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“I have no idea about what makes a good olive or a bad olive. My aunt does and my father sure as hell does. I bet everyone in this villa aside from me does, but it’s me who is going to be routing a man from his position to pretend to be a manager when I know nothing about olives or farming or the business world. I’m wondering if I’m just agreeing to this job to please my father who is now showering me with the praise and love that I needed as a child.”
I nearly fainted after that massive word dump. I teetered back to fall into the grass, conscious of my vest and white shirt so as not to slide or smear grass stains into the material. I stared at the sky. So blue, so clear, not a sign of a rain cloud.
“That was…” The poor man seemed to be stunned at the verbal deluge I’d hit him with. He’d learn to carry an umbrella if he stayed with me for long. “You will learn. Your father and aunt will help you if you are confused. And the people at the office will be happy to help if you do not know a thing or two.”
“But what if I screw up things so badly that there is no coming back?” I threw my blade of grass into the air. It fluttered down to rest on my nose. Donvino gently brushed it off when I left it there.
“Are you thinking of not taking the position? If so, please let me know before I fill out the application online for the mechanic job,” he said, his finger lingering alongside my nose and then sliding down to my lips.
“No, no, I am not thinking of not taking it, I’m just having a nervous fit. I’ve never been in a position of power before. I know Lowell is flying out to be at my side during the transition and that’s a help, but what if I turn the workers against me?”
“You are too sweet to set people against you,” he whispered, his dirty fingertip moving along my lower lip.
“So says you. You’re biased because you love me,” I shot back half teasingly.
“Sì, that is true.” He leaned down to brush a kiss over my lips. All the worries drifted off with the dry, hot wind. Of course, he was right. I could do this. I was charming and well-dressed and had incredible hair as well as some highly fashionable scruff. All quite important assets of a senior manager of an olive mill.
I was so fucked.
***
That thought kept running through my head two days later when the employment contract arrived in my inbox. I lay beside my lover in his tiny bed, phone in hand, Donvino at my side sipping water to replenish the fluids he had lost fucking me into another galaxy, reading over it several times. Lowell was in transit, and I had to assume the axe had fallen on Signor Piravino. Guilt gnawed at my belly. I looked to the side, bit down on my lower lip, and waited for him to feel my stare. It didn’t take long.
“You’re anxious again?” he asked in Italian, his words slow and sleepy in this late afternoon heat. We now tended to bounce back and forth between his native tongue and mine, something that I was rather proud of. Who knew I would catch onto a foreign language so quickly? Perhaps I could do other things new to me as well if I tried? Like run a farm or sell designer steamer trunks or even be a good long-term partner.
“Guilty. Do you think we could make a run out to the mill to speak with Signor Piravino? I just want to assure him that I did not set out to take his job when I arrived on the bus.”
“Mm, well, perhaps if he had been kinder to the workers, he would not be packing his bags now?”
I sighed. The man did have a point. Still, I felt bad. Donvino glanced over at me, exhaled theatrically, and passed me the dregs of his water. “Yes, fine. We will ride out to the mill so you can speak with Piravino. I think it will be a waste of time given what the men and women who work the fields have told me, but if it will make you restful…”
“What have they told you?” I asked as he exited the bed to grab a shower. I followed, nagging at him to fill me in, but he wouldn’t say what he had been told in confidence. Damn the man and his morals.
The ride out to mill 20 was glorious as it always was. The Italian countryside was slowly embedding its beauty in my heart. Much like the people of this land. Clinging to Donvino as we roared along on his Suzuki, I let the wind blow away my concerns.
“The left.” Static. “Grapes are suffering.” Static. “Broken heart.” Static.
The man sorely needed to buy some new helmets when he was flush. Which should be soon if his application was chosen, and I suspected it would be. I may have put a word in for him with the boss, and I mean, the big boss, aka Aunt Ginerva. Even my father would admit that while he had all the titles, it was Ginerva who was in charge of everything just from behind the scenes. So yeah, I was pretty sure she would make a call to the head mechanic on my boyfriend’s behalf. I just wouldn’t pass that along to the man I was snuggled up to for a wee bit. Like, say, ten or twenty years.
We rolled past some sickly-looking vineyards, the small grapes hanging off nearly dead vines. The olive trees that we passed seemed to be doing a little better. Irrigation was being closely monitored according to the reports that I was now getting. We were doing our best to save the current crops by giving priority to the critical orchards that were most valuable. We had to weigh using water carefully by using the drip irrigators with careful planning not to compromise the seriously low Tiber where we drew our water from. According to the Bonetti experts, drip waterers were the best way to water olive trees. They were supposed to be drought resistant, so perhaps that was why they didn’t look as bad as the grape vineyards we were passing. I took all of this at face value, as what I knew about olive farming could be fit into a thimble for a pixie.
Still, I was the one being placed in charge. Even after reading the contract and seeing where I was to sign, I was still questioning my father’s wisdom. As we rode onto Bonetti land, we passed workers in the fields readying them for the harvest. They all waved and shouted greetings that I couldn’t hear over the damn exhaust on this bike, but I waved back and yelled to them. Then we pulled up to the front of the main office, dust-covered, and the smile on my face disappeared when Signor Piravino exited the brick building, his face red, the contempt undisguised now.
“Buongiorno,” I called as I slid off the back of the bike. Donvino sat on the torn seat, slowly removing his helmet, his gaze locked on the older man bearing down on us. “I was wondering if we could have a few words about—”
Piravino lunged at me. I stumbled back. Donvino moved with a speed that Hermes would envy. One moment he was seated, the next his big frame was blocking an irate Piravino from assaulting me. They scuffled about. Both were large men, but Donvino had youth and athleticism on his side. He gave the manager a stout shove that sent him back into the glass doors of the office. A duo of women inside scattered from where they had been watching, bolting out of sight.
“You dare show up here after costing me my position?!” Piravino bellowed, his tan face bright ruby, his hands in fists, and his eyes burning. “You little cocksucker.”
Donvino went for the man. I grabbed at his arm, pulling the punch that would surely cost him his new job as well as get him arrested for assault.
“No, don’t hit him. Let me talk to him,” I begged, yanking back my boyfriend’s meaty arm. A few field workers had gathered at the fence, eyes wide, as this drama played out under the blistering Tuscan sun. “Signor Piravino, please, just let me say that I had no intention of taking your job when I—”
“You are a liar. A scheming little backstabber.” He spit at my feet. Donvino growled. I held onto his arm for dear life. “You prance around like a woman in fancy clothes, making eyes at the men in the field, promising them things that they do not deserve. Then you beg for my place with your papà and he gives into you because you are nothing but a dirty son of a whore!”
“That is enough,” Donvino snarled. The workers along the fence were shouting at us, calling Piravino a fucking asshole, which, while the support was lovely, was only making the man more incensed. “You are close to losing teeth.”
“I’m not scared of you two abominations to God.” With that, he kicked dirt at us, spit at us, and then threw himself about the yard in a whirling rage that ended with him glaring at Donvino and me as if plotting how to end us. “You two are cursed souls. And cursed souls should be eradicated!”
