The Other Side Of Midnight

I nod.

“Well, goodnight to both of you then.”

“Goodnight, Larry,” I say.

The Count only nods.

Then Larry almost sprints out of the room.

Once he is gone, I turn slowly back towards the Count. “Do you have something to do with Larry’s emergency?”

One eyebrow rises. “What do you think?”

“I think… yes.”

“Well done,” he murmurs.

I feel my heart begin to pound. “Why do you want to have dinner with me?”

He leans forward and his eyes sparkle like sapphires under a spotlight. “Why do you think?”

“Because you want to sleep with me?” My voice is hoarse, barely a whisper.

He looks amused. “Obviously, but I am also intrigued by you.”

My eyes widen with disbelief. “You are intrigued by me?”

“You wouldn’t be here, otherwise,” he replies, reaching for the wine menu. “White or red?”

“White,” I say automatically. Just then a waiter, a painfully thin man with sandy brown hair, responds to his action of reaching for the menu by arriving by his side.

“The usual,” he tells the waiter as he hands the menu to him without having looked at it, or even opened it.

“Thank you, Count Rossetti,” the waiter says, and with a courteous nod he withdraws.

The Count turns his piercing, intense attention back to me.

I swallow hard. “I suppose you come here often.”

“When I am around,” he says simply.

I look around me at all the empty tables around us. “Strange, all these tables are unoccupied while the other dining area is completely booked out?”

“I don’t like crowds. When I dine here, I always book the whole area.”

“They let you do that?” I ask, surprised.

A flash of amusement passes over his eyes, probably at the thought of anyone ‘letting’ him do something. “I own this restaurant. I needed somewhere good to eat out.”

Of course he did, but before I can reply the waiter comes back with the wine. I can tell just by looking at the label that it is an old wine. A special wine. Silently, the waiter uncorks the bottle and quarter-fills our glasses with the straw-colored liquid. The glasses immediately mist. Then he places the bottle into a silver ice bucket and withdraws.

The Count lifts his glass towards me in a silent toast. Gripping the stem of my wine glass I take a sip. The wine is cold on my tongue, but as it starts to warm to the temperature in my mouth, it tastes like no wine I have ever tasted before. I used to laugh at the wine connoisseurs who would claim they could taste cappuccino with a hint of charcoal, or elderberry with pencil shavings. I always thought they were just being pretentious, but now…

Now, I feel as if I have become one of them.

For I can taste and smell not just the grapes, but the oak barrels the wine has been kept in, and even the earth they have been grown in. It is as if all my senses have been sharpened. As the aromatic, velvety wine swirls in my mouth the sensation is one of sheer opulence and decadence. I know I am not imagining it, so it must be him. I am so attuned and aware of him that all my perceptions have become more sensitive and sharper.

“Like it?” he asks softly.

“I have never tasted anything so delicious,” I reply truthfully.

He smiles, but strangely, his beautiful face seems almost sad. “You must take a bottle back with you.”

“I’m pretty certain I can’t afford to do any such thing,” I reply.

“It’s a gift from me to you.”

“Why?”

He shrugs. “Why not? I have more than I can ever spend.”

I put the glass down and lean back. There is so much I want to know about him. “So… what is a Count doing in a sleepy place like Hunter’s Cross when the most glamorous cities beckon?”

“I enjoy living on mountains away from prying eyes, and when this mountain and surrounding land came up for sale… it suited me perfectly so I bought it.”

“The whole mountain belongs to you?” I ask, astonished. He seems to belong to a different world than me. A mysterious world where money is no object and beautiful people flittered around the world, owning fine restaurants because they needed somewhere good to eat, offered ludicrous sums of money for unknown artists, and owned whole mountains because they liked seclusion.

He nods and I think of my painting, of the crumbling castle built into the mountain, and as if he can read my mind he asks, “Have you finished your painting?”

“Yes, but I’m afraid it’s still not for sale.”

A strange expression crosses his eyes, but he doesn’t push further. “Perhaps you’d like to look at the menu.”

Chapter 11

Autumn

I pull the menu towards me, but find that I can’t concentrate at all. The words swim as if I am inside the magical world of Harry Potter. I look up and he is watching me. His eyes are like crushed gems. At that moment, the desire to go to him and kiss him is so strong that it actually shocks me. I stare at him. I lick my bottom lip and instantly his gaze makes an excursion to my mouth… and lingers there.