“Don’t touch me!”
Benito relents. “Ok, it’s ok.” He waits while I take another deep breath. “I’ll keep up appearances with Sutton until I can get my father off my back and you and I will just have to. . . wait.” I take another breath as Benito watches. Waiting. I’m familiar with the concept. “That’s what we’re doing, right?” he asks.
I put my hand on my heart, willing it to beat slower. “What?”
“We’re waiting until the time is right. You’re not. . . you’re not saying no forever. Right?” He steps closer, his fingertips just inches from the edges of my hips.
I think back to that cold morning after with Levi. How he’d held me and kissed my head, telling me now wasn’t the right time, but the right time would come. I know now not to hold my breath when someone makes such a promise.
“Ok,” he repeats. His calmness is making me calm. Annoying, because I find spiraling energizing and I could stand to finish another chapter ofAnna Karenina—well,achapter ofAnna Karenina. “What are we doing, then?” he asks.
I study his expression. His eyes are soft and the creases in his forehead are relaxed. He looks so harmless, it’s disarming. “I don’t know,” I say. “I mean, the other day—I wasn’t expecting that, and I wasn’t thinking about what comes next.” Besides more kissing.
Benito laughs. “Me neither. The other day, I wasn’t thinking logically. When it comes to you, I’m never thinking logically.”
My heart squeezes. Goddammit. This is the last thing I need. Another crush that unravels my entire life. Even if the vicious news cycle surrounding my reappearance slows, I still don’t know if I can let myself fall as much as I want to. I was supposed to find a no-strings-attached Italian stallion, not a man who talks about waiting for me and is looking at me like. . . well, how Levi used to look at me. Like I’m important, like I matter, and like everything I want in this life is possible. Couldn’t he have come in herewith two glasses ofvinoand lured me into bed like a normal person? Why isn’t anyone ever trying to use me? Other girls get late-nightu uptexts and all I ever get is to freaking yearn.
“So, Sutton,” I say. “Is she sleeping in your bed with you?” The thought crossed my mind the second I saw her at lunch, but I was too scared to ask. If the answer is yes, I might hurl.
“No,” Benito says. “Oh god, no. She told my mother she needs very specific conditions in order to fall asleep and took a guest room on the first floor. Not a lie, by the way.” A shiver runs down my spine to remember that even if they’re not sleeping together tonight, they did regularly sleep together at one point not that long ago.
“Good,” I say. “I mean, I guess it’s technically none of my business what you do.” I look down at my floor. “The last time a guy said he was waiting for me, he ended up stealing my job, so. . . I guess it’s a good thing I don’t have a job.”
Benito’s eyes flit up to me. “I would never do that to you.” He latches his fingertips into mine. “Maybe waiting is the wrong word. We’re just. . . on pause.” I smirk at theHousewivesuniverse reference to when one of the titular wives is let go from her duties for at least a season or two. I wonder if he watched with Sutton. I will bring up Teresa Giudice to her and see if she reacts.
“We’re on pause,” I repeat.
Benito squeezes my hand. “I’ll be right next door if you change your mind.”
Benito leaves and I check my phone, which has now blown up with countless messages. I go to flip it onto Do Not Disturb but a phone call from Kate, my former campaign manager, comes in before I have the chance. She’d never call if it weren’t truly important and if she hadn’t exhausted every other option, so I answer.
“Hey, kiddo.” Kate’s voice is like an instant balm on my soul. She’s in her late 40s but she was like a second mother to me throughout both campaigns and my time in Congress, always grounding and taking care of me, shoving food into my mouth or texting me at 2 a.m. to tell me to go to bed. “Sorry to bug you, but I’m getting inundated with requests for comment. I guess since your chief of staff and press secretary work for Cross now.” Traitors. “I’m the last line of communication and I’d ignore it, but I’m genuinely worried they’d ship a news crew to Umbria.”
“It’s ok,” I say, though my palms are slick with sweat at the idea of commenting publicly about anything. “What do we do?”
“We can say nothing if you’d prefer, deny any requests for comment, but I think you should keep it simple. Confirm that you’re in Italy but reiterate that you’re a private citizen now with an emphasis on private.”
I sit back on my bed and fiddle with the edge of my comforter. No matter what I do, it doesn’t change the fact that people know where I am now. It’ll probably die down with the next international crisis, but either way, I’m in the news for the next 24 hours—and so is La Musa. “Actually,” I say. “I have a different idea.”
Chapter Thirteen
Where Is La Musa, Isabella Rhodes’s new home?—Washington Post
Why You Should Add La Musa to Your Italian Summer Itinerary—Traveler
This Quiet Clifftop Hamlet Is the Forgotten Gem of Umbria—NYT Magazine
How the Internet Sold Out This Small-Town Italian Inn for an Entire Summer in 24 Hours—Teen Vogue
I toss and turn all night thinking about everything: Benito, Sutton, Raffaello, Raffaello’s horrible development idea, the loss of my anonymity, the fact that La Musa is now on track to become the hottest summer travel destination thanks to me. There’s still a way to salvage this. More tourists in town aren’t necessarily a bad thing for me. I’ll wear hoods and sunglasses and take my meals to go and eventually,with enough positive buzz about La Musa, my presence here will be less relevant than its sprawling views and locally sourced restaurants.
It’s nearly noon when I make my way downstairs in the morning. I hear Benito and his father in the kitchen. They’re raising their voices at each other in Italian, but they stop when they see me enter. “Uh,buongiorno,” I say, with a halfhearted wave.
Raffaello relaxes and greets me with a double-cheek air-kiss. “Buongiorno,Isabella. Apologies for the loud start to the morning. My son and I have a business deal to make.”
“There is no such deal,” Benito grunts.
“My son fails to recognize that I own several buildings in La Musa, and it is my right to do with them as I please.”
