The Truth Behind Their Practical Marriage. Marguerite Kaye

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       ‘Finito?’

      Estelle started at the proprietor’s interruption, snatching her hands from the table. As Signor Giordano whipped away the empty plates with a flourish, she tried to collect her thoughts. What had just happened there? She realised it wasn’t just Aidan’s conversation she was enjoying, it was him. She hadn’t ever felt like this before, but there was no mistaking it for what it was—attraction, and a very visceral, intense one at that, which was unmistakably reciprocated.

      ‘Stracciatella,’ Signor Giordan announced, setting the bowls down. ‘Egg soup made with beef stock and thickened with ground almonds.’

      Estelle picked up her spoon. ‘It smells delicious.’

      ‘Delicious,’ Aidan echoed.

      He smiled, and her tummy gave an odd little lurch in response. She smiled back foolishly, and their gazes held for a long moment, long enough for her tummy to flutter again, for her skin to prickle with heat. ‘I must write this receipt down for my sister,’ Estelle said, because she felt she had to say something. For heaven’s sake, he really wasn’t at all handsome. Though he did have the most irresistible smile. ‘Do you have any siblings?’

      ‘I have one older sister, Clodagh. She seems to think that gives her the right to organise my life, despite the fact that she has a husband and three children of her own.’

      ‘But you adore her, really, don’t you?’

      ‘Oh, yes.’ Aidan grinned. ‘Never more so than when we’re a thousand miles apart. Actually, I don’t mean that. She has my best interests at heart, it’s just that…’

      ‘Her idea of what that constitutes and yours don’t necessarily align?’

      ‘There speaks the voice of experience. Is—remind me of your eldest sister’s name?—is she cast in the same mould?’

      ‘Eloise. And, yes, she is, in a way, though I can’t blame her, for she had to stand in for our mother practically from the moment Phoebe and I were born.’

      ‘Clodagh had to step into the breach too. Our mother died when I was a babe, not more than two years old. I hardly remember her.’

      ‘Do you see much of her?’

      His face clouded. ‘Not so much these days. She has three boys to raise, so she has enough on her plate. I tend to leave her to it. She lives just outside Wicklow, about fifty miles from Cashel Duairc.’

      ‘Cashel Doo-ark?’ Estelle mouthed, frowning. ‘Dark Castle?’

      ‘Brooding, or gloomy, would be a more accurate translation, though the name refers to a previous castle on the site.’

      ‘Is it your home, then? Do you actually live in a proper castle?’

      ‘Oh, yes, replete with a lake and turrets, battlements and even a dungeon. Pretty much everything save a moat.’

      ‘And a resident ghost, no doubt?’

      The wine he had been pouring slopped on to the table as his hand suddenly shook. Aidan set the jug down, mopping up the mess with his napkin. ‘Too many to mention.’ He took a draught of wine. ‘Ah good, here comes our next course,’ he said with palpable relief.

      ‘Pappardelle sulla lepre,’ Signor Giordano announced with a reverence which was entirely justified by the aroma rising from the plate, the gamey smell of hare mingling with wine, garlic and tomatoes.

      Aidan was embarrassed, she decided. A mathematician ought not to believe in ghosts, but his dark and gloomy castle obviously harboured something that defied logic and reason. She longed to question him, but she didn’t want to embarrass him further. Picking up her fork and spoon, the first mouthful of the hare ragu made her forget all about ghosts. Her toes curled with pleasure. ‘Delizioso.’

      ‘I couldn’t agree more,’ Aidan said, smiling once again, raising his glass.

      ‘You haven’t even tasted it yet.’

      ‘I wasn’t referring to the dish.’

      ‘Food can be delicious, wine can be delicious, but you can’t describe a person as delicious, that’s ridiculous.’ Though what was ridiculous, Estelle told herself, was to blush at such an odd compliment.

      His smile broadened, but he shook his head, refusing to be drawn, and the conversation turned to Florence and remained there, until they had both finished the pasta, and the plates had once more been cleared. ‘Would you like cheese, an ice, coffee?’ he asked.

      ‘No to all, thank you very much. What I need is to walk off this excellent lunch.’ She hesitated only briefly this time. ‘Would you like to…?’

      ‘Very much. Give me a minute to settle the bill.’