Rome for the Summer

by Lynne Shelby

Genres: Women's Fiction; Romantic Comedy

Synopsis

Escape to Rome with this sparkling summer romance!

'A wonderful fresh new talent' Katie Fforde

The last thing Kate Harper expects when she escapes to Rome for the summer after a heartbreak is to fall in love. But after meeting Jamie and exploring the city together as they uncover the romantic mystery of what happened to another English woman who ran away to Rome 200 years before, Kate starts to find more and more reasons to follow her heart and stay.

This charming, summery romance is perfect for fans of Sue Moorcroft and Miranda Dickinson.

Raves for Love on Location:

'A beautiful story that you will not be able to part with, this is a definite must read' NetGalley reviewer

'I was completely enchanted by this book . . . It's really captured my imagination and was a sheer pleasure to read' NetGalley reviewer

'Gold-plated romantic escapism at its finest! . . . A fun, flirty and feel-good romantic read that is simply delightful. An irresistible page-turner sprinkled with humour, warmth, wit and a whole lot of heart . . . pure magic from start to finish' NetGalley reviewer

'Oh I loved this book . . . I couldn't put it down' NetGalley reviewer

'A lovely summery read! . . . it just draws you in' NetGalley reviewer

'This book is the perfect summer beach read or to snuggle in under a blanket in winter and dream of Greek Islands and love' NetGalley reviewer

'Uniquely written and I loved that it was different from most of the traditional romantic books of this genre. Really enjoyed this one and will be anxiously awaiting the author's next book!' NetGalley reviewer

'A wonderfully fun read! Laurel and Jason were both amazing characters who made me cheer them on throughout the entire story . . . All in all this was an amazing read and I will certainly be checking out this author again' NetGalley reviewer

Release date: June 23, 2022

Publisher: Headline

Print pages: 192

Sample

June 2016

I sit on the steps of a stone fountain in a tiny piazza, surrounded by tall ochre-coloured buildings with shutters at their windows, scarlet, crimson and purple flowers tumbling from every wrought-iron balcony, and eat my gelato – it’s limone flavour, and it’s mouth-wateringly delicious. A flock of chirping sparrows flies into the piazza, circling the fountain, before flying off over the red-tiled rooftops. Two young women, elegant in dresses and high heels, come out of one of the houses, smiling at me as they pass by, and wishing me buona sera, before vanishing into a narrow alleyway.

I am in Rome for the summer. The thought makes me smile.

My ice cream finished, I take out my sketchbook, resting it on my knees. With the shadows growing longer, and the sunlight turning to liquid gold, I make a pencil sketch of one of the flower-bedecked balconies.

I know that when I’m back in England, every time I look at this drawing, I’ll remember how it felt to sit in a sunlit piazza in Italy, eating gelato, hearing the plash of a fountain and breathing in the scent of flowers.

Three months earlier . . .

When we left London, the morning was grey and chill, but by the time we’d crossed the South Downs, the cloud had lifted, and we drove along the narrow lane that led to the village in bright sunlight – a good omen for the weekend, I hoped.

‘It’s very green around here,’ Gabe said.

‘That would be the fields and trees,’ I said, looking out of the passenger window at the familiar countryside, seeing daffodils growing on the grass verges and blossom in the hedgerows, and then, as Gabe steered the car around a bend, the village where my family and many of my childhood friends still lived.

‘So are there any country traditions I ought to be aware of this weekend?’ Gabe said. ‘Do I get to make love to you in a hayloft?’

‘I’ll see what I can arrange,’ I said.

He laughed. ‘How much further?’

‘Not far,’ I said. ‘There’s the house – just past the oak tree. You can park on the drive.’

Gabe turned into the driveway and, with a crunch of gravel, brought the car to a halt. We got out, and he retrieved our luggage from the boot. Suddenly, my stomach was churning – I so wanted this visit to go well. I stole a look at Gabe as his gaze travelled over the thatched roof of my parents’ house, the ivy-covered walls and the leaded-glass windows, and I saw his mouth lift in a smile. If he had any qualms about meeting his girlfriend’s family for the first time, he was keeping them to himself.

‘Kate?’ Gabe said. ‘Shall we go inside?’

We went to the front door and, taking a deep breath, I rang the bell. Almost immediately, my mother flung the door open.

‘Kate!’ she exclaimed – as if she hadn’t been keeping watch at the window for our arrival. Looking back over her shoulder, she called out, ‘They’re here!’

My father came out of the living room, followed by my younger sister, Alice, and my older sister, Melanie, holding the hand of her three-year-old daughter, Hester. Melanie’s husband, Pete, brought up the rear, along with their six-year-old son, Mason. They all looked at me and Gabe expectantly.

‘Happy birthday, Dad,’ I said. ‘This is Gabe – Gabriel Heydon. Gabe, these are my parents.’

‘Hello, Mrs Harper,’ Gabe said smoothly, seemingly oblivious to the intensity of my family’s scrutiny. ‘Mr Harper. It’s good to meet you.’

My mother smiled. ‘Oh, please call me Louise. We’re so glad you were able to join us this weekend.’

‘And I’m Brian,’ my father said. To my relief, for he had an unfortunate tendency to regard any male brought into his house by his daughters as a scoundrel until proved otherwise, his face also broke into a smile, and he held out his hand for Gabe to shake. I introduced the other members of my family

‘I hope you’re good at remembering names, Gabe,’ Melanie said. ‘There are rather a lot of us.’

‘Why are we all standing in the hall?’ my mother said. ‘Come on in, you two.’ As one, my family shuffled back so that Gabe and I could step over the threshold.

‘Where would you like me to put our cases, Louise?’ Gabe said.

‘You may as well take them straight upstairs,’ my mother said. ‘You’re in Kate’s old room. And Kate is in with Alice.’

My mouth fell open. I shut it.

‘Why don’t you show Gabe where the bedrooms are, Kate,’ my mother went on. ‘Then we’ll have coffee and your father can open his presents.’

While my family trooped off into the living room, I led Gabe upstairs. Once we were in my bedroom, I shut the door.

‘I am so sorry,’ I said. ‘It never crossed my mind that my mother would put us in separate rooms.’

‘You really don’t need to apologise,’ Gabe said, his eyes glinting with amusement. ‘Although the fact that you’re so anxious for us to share a bed is extremely gratifying.’

‘I should have said we’d both sleep in my room, but I couldn’t. Not with my whole family standing there.’ My face grew hot at the thought.

‘It’s fine, Kate,’ Gabe said. ‘I get it.’ Crossing the room, he sat down on my old single bed and looked out of the window. ‘So this is the view you woke up to every morning when you were a child. Is that water I can see behind the trees?’

‘Yes, that’s the river,’ I said, glad to talk about something other than our sleeping arrangements. ‘Think weeping willows, rowing boats and ducks.’

‘As depicted in the watercolour we passed on the stairs?’

‘Ah – you noticed that,’ I said. ‘I wish you hadn’t. Try not to look at it again.’

Gabe smiled. ‘Was it you, by any chance, who painted that picture?’

‘Ye-es,’ I said, wishing I’d never told him that I used to paint. ‘I was fourteen at the time. We’ll go for a walk along the riverbank later and I’ll show you where I set up my easel, if you like. Right now, we should go downstairs and join the birthday celebrations.’

Gabe got to his feet. ‘Before we do, come here,’ he said.

I went to him, and he rested his hands on my waist and kissed me. I was breathless by the time he lifted his head from mine.

‘Now, we’ll go and join your numerous relatives,’ he said.

Having rescued my father’s birthday gifts from our luggage and trundled my case into Alice’s room, we went downstairs – Gabe pointedly stopping halfway down to take another look at my painting, grinning at me when I rolled my eyes – and joined the gathering in the living room. After a brief hiatus while Pete obligingly lifted Hester onto his lap, making room for me and Gabe to sit next to each other on the sofa, and my mother served coffee, my father unwrapped his presents. He was, as always, delighted with what his family had chosen for him, and leafed through the biography of a cricketer – cricket being his favourite sport – that I gave him straight away. I’d told Gabe there was no need for him to bring a birthday gift for a man he’d never met, but after learning that his host enjoyed a post-prandial whisky, he’d decided to give him a bottle of single malt. I could tell from the expression on my father’s face and his profuse thanks that the gesture was much appreciated. So far, so good.

After the last present was opened, Alice took Hester and Mason off to play in the garden, while the rest of us sat drinking coffee and talking about the recent happenings in the village – I was amazed at the number of people in the small community who’d got married, given birth or embarked on a scandalous love affair since the last time I’d been home – until my mother, having run out of gossip, and possibly recalling that her daughter’s boyfriend might not have much interest in the doings of her neighbours, scandalous or otherwise, turned her attention to her guest.

‘So, Gabe,’ she said brightly, ‘what do you do?’

‘I’m an art dealer,’ Gabe said. When my mother continued to smile at him encouragingly, he added, ‘I link up artists with people or organisations who buy paintings.’

‘Ah – you work with Kate?’ my father said.

‘Not exactly,’ Gabe said, ‘but our paths cross professionally from time to time.’

‘We met when Gabe came to an exhibition at the gallery where I work,’ I said. My mind drifted back to the exhibition’s opening night, the first such event I’d ever attended, Gabe’s fingers brushing mine as we’d both reached for a glass of champagne . . . him taking me out to dinner and what had happened afterwards, back at his flat . . . Not that my family needed to hear about any of that.

Melanie’s voice interrupted my thoughts. ‘You must know a lot about paintings.’

‘It’s my job to know,’ Gabe said.

‘You should show him the Italian Girl, Kate,’ Melanie said.

‘Is this another of your artworks?’ Gabe asked.

‘No,’ I said. ‘It’s a portrait my grandfather brought back from Italy many years ago.’

Gabe raised his eyebrows. ‘Do you know its provenance?’ My family stared at him blankly.

‘He’s asking if we know the painting’s history and who were its previous owners,’ I explained.

‘The only thing anyone knows is that Louise’s father bought it in Rome at the end of the Second World War,’ my father said.

‘I inherited it along with this house,’ my mother said. ‘We don’t know its real title, but Kate started calling the girl in the picture “the Italian Girl” when she was very young, and the name stuck. It doesn’t have a signature.’

‘Would you like me to take a look at it?’ Gabe said. ‘It’s a long shot, but I might be able to tell you the name of the artist.’

‘That would be very kind of you,’ my mother said. ‘I’d love to know who painted it.’

‘We’d all like to know that,’ Melanie said. ‘I’ve often wondered if it’s one of those lost masterpieces that you sometimes hear about.’ I shot her a look. When had my sister ever been interested in art?

‘You do realise that most of those stories about priceless Old Masters being discovered in attics aren’t true, don’t you?’ I said.

Melanie’s eyes widened. ‘Do you think Mum’s painting might be valuable?’ she said.

‘No – exactly the opposite,’ I said.

‘But you’re no art expert,’ Melanie said. ‘How would you know?’

I reminded myself very firmly that one thing I was determined not to do this weekend was squabble with my siblings, however much I was provoked.

‘I’ll show you the painting now, if you like,’ I said to Gabe, getting to my feet. To the room at large, I added, ‘We won’t be long.’ Melanie, who was half out of her chair, sat back down again.

I ushered Gabe out of the living room and along the hall, coming to a halt outside the dining room where the portrait had hung for so many years.

‘Just so you know,’ I said, ‘when I invited you to be my plus one this weekend, it wasn’t an excuse to have you value the family heirlooms.’

Gabe laughed. ‘It’s never going to be a hardship for me to look at a painting.’

I turned the door handle. The heavy door creaked open.

‘Meet the Italian Girl,’ I said.

Gabe stepped past me into the room, his gaze going immediately to the painting on the far wall. His face impassive, he walked around the dining table and stood directly in front of the picture. I went and stood beside him, both of us staring up at the portrait of the young woman which had hung above the fireplace for as long as I could remember.

The Italian Girl was seated on a white marble bench, in front of a hazy landscape of undulating hills studded with dark trees. Her long dark hair was drawn back from her face and caught up on top of her head with a pink ribbon, her dark eyes looking out of the picture at something only she could see, her mouth lifted in a secretive smile. She wore a white, high-waisted, ankle-length dress, with a pink sash, her dainty black shoes just visible beneath her skirts, and she was holding a leather-bound book. I smiled, remembering how often as a teenager I’d stood gazing at her, wondering what thoughts were going through her head.

‘That girl looks English to me,’ Gabe said.

‘You think?’ To me, she’d always looked Italian.

‘I reckon the artist was English as well,’ Gabe said. ‘Or at least, he painted in the English style of the time.’

‘Which was when?’

‘Early nineteenth century.’

My head reeled. ‘You think this portrait is two hundred years old?’

He gave me a quizzical look. ‘Have you never tried to find out anything about it before now?’

‘I’ve never even thought about it,’ I said. ‘She’s always just been here, hanging on the wall.’

‘Well, I’m not a specialist in nineteenth-century painting,’ Gabe said, ‘but I think your Italian Girl was painted during the Regency, probably in Italy, given that the artist has placed her in the Italian countryside. A lot of English artists were working in Italy at that time.’

‘Any idea which one of them painted her?’ I said. Not for the first time, I was suddenly very aware of the depths of my ignorance when it came to art history.

‘Not anyone I recognise at first sight,’ Gabe said, ‘but let’s see if there’s anything on the verso that’ll help us find out.’ He reached towards the painting. ‘May I take it off the wall?’

‘Oh, yes, of course,’ I said – I’d been working long enough at the gallery to learn that exhibition labels or inscriptions on the back of a painting were often clues as to its provenance. ‘I’ll just find something to protect the table.’ I went to the sideboard, pulled out a thick linen tablecloth and spread it out on the dining table’s highly polished surface.

Gabe lifted down the painting, revealing a rectangle of paint behind it several shades lighter than the rest of the wall, and laid it carefully on the tablecloth. I stood beside him and we examined the verso. The canvas was a dark brown in colour, and the wooden frame was rough and worn.

‘The wire it’s hanging on is of a much later date,’ Gabe said, ‘but that looks like an early-nineteenth-century frame to me. And the colour of the canvas indicates that the painting is the same age. See where it’s frayed?’ He pointed at the edge of the canvas where it had been nailed to the stretcher. ‘Those are handwrought nails. All signs that I’m right about when the portrait was painted, but as to who painted it . . .’ His brows drawing together in concentration, he bent over the canvas to peer closely at a mark in the top right-hand corner. ‘That looks like black ink – a couple of letters. C and B, I think.’

I felt an unexpected frisson of excitement. ‘Could they be the artist’s initials?’ I asked.

Gabe shrugged. ‘Possibly.’ He picked up the painting and returned it to its place on the wall, readjusting it several times until he was satisfied it was hanging straight. Taking several steps back, he regarded the painting in silence for a long moment, before saying, ‘All I can tell you is that the artist who painted this portrait isn’t anyone particularly well known, but he is – was – technically very proficient. I’m sorry I can’t tell you more.’

It wasn’t as if I’d expected him to announce that my family had been harbouring a long-lost masterpiece in the dining room, but I couldn’t help but feel mildly disappointed that he couldn’t tell me the artist’s name or, now I came to think about it, the name of the girl in the painting.

‘Oh, it doesn’t matter,’ I said. Realising that this sounded both ungrateful and dismissive of his efforts, I added, ‘What I mean is, I’d have liked to know more, but it doesn’t make any difference to how I feel about the painting. I’m very fond of it. I always have been.’

Gabe raised a quizzical eyebrow. ‘But surely you’d like to know how much it’s worth?’

‘That isn’t important to me,’ I said. ‘But maybe don’t tell my boss that – the first thing he ever said to me was that a gallery is a business, not just a space to display artwork.’

Gabe laughed. ‘That sounds like every gallery director I know. And they’re right.’ Putting his hands on my hips, he leaned in for a kiss, raising his head from mine far sooner than I’d have liked. ‘Shall we go and join your family?’

‘What, now? I was hoping that you were about to ravish me on the dining table.’

He laughed again. Waiting only for me to return the tablecloth to a drawer, he headed for the door. I followed him, pausing in the doorway to look back over my shoulder at the Italian Girl. Whatever secrets lay behind her smile, she was keeping them.

We found my family still ensconced in the living room, discussing whether a visit to the pub was in order before lunch. When we stepped through the doorway, every face turned towards us.

‘So what have you got to tell us, Gabe?’ Melanie said. ‘Don’t keep us in suspense. Is Mum’s painting worth anything?’

‘For goodness’ sake, Mel, give the man a chance to sit down,’ Pete muttered, which earned him a frown from his wife.

‘I’m sure Mum is dying to know if her painting is valuable,’ she said.

‘It isn’t—’ I began, but no one was listening to me – their attention was all on my boyfriend. I strode across the room and sat down on the sofa, expecting Gabe to sit next to me. Instead, he went and stood in front of the fireplace.

‘I’m afraid all I can tell you about the portrait is that it was painted approximately two hundred years ago, probably in Italy,’ he said, looking from my mother to my father and back again. ‘But if you’re interested in finding out more, I do have a colleague – a friend – who specialises in that era whom I could show it to.’

I sat bolt upright. Who was this friend Gabe was talking about? He’d never said anything about a nineteenth-century-specialist friend to me.

‘You think he might be able to identify the artist?’ my mother said.

‘If anyone can,’ Gabe said. ‘He’d also be able to value the painting, should you ever wish to sell.’

My parents exchanged glances.

‘So the painting could be worth . . . what?’ my mother said.

My father leaned forward in his chair. ‘Are we talking hundreds of pounds?’ he asked. ‘Or more?’

‘I couldn’t say at this point,’ Gabe said, ‘not without knowing more about the painting, but I do have the connections to ensure that you’d get the best possible price in today’s market.’

I gaped at him. One moment we were speculating about the name of the artist who’d painted the Italian Girl, and now we were talking about selling her? How had that happened?

‘Hey – hold on a sec,’ I said. ‘No one’s going to sell that painting.’

‘I rather think that’s up to Mum, not you,’ Melanie said, which took me aback.

‘Ye-es,’ I said. ‘Of course.’ Suddenly my heart was thumping. Turning away from Melanie, I caught my mother’s gaze and held it. ‘You know how much I like that painting. I thought you liked it too.’

‘I do,’ my mother said, ‘but that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t sell it. If the price was right.’

‘I wouldn’t miss it if you sold it, Louise,’ my father said. ‘I forget it’s there most of the time. But then I’ve never been much of a one for art. No offence, Gabe.’

‘None taken,’ Gabe said, with a disarming smile, seemingly unaware of the tension in the room. Caused by him, I thought, irritably.

‘Well, I think it would be a shame to sell it after it’s been in your family so long,’ Pete said. Melanie’s mouth became a thin tight line.

‘Aren’t we all getting just a bit ahead of ourselves?’ I said. ‘Just because a painting is old it doesn’t automatically give it monetary value. Isn’t that right, Gabe?’

‘Absolutely,’ Gabe said. ‘Just a suggestion, Louise, but why don’t Kate and I take the painting back to London with us so that my friend can look it over?’

‘That sounds like a good plan,’ my mother said. ‘If it wouldn’t put you to too much trouble.’

‘It would be my pleasure,’ Gabe said. ‘You’d like to discover who painted the Italian Girl, wouldn’t you, Kate? And if my friend can give us a valuation, all the better.’ He smiled, apparently confident that I’d agree with him.

I thought of the Italian Girl hanging in her usual place in the next room, and my heart sank. I did not want to take her to London to be identified and valued. I wanted her to stay right where she was. And yet, how could I explain this to Gabe, who made his living selling works of art, and would never understand my reluctance to discover the painting’s value. He probably thought he was doing me a favour. I reminded myself that I had no right to feel so possessive towards a painting that didn’t actually belong to me. And that the chances of it being priced at a sum that would make it worth selling were remote in the extreme.

‘Kate?’ Gabe said.

‘Oh, why not?’ I said. Thinking that he was probably expecting me to respond with more enthusiasm, I added, ‘Thanks, Gabe. I would like to know who painted my Italian Girl, and if your friend can tell me her real name, all the better.’

Melanie clapped her hands.

‘This is all very exciting,’ my mother said.

I managed a feeble smile.

My father said, ‘Right. Now that’s settled, who’s joining me for a drink in the Black Horse?’

My phone’s alarm woke me at 6 a.m., which I was sure would give me time to slip out of my old bedroom, creep back to Alice’s room, and have another couple of hours’ sleep, before anyone else in the house stirred. Gabe, lying beside me, groaned, opened his eyes and raised his head from the pillow.

‘Please tell me it isn’t morning,’ he said.

‘It is, but you don’t have to get up yet,’ I said. ‘Try to go back to sleep.’ He immediately shut his eyes and rolled over onto his side, facing the wall. Not without difficulty, I made myself slide out from under the duvet, shivering at the touch of cold air on my bare skin, located my pyjamas on the floor where I’d dropped them the previous night, and put them on. Yawning my way to the door, I opened it and stepped out onto the landing – and came face to face with Melanie coming out of her old room. We both jumped about a foot in the air. She was the first to recover.

‘Morning, Kate. You’re up early.’ She spoke to me quite naturally, as if there was nothing unusual or awkward in her meeting me slinking out of the room where my boyfriend was sleeping at the crack of dawn.

I pulled the bedroom door firmly closed. ‘So are you.’

‘I woke up at five with a splitting headache – too much wine probably – and I can’t get back to sleep. I thought I’d make a cup of tea. Would you like one?’

‘I would, actually.’ I was wide awake now. There didn’t seem much point in going back to bed.

We went downstairs to the kitchen. Melanie made tea while I found her an aspirin, and we sat down at the kitchen table.

‘I’m glad we’ve got this chance to talk,’ she began. ‘About the painting . . .’

The previous day, after a drink in the Black Horse – where my mother had enjoyed herself introducing Gabe as ‘Kate’s boyfriend from London’ to everyone she knew – and a sandwich lunch back at my parents’ house, Gabe and I’d left the others chatting, and I’d shown him around the village. I pointed out the Saxon church, the old forge – now a tearoom – the ancient oak in which Charles I had allegedly hidden from the Roundheads, and the flintstone cottages, their tiny gardens bursting with spring flowers, that had made Upper Teyford a popular stop-off point for camera-wielding coach parties.

I’d intended to pay a visit to my old workplace, Crafty Gifts, but the shop – which as well as selling arts and crafts materials and the up-market souvenirs found in heritage centres all over rural England, had one white-painted wall where amateur artists could exhibit their paintings – was packed with tourists. I’d contented myself with waving at Janet, the owner and my former employer, through the window and, on reflection, had decided that it was probably for the best if the artistic endeavours of the inhabitants of Upper Teyford were not subjected to my art-dealer boyfriend’s critical inspection. Then, having exhausted the village’s sightseeing potential, I’d taken Gabe down to the Tey and we’d walked along the tree-lined banks as far as the ford that had given the place its name.

‘This was one of the places where I used to come to paint when I was a teenager,’ I’d said to Gabe, as we stood in the dappled light and shade of an alder, looking out across the river, amid a carpet of bluebells and celandines.

‘Very picturesque,’ Gabe had said, surveying the water swirling around the mossy rocks and the willows with their trailing branches.

‘It’s beautiful,’ I said, ‘but I’m still glad I moved to London.’

‘The countryside didn’t provide you with enough excitement?’ Gabe said.

‘Something like that,’ I said, recalling the panic that had overtaken me a year ago when – still living with my parents, doing the same job I’d done since I was a teenager, spending my evenings drinking in the Black Horse with the people I’d gone to school with – I’d realised that unless I did something about it, my life was never going to change.

‘That surprises me,’ Gabe said. ‘After the stories of village life your mother recounted this morning, I’d have thought living in Upper Teyford could be very stimulating.’

I laughed. ‘No, seriously, there’s nothing wrong in living all your life in a village where everyone knows everyone else, but it wasn’t for me.’

‘You wanted more?’ Gabe said.

‘I wanted different.’ I felt closer to him at that moment, standing by the river, talking about my reasons for leaving the village, than I’d ever felt before.

Gabe smiled and put his arms around me. ‘Will it cause yet another village scandal if . . .