CHAPTER THIRTEEN
THE DAY AFTERthe wedding, everything felt different.
They’d both enjoyed the wedding. Fotis had been surprised how much, since his natural inclination was to refuse group celebrations. But Tassos was his closest friend, one of a very few. In the end it had been easy and fun.
Rosa had made it fun, drawing him in so he forgot the reasons he usually avoided such events.
He didn’t even mind that he’d opened up about his past. Remarkably, even knowing his secrets were no longer completely secret didn’t bother him. He knew she’d respect his privacy.
Later, in bed… The sex only got better. Even the aftermath, lying with her in his arms, felt like nothing he’d known. Almost frighteningly good.
He frowned as he exited the house and made for the old orchard where she’d been for the last half hour.
Frighteningly good.
Why be frightened? Their time together was an unexpected gift. Spectacular sex. A sense of well-being more satisfying than any time he could recall. Engaging conversations that often challenged and stretched him. The best sleep he could remember.
Frightening because it’s all about to end. Because you don’t want it to be over. You like her too much.
He tried to dismiss the idea but a creeping feeling of dismay tightened his nape, confirming it.
The phone call he’d just received changed everything. But he realised, everything had already begun to change. Now the lingering glow inside conflicted with a new, jittery feeling in the pit of his stomach. Regret.
He wasn’t ready for this liaison to end. But of course it must. They’d both known it from the start, and it had lasted longer than either had anticipated.
For the first time in many years however, logic was no match for his feelings.
That’s what should frighten you. Feelings. For Rosa.
Fotis paused in the arched entrance to the orchard, his hand on the old stonework for support. He needed it as he grappled with his emotions.
Rosa sat on a chair in the dappled shade. Her head was bent over her journal, pencil racing across the page. Her strawberry-blond hair gleamed where the sun caught it, amber and gold. In cut-off shorts and a T-shirt, with a haphazard bun and her sandals kicked off, one foot tucked beneath her, she stole his breath.
There was no artifice about her. She was simply Rosa and he needed—
His hands clenched.
Notneeded.Desired. There’s a difference.
He’d designed his life around the absolute requirement that he be separate. Independent. Alone. He didn’tneedanyone.
The grief he felt over his brother’s death, and the guilt—because he knew Nico wouldn’t have been targeted if not for him—were permanently branded on his soul. He should have been there to protect his little brother. He’d failed him and nothing, ever, could change that.
The early loss of his father, then his stepfather, and his mother’s narcissism, reinforced his compulsion to hold himself apart because loss was a terrible void that threatened to suck the heart from a man.
Trust was tough though not, he realised now, completely impossible. He trusted Rosa. But grief and unending guilt were constant. He knew them well. He couldn’t, wouldn’t, make himself vulnerable again.
He’d let her under his guard and it had felt like the best thing he’d ever experienced. Now he saw how perilous it was, awaking yearnings for a life for which he simply wasn’t cut out.
The phone call from America had come at an opportune time, before he fell heedlessly into a catastrophic error of judgement.
That didn’t stop stark grief curdling his stomach. Because this was over and he didn’t want it to be.
His avid gaze traced Rosa’s profile. Lingered on the curve of her ear, the arch of her brow and the tiny hint of a dimple lurking at the corner of her mouth. Her resolute chin. Her nose with that tiny hint of a bump near the bridge.
The way her teeth sank into her bottom lip as she flipped to a new page and quickly started to sketch instead of write. He couldn’t make out what she drew but her bold, sure strokes spoke of long practice. She was totally absorbed and he drank her in, knowing the news he brought would end this idyll.
There’d be no more moments like this.
