“Race? What race?”
Nick stuck his hands in his jeans pockets. “The Palio.” At her blank look, he added, “It’s a horse race, but it’s more than a horse race…it’s a way of life. A way of belonging to the city.”
Faith couldn’t imagine what he was talking about, then remembered Leonardo talking about some horse race.
“A family tradition,” he ended lamely. “We all come over, sometimes in July, usually in August. Lou will be over in August and my parents will be, too.”
Nick was interested in horses? Lou was interested in horses? As far as Faith knew, Lou was interested in money, clothes and bullying Nick, their father and any man within a ten-mile radius into doing what she wanted. “I…see.”
“I just came over earlier than I would have anyway.”
Great, Faith thought as new humiliation washed over her. Nick had slept with her because he’d been drunk and thought she was someone else, and she’d made this big deal out of it. He’d come over to Siena because he came over every year around this time anyway, and she’d made a big deal out of that, too. She was suddenly reminded all over again why she loved math so much.
Numbers weren’t people.
“Listen, Faith—” Nick began, two red spots of color on his high cheekbones.
“No, you listen to me.” Faith had never wanted anything in her life as badly as she wanted to get away from Nick.
Not even getting out of Sophie, Indiana and then getting her PhD had evoked the same yearning in her.
She’d longed for Nick for almost a year, knowing she could never have him. In comparison, getting out of Sophie and getting her PhD had been a piece of cake.
And then she’d landed Nick, briefly and humiliatingly, and all she could think of was how much she longed to toss him back.
She backed away. “Look, I’m tired and stressed, and hungry and thirsty and dirty. I need to get back to—” She broke off as Nick took her arm and marched her down the street. “You’re hurting me,” she said icily.
“I’m not hurting you,” he snapped. “Believe me, if I wanted to hurt you, by God you’d know it.”
Faith rolled her eyes. “If I’m going to be kidnapped, can I at least know where you’re taking me?”
“To eat.” She could actually hear Nick’s teeth grinding. “Not that you deserve being taken care of, or having someone worry about you. God forbid someone care that you look like you’re about ready to faint.” His features were hard, tense.
He was angry. Fine, Faith thought, as she stared blindly at the gorgeous shop windows. Fine. Let him be angry. She was angry, too.
Nick dug his fingers into her elbow and started limping fast. She had no choice. Thoughts and stomach churning, Faith walked with him, staring blindly at the street scene. Faith didn’t want to look at him, so she looked around and her heart simply melted as she finally saw what she’d been looking at.
The world had turned red-gold while she’d been in the Questura. The light was so intense she had to squint her eyes against the crimson sun shedding its dying rays over…perfection.
There was no other word for it. Deep red brick buildings, which were probably golden at high noon, rose straight and high from the cobblestone street. She could hardly take all the gorgeousness in all at once. Marble and stucco casements, wrought iron balconies, friendly green shutters. Swallows wheeled and cried overhead in the dying light.
It was like some impossible film set.
Music, she thought. We need some music… And sure enough, the sounds of someone practicing a piano concerto drifted down from an open window.
Faith stood taking it in, too overwhelmed to think beyond the moment, too tired to move in any direction. Too tired to react when Nick took her arm again.
She just stood there, soaking up the glow, Nick’s tall, broad figure as much a part of the scenery as the earth-colored buildings, the oleander bushes in big terracotta pots with molded angels on the side, the pewter-colored cobblestones and the shafts of bronze sunlight with gilded dust motes dancing in the air.
Faith closed her eyes and savored the gentle evening breeze. Even her eyelids turned golden on the inside. For a moment, she felt an elemental connection with everything—the hand-made cobbles, the warm wind on her cheeks, the glow of the sun so strong it almost had weight. The hard, warm hand at her elbow.
For an instant, she imagined herself one of the swallows wheeling overhead. Imagined the freedom, whirling and banking over this lovely city…
“Come on,” Nick said. “Let’s go.”
And just like that, she snapped back to reality. Back to a foreign country, back to the thought of a dead man someone she knew had killed, back to her deepest humiliation.
Nick had come for her because he felt guilty.
Sweet Nick.
He was incredibly tough on the ice, slashing and hacking his way through his opponents at thirty-five miles an hour, slicing over the ice like a fury. A ruthless and canny adversary, he had what the sports reporters called simply “the edge”. That extra something that men who went into war and survived had.
Off the ice, he was a perfectly normal man, if you didn’t count the fact that the many years spent playing hockey to the exclusion of anything else besides chasing skirts had left him a little…uninformed.
He was larger and stronger and tougher than most men, but he was a real softie when it came to his family. Lou and his mother rode roughshod over him. Even his father could get him to do anything.
And somehow she’d fallen into the category of family for him. All those evenings out with Lou and Nick and Rossi friends, tagging along in the background, watching Nick with the hockey groupie du jour, had turned her into wallpaper.
Rossi wallpaper.
So much in the background that, for Nick, she’d somehow become a female family member who needed looking after.
Nick was loyal to his family. Of course he’d be appalled at what he’d done. Which was only fair, since Faith was appalled at what she’d done.
Not that she hadn’t enjoyed it.
She pulled away and started walking. She didn’t even know in which direction she was supposed to go, but anywhere away from Nick sounded good.
He hobbled along beside her and she stepped up the pace.
Nick grabbed her elbow again in an unshakable grip. “Hold on. I can’t keep up,” he gritted, and Faith felt guilty.
She also felt angry and sad and lost, but right now guilty prevailed. With a huge sigh, she slowed her pace and he dropped his hand.
“I didn’t know where I was going anyway,” she confessed.
“Doesn’t make any difference. You just follow the road. All the streets lead to where we’re going.”
Faith blinked, momentarily diverted from her misery. All the streets lead to where we’re going. It was an interesting topological concept. Were they on a Moebius strip?
Faith matched her pace to Nick’s as they turned left into a busier street. Nick was slow, too slow. He’d always had some injury or another in the year she’d known him. He’d shown up splinted, bandaged or strapped up so often she’d lost count.
But he was also a fast healer and, once the cast or the bandage came off, he was as good as new. If he was still limping, maybe something was seriously wrong.
She stopped herself from fretting. She didn’t want to wonder and she didn’t want to worry about him. To hell with him. She moved off.
“Hold it.” Nick pulled her to a stop and Faith glanced at him in surprise.
They were on what seemed to pass for a main street in Siena, though there weren’t any cars.
There had been no cars at all, she realized. They’d meandered down a narrow, cobble-stoned street filled with people and plants, the loudest sound that of kids playing street ball, then had turned left onto this broader street with gorgeous shops, cool and secret courtyards, mysterious ten-foot high wooden doors like the entrance to heaven.
Nick had stopped her at the corner of wh
at looked like a dark alley angling off down to the right.
“Close your eyes,” he ordered, and Faith stepped back.
“Nick,” she murmured warily.
But Nick looked perfectly normal, not crazed with lust, and certainly not drunk.
“Close them. It’s a surprise.”
In spite of all that had happened, somewhere deep inside she trusted him. She closed her eyes and felt Nick’s warm, large hand clasp hers. He tugged and she stiffened.
“Come on,” he said coaxingly. “I’m not going to let anything happen to you.”
You already did, Faith thought, and stepped haltingly forward.
He turned them right, into the dark alleyway. The golden light seeping through her eyelids vanished and the air was noticeably cooler. Unexpectedly, the cobblestones beneath her feet slanted and she lost her footing for a moment.
“Steady there,” Nick said and put an arm around her for a moment. She hated the unstoppable thrill that shot through her heart at his touch, and straightened away from him.
The road angled downward in broad shallow steps and they walked in silence. After a minute or two, she obeyed Nick’s tug on her waist and stopped.
“Okay now,” he said, his voice serious. His hand dropped away. “You can look. And be prepared.”
Prepared for what? Puzzled, Faith opened her eyes and stared. And stared.
The alleyway was steep and narrow and dark, with high walls rising on either side, and at the end of the alleyway…
Like a painting, she thought, dazzled. Framed by the walls of the alleyway, the cobblestones and the cobalt blue sky overhead.
She moved slowly forward and the vista opened up more magically with each step. The square was bathed in intense light, the contrast with the dark alleyway making the colors even more vivid.
The square was shell-shaped, the exact shape it would have if God were to hold it in his cupped hands. It was made of rose-red brick, as were the buildings ringing it.
Circling the piazza was a ring of tawny earth, like a ring of gold. People were walking along it. Every once in a while, someone would stoop and gather a handful, as of gold dust.
It seemed impossible that such a large space could be so seamlessly beautiful, that there could be a place in the world where nothing was ugly or unsightly.
After a moment or two, Faith realized she’d stopped breathing. She sucked in warm, golden air and let it slowly out. Her breath hitched.
“Yeah.”
Faith turned. Impossibly, she’d even forgotten Nick’s presence beside her. “It’s, it’s…” She shook her head sharply, as if to loosen words up, but none came.
“Yeah.” The corner of Nick’s mouth went up in a half smile. His eyes lifted over her head to the square beyond. “I’ve seen it every year of my life and it still makes an impact. It’s in every Sienese’s blood. It’s the center of the city and the center of their lives. Come on in.”
She didn’t need his hand at her back to move forward. The square beckoned like Oz.
Nick would have smiled at Faith’s amazement if he hadn’t felt so bad.
He’d been showing the Piazza del Campo off all his life and it always gave him a lift, particularly the view from the alleyway they were on, the Chiasso del Bargello. The view of the piazza had to be seen to be believed. For most Americans, it was right off the radar.
He was grateful Faith’s astonishment made her forget she was mad at him. He hated seeing that get-out-of-my-sight expression on her face. It was only now that things had changed that he realized how much he craved her looking at him with her usual…what? Approval? Admiration? This past year he’d gotten used to having her around. She was funny, smart, easy to be with. They joked a lot and she was great company. He wanted things back the way they were. Damn it, he wanted her back the way she was.
Well, he was the one who had made this mess, so he was the one who was going to have to clean it up. Starting now.
The cobblestones were a little uneven and Faith wasn’t able to watch her feet because what she was seeing was so fascinating. She kept swiveling her head around on that long, slim neck of hers and stumbling over her own feet.
Nick gently took her upper arm and steered her down into the square and onto the terra, the dirt made of ground tufa stone that comprised the track for the Palio. When the horses weren’t running trial heats, the track was filled with people and tables and chairs from the bars and restaurants ringing the piazza.
Her mouth was open and her eyes were slightly glazed and she didn’t even notice he was holding on to her.
“This is neutral territory,” he said, and she shifted those large brandy-colored eyes to look at him. “This square belongs to all of Siena, but the rest…” He grinned. “The rest of Siena belongs to its contradas.”
Faith frowned. “Contradas?”
“Yup. Neighborhoods, though there’s nothing neighborly about the way they feel about each other. Seventeen of them and each one is as individual as a fingerprint. Ornery, too. You see those flags waving from the flag-holders?”
She nodded.
“Each contrada has its own symbol. A couple of hundred years back, they’d have killed for those symbols. And they’ll still shed blood over them come Palio time. The contradas include the She-Wolf, the Giraffe, the Owl, and the Dragon. The Rossis belong to the Snail.”
“You guys should’ve been the Panthers,” she murmured.
“God forbid,” Nick shuddered. “They’re north of us. We hate them, of course, and they hate us. But we particularly hate the Turtles. We’d rather lose the race than see the Turtles win. We’ve been rivals for seven hundred years.”
Her face shut down, smooth as a doll’s. “My parents are from Belfast. We took a visit back to the old country when I was fifteen. Technically, there’s peace, but…” She shrugged tensely. “They have hatreds that last for hundreds of years, too.”
“Nah, it’s not like that here. Sure, the rivalry gets a little…heated at times—” And the blood could flow, Nick thought with an inward smile, and often did. But it usually got mopped up quickly and forgiven over a glass of wine. “Once the Palio’s over, there’s this huge victory dinner in the streets of the winning contrada and life goes right back to normal. Speaking of dinner, here we are.”
They’d circled the square and plunged into another narrow street that angled upwards this time.
Ten yards up the steep incline, a large, gray, stone archway set into the wall led into a square courtyard with geraniums banked in terracotta pots around the perimeter. Tables were set out in the courtyard. It was early for the Sienese and nearly all the tables were still free. In an hour’s time, the place would be jumping.
“Niccolò! Mascalzone!” a burly man shouted and rushed toward them. He pounded Nick on the back. “Good to see you, you rascal, you! Still killing them on the ice?”
“Tullio.” Some of the pleasure Nick felt at seeing his old friend faded. He pounded back, because it was expected, and tried not to think about never being on the ice again.
Tullio had a broad grin. “You’re here early. You going to help your cousins Michelangelo and Dante whip Turtle butt?” Tullio leaned close and Nick got a tantalizing whiff of garlic, truffles and Brunello wine. “We’re going to show those fucking Turtles what’s what, aren’t we?”
Technically, Tullio was a Dragon and a potential rival, but the Dragons were the sworn enemies of the Turtles, too, and on the theory that your enemy’s enemy was your friend, the Dragon and the Snail were allies. Sort of. This year.
“I don’t think Michelangelo needs my help,” Nick said. “And Dante’s staying out of it, of course.” Mike was the capitano del popolo, the leader, of the Snail contrada. For the purposes of the Palio, the capitani del popolo were the commanders-in-chief.
Tullio knew perfectly well that a police commissario shouldn’t be involved in the mostly illegal wheeling and dealing that went into trying to secure a victory for your contrada. Tullio also kne
w that Dante was happily involved up to his neck. Their eyes met and slid away in perfect understanding.
“And who is this lovely young lady?” Tullio boomed as he turned to Faith. “Bella ragazza. Much too good for you, Nick.” Tullio frowned, taking in Faith’s pallor and the bruised-looking skin under her eyes.
He stretched out a beefy arm to indicate the way and bustled behind them. He sat them, with enormous fuss and bother, in a small out-of-the-way table in the courtyard where they would still have privacy even when other diners started trooping in.
Then he and Nick started haggling over the meal, serious as judges.
It was only when Nick was assured that the panzanella was made with the freshest of spring onions, the crispiest of cucumbers, the greenest of tomatoes—nostrane, the lumpy but savory local variety—and the purest virgin olive oil, made only from trees on the south side of Monte Cercina; that Faith’s fish antipasto was made with seafood so fresh it was practically still swimming; that the vitello tonnato was made according to Artusi’s nineteenth-century canon; the mayonnaise made by hand by his sainted mother a quarter of an hour ago and the salad plucked from his own garden that very morning, did Nick sit back, satisfied.
“Now,” Tullio said with a gleam in his eye. “The wine.”
Nick and Tullio put their heads together again. In the end, Tullio disappeared and came back with a wisp of cobweb clinging to his cheek and a bottle of 1992 Poggio Antico white from his own special reserve. He poured a golden finger into the crystal glass and waited with a smug smile.
Nick sipped and closed his eyes as every cell in his battered body signaled acute pleasure. Tullio poured half a glass for Faith and she, too, closed her eyes in pleasure after the first sip.
A call came from inside the restaurant. “Vengo!” Tullio bellowed, and hurried off.
“Sorry to take the ordering out of your hands, Faith,” Nick said as he topped their glasses. “But I thought it might be easier that way. Tullio takes pleasure in setting a fine table. I wouldn’t cheat him out of fussing over the food. It’s the way things are done here, and this way he got to describe every dish.”