Venetian Moon by Maria Grazia Swan

Author:Maria Grazia Swan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: romance, Italy, Italian woman, action, adventure
Publisher: Echo Canyon Press
Published: 2019-05-02T00:00:00+00:00

SEVENTEEN

A light fog floated inches above the wet asphalt of the autostrada.

To my surprise, Giada, wonderful Giada, had a quilted jacket with a hood delivered to the hotel, and Kyle assured me it would come in handy once we left the Adriatic coast and headed up north. He was right. I remembered Larry's remark about the freezing rain in Innsbruck. I should have brought my heavy mohair coat that was hosting moths in my closet back in Dana Point. I should have—story of my life.

"How long do you think it's going to take to get to Trento?" I asked.

"A couple of hours. I only did this road once, the week of my arrival. It was with Pia's car, better known as the slug. It was my first experience with Italian toll roads. Right away I wanted to be one of those drivers with the heavy foot. I didn't know Pia that well, didn't dare tell her to speed up. It was awful. The Italian love affair with cars is so evident on their autostrade. No apparent speed limit, the boldest driver with the fastest car wins. Every vehicle on the road was passing us, zoom, zoom... maddening. I did miss my Porsche. I didn't want to be a spectator; I wanted to be a contender."

"Where were you going? Lake Garda?"

"No, although in retrospect that would have been a better choice. Pia had this fantasy. I call it a fantasy. According to her it's a real place. She just couldn't remember how to get there."

"Sounds interesting. Did it involve a rabbit hole?"

"Mother!"

"What? I'm talking about Alice in Wonderland."

"Yeah, I got that. No. Pia said that when she was very young she spent her summer months in a small cabin—wait, she called it a baita. The word stuck in my mind because it sounds like bite, instead it means—"

"Kyle, I know what it means, a rustic cabin in the mountains. It's not uncommon in the Dolomites. Why would you think it was a fantasy?"

"Because we never found it."

"Maybe it isn't there anymore."

"You don't understand. We left the autostrada about three exits past Trento, and we meandered around narrow roads under huge trees. I swear it was like a forest, and the first thing you know, we found ourselves right back where we started, looking at the toll road from below. We did that twice with the same results. There was no one to ask directions. On the third attempt we ran out of gas out there in the middle of nowhere. She called ACI, the Italian version of triple A, but we didn't know where we were. We walked miles and finally were able to get a ride to town. Since I couldn't communicate well, I stayed at a bar in Trento while Pia tried to figure out how to get her car towed to the nearest gas station."

"Did she?" Poor Pia.

"No. We rented a car to get me home on time for a meeting the next day. Eventually one of Pia's friends drove her back to her vehicle, along with a large gas can.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.