“Great,” Ross said, not fully digesting what had been offered. He was still distracted by the woman by the pool.

“So what do you think?” Luigi asked.

Ross stirred. “About?”

Luigi grinned. “About the apartment.”

“Of course. When will it be available?”

“You are decided?”

“Sì.”

Luigi looked surprised. “I think soon. I will ask. When would you like to move in?”

“Immediately.”

“Adesso,” Luigi said to himself. He spoke to Anna, then told Ross, “She says it is ready, but she still needs the cleaning lady to go through it. Also she needs to get some new sheets for the bed.”

“Is that everything?”

“There is a lease that needs to be signed. Along with the matter of the deposit.”

Ross looked out over the landscape. Here was every seduction the countryside offered. “Go ahead and prepare the paperwork. How much of a deposit does she need?”

“She was asking for the first month’s rent and an additional five million lire, but I think that it is too much. I think four is better.”

“Four will be okay,” Ross said though he didn’t really care. He had already made up his mind.

“I will ask her.”

There was an animated exchange between Luigi and Anna, with escalating voices and broad hand gestures. All he could hear of it was Luigi’s calm voice, “Signora . . . Signora.” For a moment Ross thought it might turn bad and he considered intervening, but then the voices stopped and Luigi returned, smiling as if nothing had happened. “She says that four will be fine.”

Ross laughed to himself. If only business in America had been so straightforward, he thought.

“We can come back tomorrow and sign the papers.”

Ross nodded his approval. “I’ll need to wire some money. Do you have a bank account number for her?”

“It will be on the contract. I will call you with it.”

Ross looked around the grounds but again found his gaze drawn to the woman. “I would like to move in tomorrow afternoon. Ask her if that will be possible.”

“You can move all your things in by then?”

“I don’t own much,” Ross said.

Luigi spoke with Anna then returned with the news that tomorrow would be satisfactory, even preferable. Anna would soon be leaving on holiday, and after Thursday all would be delayed as they would have to wait till sometime next week for her brother to return from a business trip to sign the lease agreement. But she could not guarantee that the house would be cleaned by tomorrow until she talked to her cleaning lady. Ross shrugged. “Non è importante.” It was already clean enough for him.

As they walked back toward the villa, Ross glanced back once more at the woman by the pool. She was looking up at him and for a brief moment they again shared eye contact. This time he was the first to turn away. He walked back to the car in silence. He had just made a decision on where he would live for the next year, and all he could think about was some woman he didn’t know. He did not believe in love at first sight or any such foolishness. She had barely even acknowledged his presence. Yet there was something that drew him to her.