“Of course,” she replied, robotically. “You know how curious I’ve been.”

“I do, and I’m sorry for keeping so much of this hidden from you. I think . . . I was just afraid that you’d hate it, and if you did, it would have derailed me because I respect your opinion so much.”

Another wave of guilt washed over her.

He sat down at the table, pushed his plate back, and smiled up at her. “Now, we can go home,” he said. “I feel like celebrating. We should go out for dinner tonight in Montepulciano and order a bottle of wine.”

She frowned. “What do you mean, go home?”

“I mean, I did it. I finished the book, and now I want to get home, because that’s the address on my cover letter to the agent. I’ll need to be checking the mailbox every day.”

She gestured toward the telephone. “Couldn’t you have given him the phone number here?”

“Well . . . no. That would be an overseas call. I didn’t want to put any obstacles in front of him.”

She stiffened with annoyance. “But Freddie, I’ve committed to the whole summer here. They spent time training me, and they expect me to stay until after the harvest in September. I can’t just quit on them.”

“Oh.” He sat back, looking dumbfounded. “Are you worried about references? Because it won’t matter after I sell this book. You’ll be able to stop working.”

She struggled to cling to her patience. “Do you realize that not once since you walked in the door have you asked what I wanted? You never do.”

“I thought you wanted me to finish my book.”

Frustrated, she spoke in a rush. “Maybe I like working. And you don’t even know if a publisher will make an offer on your book. Even if the agent accepts it, it could take years to find a home for it and start earning royalties. And not all books get published. Most of them get rejected. I know this because I read your Writer’s Digest magazine all the time.”

Silence. All the color drained from Freddie’s face. It was the first time Lillian had ever stuck a pin in his dream bubble.

“Don’t say that. Not today, when I’m feeling on top of the world.”

She put her hand over her eyes. “It’s not my intention to bring you down. I’m sure your book is great and the agent’s going to love it.” She lowered her hand and looked at him directly. “But your dreams of publication aren’t going to put food on the table while you wait to hear back from him, and that could take months, maybe even a year. Besides, I love working here. I’ve never enjoyed a job so much in my life. I’m passionate about all this, and I want to learn more about wine making. I’m even toying with the idea of taking a sommelier course.”

“What?” Freddie frowned and scratched at his jaw. “A sommelier? You know you can’t drink when you’re pregnant, right? Does that mean you don’t want to start trying?”

The look on his face left her frazzled. She wasn’t sure if it was disappointment she saw or relief. She honestly had no idea.

A deep frown set into his features, and she waited for him to elaborate—to tell her that a career in the wine-making industry was a pipe dream, that a sommelier course would cost too much, or that he was happy with a career plan for her because he didn’t want to have children after all—he’d never wanted that—and he had been stringing her along all this time. She almost wanted him to say those things so that they could fight and shout at each other. Someone might even throw something. It would be a first for them, but maybe it might feel good, for once, to vent her frustrations about their marriage. After five years, she felt like a pressure cooker.

Freddie stood up and walked toward her. He pulled her into his arms.

“I’m sorry,” he said, rubbing her back. “You’ve been supporting my dreams ever since the day we met, so if you want to stay here and finish out the season, we can do that. And if you want to take a class about wine tasting, we can do that too. I’m just so happy that I finished my book. Now that it’s done, we can start living. We’ll do whatever you want.”

She should have been relieved. Finally, her husband was thinking of their life together, not just his own personal dreams and goals. More importantly, he had proven yet again that he was not the sort of man who shouted or smashed things, which was why she had chosen him as a husband in the first place. In that way, he had never disappointed her.

Why, then, was her stomach churning with exasperation?

Just when she’d grown tired of waiting for Freddie to put her happiness first and had finally come to a decision about a future without him, he decided to return with a completed manuscript and the fulfillment of all his promises.

Had she been wrong to lose faith in him? Had she given up too soon?

God, oh God . . . Anton was waiting for her at the swimming pool. She wanted desperately to go to him and tell him about Freddie’s return, to talk everything over. He would understand what she was feeling because he understood her better than anyone, including Freddie. He would help her make sense of it.

At the same time, she couldn’t deny that her physical attraction to Anton was still overpowering, and her desires were waging a battle against the loyalty she felt toward Freddie. Was that all it was, where Anton was concerned? Physical attraction? Had she lost touch with what really mattered?

Stepping back, Lillian spoke without making direct eye contact with Freddie. “Dinner in Montepulciano sounds perfect.” She couldn’t possibly take him to the villa. “But right now, I have to get back to work. I just came back to put on a different pair of shoes.”

How appallingly easy it was to lie to him. Poor Freddie believed her without question.

“All right,” he said. “I’ll make reservations somewhere. You got paid yesterday, right? We can afford it?”

“Yes.” She went to the bedroom to change her shoes but stopped in the doorway when her gaze fell upon the bed. Thankfully, the maid had visited that morning. The sheets were freshly laundered, and the whole apartment had been vacuumed and mopped.

Lillian entered the room, opened the wardrobe, and put on her deck shoes.

“I’ll see you later,” she said, hurrying for the door.

Freddie set his plate in the sink with a clatter. “Okay. Love you.”

His words hit her like a gut punch. She paused for a few seconds, sinking into a sea of doubt, but quickly gathered her wits about her and flew down the steps.

Anton was swimming below the surface, shooting across the turquoise bottom of the pool. When he surfaced at the shallow end, Lillian was pacing back and forth on the cement deck. She couldn’t catch her breath.

He took one look at her and said, “Is everything okay?”

Two guests were sunning themselves on lounge chairs at the far end of the pool.

“He’s back,” she whispered heatedly, pacing like a caged tiger.

“Who’s back? Freddie?”

“Yes. It was exactly like you said. He wanted to surprise me. He was sitting at the kitchen table when I walked into the apartment just now.”

Anton wasted no time climbing out of the pool. He padded to a deck chair, dried off, and pulled on his shirt.

“Come with me,” he said, leading her to the gate.