once. She
wouldn't give up a single morning of waking beside him, a single
thrill of seeing him after an absence, a single walk through the
vineyards holding hands. One of her self-help books told her that
meant she was truly living. She'd thrown it against the wall.

He shook his head. He looked tired—exhausted,
really—and older than he'd looked just the year before. "I don't
really want to take it back, Gabriella. But I knew there would be
problems with my parents and I didn't do anything about it. I was
too happy, I guess. I didn't want it to stop."

Their gazes locked. She saw the pain in his
eyes, mirroring her own, and for that moment was thrown back to
that savage day when she first lost him, when amid the brutal
destruction of her own world her heart had broken all over again
for
him
, for his rage and pain and frustration. She had, in
some ways, suffered for two. She had understood that he had counted
on his parents to bestow their blessing, even though he had to have
known they wouldn't. She had understood how deeply their refusal
had hurt him. She had understood how their edict that he live his
life on their terms—or else—had disillusioned him, robbed him of
the last of his youthful innocence. Maybe, if he'd been a different
man, their stubbornness would have given him the strength to marry
her.

But was that a matter of strength? She wasn't
sure. Vittorio was the man she loved precisely because he couldn't
walk away from his family. The love and loyalty that infused his
soul were what made him so dear.

"When my parents told me they wouldn't accept
you, Gabriella, you have to understand, it was like they were
saying, Vittorio, you have a choice. You can cut off your arm or
you can cut off your leg." He leaned closer, a plea in his voice.
"Do you understand?"

She hesitated. Then, "I understand you chose
them over me."

"I had to! I couldn't choose you and keep
them. And if I couldn't keep them, then you and I would never be
happy."

"Are you happy now?"

He fell back against the spine of his chair.
No
, his silence screamed.
Not really
, his dark eyes
repeated. And there her heart went all over again, there came the
tears to her eyes, there came the fragile, beautiful wish in her
soul that even without her, he would be happy.

I must love him still
, she thought,
because no matter what, I want the best for him. Even if it
doesn't include me.

"I want you to be happy, Gabriella. I want
you to find a man who loves you with all his heart. Who can do
better than me." His voice broke. "When you find him, maybe I can
forgive myself."

She rose from her chair then, unable to speak
for the tears in her throat, for the new gash across her healing
heart. She hoped that in her eyes he could read the words that
shouted in her head.
Vittorio, Vittorio, you're already
forgiven
.

He seemed to understand, because he nodded,
and didn't try to stop her when she walked out the door, for the
first time in her life leaving him behind to watch her go.

"Can you believe this?" Max asked,
grinning.

Ava had to smile as she watched her son.
Dressed in his makeshift pajamas of sweatpants and tee shirt, his
mussed dark hair haloed by the morning rays streaming through the
kitchen windows, he wore a look of satisfaction few
Wine
World
reviews had ever provided any Winsted.

"The 1999 Suncrest Cabernet Sauvignon," he
read, "serves up dazzling layers of tightly focused currant, anise,
and blackberry. Excellent structure, remarkable focus, richly
elegant. An extraordinary effort." Max slapped the magazine and let
out a whoop. "You can say that again!"

Ava arched a brow, leaning her robed back
against the long granite-topped center island. "Are you taking
credit for the winemaking now?"

"Nope. But I am taking credit for this
review." And he gave her that lopsided grin again, like a
mischievous imp daring her to contradict him.

But she couldn't. Not this time. Ava's
slippered feet padded over to the stovetop as the teakettle began
to whistle. How could Max's "schmoozing"—as he put it—not be
credited for this best-ever
Wine World
review? A 94, Joseph
Wagner had given the 1999 cab. In Porter's day, Wagner had never
rated a Suncrest vintage above 90. Was it coincidence that this A+
score followed Max's hosting of the Pebble Beach jaunt? Who could
be so naive?

Perhaps it was true that Max would never be
the vintner his father was. Still, he might be effective in his own
way. And wasn't that as much as she could hope for?

Ava poured boiling water into her
tempered-glass coffeepot from France, freshly ground Sumatran beans
already inside. She didn't like electric coffeepots—they were
gauche somehow, besides which they cluttered the counter.
European-style coffeemaking better suited her sensibilities, as did
the high-tech German oven and the handcrafted white cabinetry it
had taken a team of woodworkers two months to complete.

"You know, Mom, I've been tossing around
another idea I'd like to run past you." Max hoisted himself atop a
black leather-covered stool at the island's curved far end. "I'm
thinking of hiring consultants. Just to get another perspective on
where Suncrest is and where it's going. I could use a thought
partner on some marketing ideas I've been playing with, for
example."

Ava laid a sourdough loaf on the wooden
cutting board and sliced off a few pieces, then poked them into the
toaster. This was both to speed breakfast and to give her time to
think.

How sage he sounds
, she thought,
how very sensible!
Another "perspective"? A "thought
partner"? And he actually wanted to run these notions past her
first? This was certainly a change. Max's traditional mode of
operation was to go off half-cocked. It had been some time since
Ava had enjoyed a swell of maternal pride, but she was starting to
feel positively buoyant now.

She pulled a few jars of fruit preserves from
the Sub-Zero. "That's an expensive proposition, though, isn't
it?"

Max abandoned his stool to fetch plates,
knives, and napkins, another departure from the
I'll sit here,
you serve me
Max of old. "It is, but it can more than pay for
itself. And I'm not planning on using them for long." He pulled two
Italian ceramic mugs from the glass-fronted cabinets. "I won't do
it unless you're in favor, Mom. I know we need to keep costs in
check."

"I'm not against it," she heard herself
say.

"Good." He bussed her on the cheek, smiling,
then proceeded to boil more water for oatmeal and to chop dried
cherries to mix in. By himself. Briefly Ava thought that another
mother might have been more gratified if her offspring had begun to
perform these tasks at age twelve, but she was thrilled to witness
them even at twenty-five. There had been many a day when the
teenaged Max had made such heavy use of Mrs. Finchley that Ava had
feared the housekeeper would flee in high dudgeon to her native
Bristol.

Max flipped on the TV—but not before a "Do
you mind?"—and ate his breakfast alongside Ava without once
swearing at the news anchors. Then he carried every single plate,
mug, and piece of cutlery to the sink—hers included. He didn't
actually load them into the dishwasher, but he did rinse them, then
straightened the dishtowel that hung from a hook near the oven.

Then, "I'm going to shower," he declared, and
half jogged out of the kitchen as if the day's business were too
important to delay. Ava watched, wondering if it was all an act and
fearing it might well be.

But perhaps it wasn't. She felt an
uncharacteristic wash of hope where her son was concerned. For a
moment she could actually envision a sparkling future in which Max
was a reliable and considerate son who managed Suncrest with an
able hand. Then she could enjoy life with an unencumbered heart.
True, without Porter. But perhaps with Jean-Luc.

Thinking of him made her smile. Maybe she
could swing a quick trip to Paris. Jean-Luc had been virtually
begging. And though she hated Paris in summer—it was crawling with
tourists and the heat positively radiated—he had suggested they
decamp to the countryside, where, it was true, the high temperature
was far more tolerable.

Amid those pleasant thoughts, Ava was about
to embark on her daily run when she saw Gabriella's mud-caked Jeep
pull into the small parking lot behind the barrel-aging building.
Ava waved a hand in the air to motion the girl closer.

She arrived at a trot, dirt-smeared as usual.
"Good morning, Mrs. W."

"Good morning, Gabriella. Have you seen the
Wine World
review?"

"I did!" The brows behind the trendy
violet-lensed sunglasses shot up in obvious surprise. "I'm going to
show it to my father. He'll be thrilled."

"Good, that's what I wanted to make sure of."
Though privately Ava believed Max had much more to do with the
review than Cosimo DeLuca—winemaker though he might be—she had
learned in her Hollywood days that a wise woman shared credit. "How
is your father doing at home?"

"Champing at the bit."

"Well, you can tell him that I believe
Suncrest's future has never been brighter. Exciting new things are
in store for this winery. He has that to took forward to."

"Excuse me?" Suddenly Gabriella was leaning
forward, all intensity. ''What exciting new things? Is something
happening to Suncrest?"

Ava frowned. "Whatever do you mean?"

She looked flustered. "I mean . . ." Her
mouth slammed shut. Then, tentatively, "Are there any changes in
the offing that perhaps I should know about?"

What is this girl going on about?
Then
Ava had a revelation, one she found quite disturbing. Could Will
Henley have told Gabriella about the offer? Of course Ava had taken
note of the attraction between those two at the hospital—it was
almost embarrassingly palpable—but she'd never imagined that a man
in his position would divulge such sensitive confidential
information. Certainly not to a woman in whom his interest could
only be sexual.