I regained some of my rumpled poise over lunch.
We both ordered the cheese fondue and were given a basket full of different rolls: foccacia, olive breads, breadsticks; and a fondue made up of mozzarella, dolcelatte and parmesan. It was the perfect winter warmer, especially on a chilly day in the Spring.
“Mmm, this is good. Have you been here before?”
He nodded nonchalantly. “A couple of times.”
“Ever bring your women here?”
He frowned, and looked irritated. “You make it sound like I had a fucking parade of them.”
“Didn’t you?”
He threw down his fondue fork angrily.
“What do you want me to say, Caro? I fucked everything I could get my hands on when I realized you weren’t coming back. It was years before I trusted a woman enough to be able to make love to her, and even then...”
He stopped mid sentence, scowling at me.
I’d done it again: forced him to say words that only brought pain to both of us.
“I’m sorry,” I murmured. “I didn’t mean…” I looked into his eyes. “It’s none of my business, Sebastian. I apologize.”
And it really wasn’t. I was the one who had insisted that we couldn’t change the past and here I was, surgically opening old wounds, one by one.
“I’m sorry, too. I didn’t mean to yell at you,” he said, his voice aching with regret.
Then he took a deep breath and shook his head to clear away the anger and recriminations.
We sat silently for several minutes. I searched around for a more neutral topic of conversation.
“How long have you had the motorcycle?”
He leaned back in his chair.
“This one, about two years. But I’ve had one on and off since I was 19. Bought my first bike as a birthday present to myself. It’s still in Ches’s garage.”
“Really? Well, there’s another reason for his wife to think you’re leading Ches astray. Or is he the responsible father-type now?”
Sebastian smiled.
“He’s a great dad – really patient. He fucking loves those kids of his. But we still take the boards out and catch some waves when I’m there.”
“Uh-huh, and how many meals have you made him late for, just catching ‘one more wave’?”
He smiled knowingly.
“Too many for Amy’s taste! But he goes out when Mitch visits, too, so she can’t blame me for that.”
“Oh, I don’t know: it sounds as if she’d think of a way. I think I’d like her: a woman immune to the Hunter charm.”
Sebastian laughed. “She’s immune alright. But yeah, she’d like you. I’ll introduce you when we’re stateside.”
“In case you’d forgotten, I live about 3,000 miles and ten states from San Diego.”
“Yeah, well, in case you’d forgotten, they’ve invented airplanes.”
“Touché, Chief Hunter.”
He smirked at me, and raised his glass of water in a toast.
“What happened to that friend of Mitch’s – Bill – the one who was at that wretched ‘fun’ day Donna dragged me to at the beach?”
“Why are you asking about him?”
Sebastian frowned at me and I rolled my eyes. Surely he wasn’t still jealous because Bill had flirted with me once?
“Just wondering: he was in your surfing crowd, wasn’t he?”
“Oh, right,” he said, rather huffily. “He got married again a few years back, I think. He got sent to Quantico. Mitch keeps up with him – Christmas cards – something like that.”
Thank God Bill’s story had a happy ending; I didn’t think I could take any more bad news today.
“It felt good having you on the bike with me today, Caro,” said Sebastian, thoughtfully, as if he was testing the water before adding something more.
“Hmm,” I said, the sound filled with skepticism.
He laughed. “Well, I’ve had an idea about that…”
“Oh, another of your ideas? That sounds dangerous.”
He grinned at me, a gleam of mischief in his eye.
“You know how we always talked about traveling through Italy? I just thought, while we’re both here, why don’t we?”