“Why are you dancing around the question, mi niña?”
I knew there was no sense in denying her. She’d wrangle the truth out of me eventually. “If Spanish men are handsome, Cristiano is in a league of his own. I won’t lie and say I haven’t noticed.”
“And do you have a little crush?”
Little?
“Ah,” she said after I failed to answer her. “Not little, then.”
“It’s a summer fling,” I insisted.
“The best kind.”
“My friends think I need to be smart about it. Not get too attached.”
She scoffed. “Nonsense. Do the exact opposite. Jump in with both feet. Flirt with wild abandon. There is nothing aselectrifying as young love. If I could go back to the summer I met your grandfather, I would kiss him the first night we met instead of putting it off for as long as I did. I was shy, though, too self-conscious.”
“Hmm. Jumping in with both feet is nice and all, but when everything crashes and burns?”
She sighed, and then her tone became wistful, almost weary. “One day you will be my age and you’ll be glad for those aching memories. They’ll become a measure of life you’ll hold dear. Do you understand, Isabel? What I’m trying to tell you?”
I consider her words carefully. “I do, Lita. I do.”
Chapter Eighteen
Isabel
I sink down onto the bench in front of my locker and sigh when I yank off my high heels. I’m used to wearing shoes like this at the De Vere office, but the highest I go is three inches, and only because I spend most of my day there hunched over my desk, staring at my computer.
We have to wear heels for our work uniform, but there’s no height requirement. The ones I have with me are courtesy of Winnie and she apparently decided that on Ibiza, she was going to proudly wear sky-high stilettos or nothing at all. I’ve lined them up in my closet back at the apartment. All of them are at least five inches. If she weren’t already dead, I’d kill her.
I close my eyes and rub them, imagining how hard Winnie would laugh at that joke. God, she loved dark humor. I don’t let the thought linger, though. I don’t want to think of her now when I’m already tired and my defenses are weak.
I stand and change back into my day clothes. Annika andSimone are still on the floor. They won’t be done for another hour or two. I got cut early, and though I offered to stay back and help them, Simone insisted I enjoy my freedom. I think her exact words were “If you don’t scram, I’m going to kick your arse.”
Once I’ve got my bag, I head for the side exit. Mia’s already up ahead, and she lingers to hold the door open for me.
I pick up my pace. “Thanks,” I tell her on the way out.
Antonio is usually posted up out here with a cigarette and his phone. He kills time scrolling through dating apps while he waits for me, and though it seems kind of boring, he’s assured me he doesn’t mind the side gig. He let it slip once that Cristiano is paying him double “and then some.” Whatever that means, it ensures he’s always eager to fall in step with me and escort me home.
His usual spot is empty tonight, though. No Antonio.
I frown and step forward only to crash right into Mia’s back. She’s stopped dead in her tracks, and when I glance over her shoulder to see why, I’m confronted with the intimidating sight of Cristiano standing on the edge of the sidewalk, poured into a bespoke black suit, fancy from his dinner.
Oh. My.God.
Though I’m not Catholic, I almost do the sign of the cross.
The dark jacket glides over his broad shoulders and strong arms. His black tie is perfectly knotted and centered on his crisp white shirt. A white handkerchief winks at me from his breast pocket.
I finally work up the nerve to lift my gaze to his face, and I actually feel weak. His jaw is clean-shaven. His smooth, jet-black hair is parted on the side, neatly held in place.
Mia looks between him and me, laughs, and pats my shoulder as she strolls away. “Good luck withthat.”
Cristiano’s smile—the one he tries to hide by stroking his thumb along his bottom lip—tells me he’s already seenand likesmy reaction to him.
I look down, horrified. I’m wearing jean cut-offs and a white tank top, not even mynicepair of sandals, but the comfortable ones. I smell like Fireball whiskey thanks to a tipsy customer who accidentally spilled his shot down my arm toward the end of my shift. I tried to wash it off in the bathroom, but I still feel sticky.
