insistence on playing that night, despite his handicapped condition, highlighted his rapidly growing obsession with the merry widow. He hadn’t been able to stand the thought of not seeing her that week. Now he wasn’t sure if he could stand seeing her again at all! He was fast reaching breaking point. Something was going to give. And soon.
Rico’s stress level lessened slightly once the more densely populated suburbs were behind him and his eyes could feast on more grass and trees. He breathed in deeply through his nostrils, smelling the cleaner air and smiling with fond memories as the city was finally left behind and he drove past familiar places. The small bush primary school he’d attended as a child. The creek where he’d gone swimming in the summer. The old community hall where he’d taken dancing lessons, much to his father’s disgust.
As far back as he could remember, Rico had been determined to one day be a star. By the time he turned twelve, he’d envisaged a career on the stage in the sort of singing, dancing, foot-stomping show he adored. But whilst his dancing technique was excellent, he’d grown too tall and too big to look as elegant and graceful as shorter, leaner dancers. On top of that, his singing left a lot to be desired. Once that career path was dashed, he’d focused his ambition on straight acting, seeing himself as an Australian John Travolta. People often said he looked like him.
His early acting career had been a hit-and-miss affair, especially after he’d failed to get into any of the élite and very restricted Australian acting academies. He did succeed in landing a few bit parts in soaps, plus a couple of television advertisements and one minor role in a TV movie, but at a lot of auditions he was told he was too big, and too Italian-looking.
Although not entirely convinced, Rico finally began looking more at a career behind the camera rather than in front of it. Producing and directing became his revised ambition, both on television and in the booming Australian film industry. He learned the ropes as a camera and sound man, working for Fortune productions, who were responsible for the most popular shows on TV back then. He watched and observed and learned till he decided he was ready to make his own show.
With backing from his large family—Rico had three indulgent older brothers and five doting older sisters—he started production on A Passion for Pasta, having noted that cooking and lifestyle programmes were really taking off. But the Australian-Italian chef he hired for the pilot episode turned out to be a bundle of nerves in front of the camera, with Rico constantly having to jump in and show him what to do, and how to do it.
Despite his not having any formal training as a chef, it soon became obvious that he was a natural in the part as the show’s host. Rico had finally found his niche. Suddenly, his size didn’t matter, his Italian looks were an asset and the Italian accent he could bung on without any trouble at all gave a touch of authenticity. It also helped that he really was a very good amateur cook, his mother having taught him. It was Signora Mandretti’s very real passion for pasta, and her creativeness with the product—feeding her large family on a tight budget required more than a little inventiveness—which had inspired the show’s title and content.
A Passion for Pasta was an instant success once Rico had found a buyer, and he hadn’t looked back.
Not that any of his successes ever impressed Renée. They had certainly impressed Jasmine, however. She’d known a good thing when she saw it.
Rico pulled a face at the memory of the gold-digger he’d married. He was still flabbergasted over how much the family law court judge had awarded her for the privilege of being a pampered princess for three years.
Still, it had been worth any price in the end to get Jasmine out of his life, although he’d deeply resented her demanding—and getting, mind you—both their Bondi Beach apartment and his favourite car, a one-off black Porsche which he’d had especially fitted out with black leather seats and thick black carpet on the floors.
Black had always been Rico’s favourite colour, both in clothes and cars. He’d bought the red Ferrari he was now driving on a mad impulse, telling himself that a change was as good as a holiday, an act which had rebounded on him when Renée had recently seen him getting into it in the car park at the races.
‘I should have known that the red Ferrari was your car,’ she’d said with a sniff of her delicately flaring nostrils. ‘What else would an Italian playboy drive?’
On that occasion—as was depressingly often the case these days—he hadn’t been able to think of a snappy comeback quick enough, and she’d driven off in her sedate and stylish BMW with a superior smirk on her face.
His mind returning to Renée once more brought a scowl to his. He’d promised himself earlier he wasn’t going to think about that witch today. He’d already given her enough thought to last a lifetime!
The sight of a very familiar roadside postbox coming up on his right soon wiped the scowl from his face.
His parents’ property wasn’t anything fancy. Just a few acres of market garden with a large but plain two-storeyed cream brick house perched on the small rise in the middle of the land. But Rico’s heart seemed to expand at the sight of it and he found himself smiling as he turned into the driveway.
There was nothing like coming home. Home to your roots, and to people who really knew you, and loved you all the same.
CHAPTER TWO
TERESA MANDRETTI was picking some herbs from her private vegetable and herb garden—the one she planted and personally tended—when a figure moved into the corner of her eye.
‘Enrico!’ she exclaimed on lifting her head and seeing her youngest child walking towards her. ‘You startled me. I wasn’t expecting you till tomorrow.’
The first Sunday of the month was traditionally family day at the Mandretti household, with her youngest son always coming home to share lunch with his parents, plus as many of his siblings and their families that could make it.
‘Mum.’ He opened his arms and drew her into a wrap-around hug, his six-foot-two, broad-shouldered frame totally enveloping her own short, plump one.
How he had come to be so big and tall, Teresa could only guess. His father, Frederico, was not a big man. When the family back in Italy had seen photos of Enrico at his twenty-first birthday, they said he had to be a throwback to Frederico’s father, who’d reputedly been a giant of a man. Teresa had never actually met her father-in-law. Frederico Senior had been killed in a fight with another man when he was only thirty-five, having flown into a jealous rage when this other fellow had paid what he called “improper” attention to his wife.
Teresa could well imagine that this was where Enrico got quite a few of his genes. Her youngest son had a temper on him, too.
‘Have you had lunch?’ she asked when her son finally let her come up for air. He was a hugger, was Enrico, like all the Mandrettis. Teresa was from more reserved stock. Which was why she’d found Frederico Mandretti so attractive. He’d taken no notice of her shyness and swept her off to his bed before she could say no. They’d been married a few weeks later with her first son already in her belly. They’d migrated to Australia a few months after that, just in time for Frederico the Third to be born in their new country.
‘No, but I’m not hungry,’ came her son’s surprising reply.
Teresa’s eyes narrowed. Not hungry? Her Enrico, who could eat a horse even if he was dying! Something was not right here.
‘What’s wrong, Enrico?’ she asked with a mother’s worried eyes and
