Page 48 of Far from Home
Carefully scrutinising the doorway for spiders’ webs or anything else that might look sinister, Amy stepped in alongside him, instinctively grabbing his arm with both of her hands for protection. At first, she couldn’t make sense of what she was seeing. The light bulb hanging from the ceiling didn’t give much light and all she could see until her eyes accommodated were loads of little spots in front of her eyes. It took a moment or two before she realised that what she was looking at were shelves filled with bottles of wine on their sides, and the little spots she could see were in fact the tops of the bottles facing her. She did a very quick count and gave up trying after reaching two hundred. Suddenly conscious that she was still hanging onto Adam’s arm – or more precisely his strong biceps – she released her grip on him and stepped over to investigate.
She glanced back at him. ‘Are these bottles of Signor Montalcino’s wine?’
He shook his head. ‘No, I don’t think so. All the bottles are corked. This is big-name stuff. Try checking some of the labels.’
She did as instructed and was soon feeling overwhelmed at the range and quality of the wines down here. There was everything from twenty-year-old Barolo to fine wines from Bordeaux, Rioja and even Austria, Premier Cru Meursault, Chablis and Sancerre and a whole shelf devoted to vintage champagnes. She turned back to Adam in amazement.
‘Wow, there must be a fortune in wine here.’
‘You can say that again. Like I told you, he knew his wines.’ He caught her eye. ‘His legacy to you just gets more and more impressive, doesn’t it?’
She was feeling quite emotional by this stage so she just waved in the general direction of the bottles and asked, ‘Red or white? Let’s open one tonight and toast him.’
‘Are you sure?’ Seeing her nod, he made a decision. ‘Red’s probably best as it doesn’t need to be chilled.’
She nodded. ‘Red it is. It’s the least I can do for him.’
She pulled out a bottle of ten-year-old St-Estèphe and blew away its covering of dust. ‘How about this?’
‘Looks very good to me.’
She followed him back to the stairs and this time as she climbed out of the cellar it felt less like escaping than before. So there were a few scorpions, so there might be a grass snake or a slow worm, the fact was that her father had collected an amazing selection of fine wines and left them for her. The least she could do was to find the courage to go down there every now and then and open one in his honour. But if Adam wasn’t going to be around, she knew she would be doing it with gloves and boots on.
They sat down to eat at the kitchen table and the porcini salad was greeted with his enthusiastic approval. After this she then got up to fry the porcini slices but, before making a start, she opened the fridge and pulled out her new Labrador dish. On this she had laid out a selection of ham, salami and cheese. As she set it on the table, she apologised and explained. ‘As I’m flying back to London tomorrow, I’m clearing the fridge, so I hope you don’t mind a few leftovers.’
‘Of course not. It all looks wonderful.’ He pointed to the bottle of wine, which had been sitting there since he had opened it. ‘Feel like trying the wine before you get the frying pan out? We probably should have let it breathe for a couple of hours or more, but it should be okay.’
He filled two glasses and handed one to her. ‘Here, are you going to say a few words?’
She took the glass from him and nodded as she held it up in front of her. ‘A toast to my dad. I love him even though I never met him and I’m sure if I’d met him I would love him all the more.’ Her voice broke but she just managed to add a croaky, ‘Cheers, Dad.’
‘To your dad.’ After clinking his glass against hers, Adam lifted his skywards. ‘Cheers to you, Mart. You were one of the good guys.’
The wine was predictably excellent. By tacit agreement they didn’t speak for a few minutes while Amy busied herself dipping the mushroom pieces in egg and flour and frying them. As she did so, she gradually regained control of her fragile emotions. Somehow, that sip of wine had brought her ever closer to the generous, loving, but complicated man who had been her father.
At the end of the meal, while they ate the fresh peach and apricot fruit salad she had made so as to use up the last of the fruit in the fridge, Adam looked across the table and asked that same question one more time.
‘So have you decided that your life is going to continue to be in London? No desire to come over here and put down roots in Tuscany?’
She took a sip of wine before answering honestly. ‘I genuinely don’t know. Part of me likes the idea of staying here, not least because it would somehow keep me closer to my father, but the ambitious part of me tells me to head back to my job.’ She gave him a few seconds to tell her he hoped she would stay but there was no response so she carried on. ‘Short-term, at least, I have no choice. I’m booked on a flight tomorrow afternoon and I’ll be back at work on Monday morning.’
‘And that’s what you want to do?’
‘Like I told you, I love my job – at least, I have done up till now. Let’s see how badly they’ve missed me over the last five weeks.’ She did her best not to let the thought of slimy Christian ensconced in her office ruin a pleasant evening.
‘Pierpaolo told me you had a collapse of some sort, brought on by overwork. Is that right?’
Amy smiled ruefully to herself. The love of Danny’s life certainly liked a bit of gossip. ‘That’s what the specialist at the hospital said. But it’s all right, I promised her and I’ve promised myself that I’m going to try to take things easier from now on.’
‘What does your boyfriend think about that? Danny told me he saw you at the restaurant with a man.’
Amy suddenly realised that she hadn’t told Adam about her breakup with Gavin. In fairness, he hadn’t spoken about any relationship he might have either. ‘He’s no longer my boyfriend. We split up while you were in Brazil.’
‘Was that because of your job? Did he think you were putting your work before him?’ He stopped and looked across at her apologetically. ‘I’m sorry, that’s no business of mine. I just get so used to asking questions for my work that it’s almost instinctive. Please excuse me. I didn’t mean to pry.’
‘It’s all right, I dumped him because he and I didn’t share the same values when it comes to being faithful.’ She considered for a moment. ‘I suppose I had been devoting a lot of time to my work, and he maybe was feeling a bit left out. But I still don’t think that’s a reason to leap into bed with another woman.’
‘That’s tough.’ She saw him take a sip of wine. ‘And that’s my own painful personal experience talking.’
