He lowers his mouth beside my ear. “I need to know,” he breathes, “cosa vuoi.”
“That’s cheating, James. You can’t use Italian against me,” I say, turning my face to where his arm leans against the wall. I kiss his forearm, softly, letting my tongue barely touch his skin. He curses and I relent, returning my eyes to his.
“I want this—”
His lips are on mine, swallowing my words before I have a chance to speak them. The pressure of his mouth over mine, the taste of him, the softness and the insistence—it spills into me, fills every pore, every cubic inch of empty space. I want this. God, do I want this.
His tongue, his lips, they meet mine with precision. This kiss is a fucking work of art. It should be hung inside. Framed in gold. And somehow my legs, useless as they were before, have found their way around his hips and my free hand is tangled in his hair, never to come loose. His hands find my thighs, my dress hitching up above my hips, and he presses against me, hard and warm as I groan into his mouth.
“I want this,” I repeat against his lips. “I want more.”
He opens his eyes and pulls back, our breath mingling between us over the sound of tinkling water. His hands slide from behind my thighs and he slowly, gently lowers me to the ground.
“This is a bad fucking idea, Ava.”
I don’t give a shit. I grab his shirt and pull him back to me, kissing him hard, making him groan when I arch into him. And the sound fills me with triumph.
I can do this. I can have a fling. An affair. A romp abroad.
For the first time since I arrived, there’s no stabbing pain beneath my rib where Ethan fractured my heart. And didn’t he say that I had to experience all that Italy had to offer? That was his plan, not—
“Where’d you go?” James asks, narrowing his eyes on me.
“Nowhere. I was just rethinking my plan.”
“While I was kissing you? You were rethinking your plan? Jesus, Ava. Just what every man wants to hear.”
I open my mouth to defend myself, but he’s right, so I shut it.
“I shouldn’t have let this happen,” he says. “Let’s get back inside.”
The words hit me like a backhand.
“Really, James? Of all the shitty things you’ve said to me, that has to be—”
“Don’t flip this. You said you wanted this and then a minute later you’re mapping out how I fit into your plan, like I’m a goddamn chess piece that you can slide around your board.” His hand gestures are making me dizzy. He’s never looked so Italian. He’s pissed. I’ve hurt him. And that hurts me more than I’d like to admit.
“I’m sorry, I can’t just jump in like you—”
“Jump in?” He laughs and steps closer, his voice low. “I’ve been trying to stay the hell away from you since you got into my car two weeks ago. I am not jumping in. I’m being dragged in by the hair.”
“I’m sorry,” I say softly, because it’s the only thing left to say.
He takes a deep breath and studies my face.
“You are going to have to figure out what you want, dolcezza. Whatever this is”—he gestures between us—“it obviously needs an outlet.”
But before I even have a chance to nod my understanding, he tugs me by the arm back toward the palace and says, “Now you need to listen. And stay the hell behind me out of sight.”
I swallow a chuckle and then remain quiet as James starts his lecture, his smooth voice filling my head with art and beauty, while I try not to think about his lips on mine.
VENTIQUATTRO
Ava
I haven’t had a moral hangover like this since the night my friends and I switched all of the holiday decorations on my street. Just like last night, it was all well and good when the adrenaline was coursing through me in the darkness as I switched the reindeer from Santa’s sled on one lawn with the goats and donkeys from the manger on another front porch, but when the light of day revealed the Christmasy chaos I’d caused, my guilt had me confessing my sins to my slightly bemused mother in the kitchen before she even had a chance to take a sip of coffee.
I have no one to confess my sins to this morning. I consider writing it all out on Mom’s postcard, the closest thing I have to the image of her trying not to laugh at my tears in her bathrobe that morning, but I know that will make it worse. The postcard isn’t for contrition. It’s for celebration.
