‘As an experiment?’ she said with a wobbly smile. ‘What do you think we’d prove? I don’t have time to accidentally fall into bed again, although that’s what my mum thinks we’re doing.’
Oops, she shouldn’t have babbled any of that in her nervousness; she shouldn’t have been nervous. She knew Gabri and had kissed him countless times. One more wouldn’t crack open the firmament.
‘Sorry – that my mum thinks we had a hot holiday fling. I couldn’t exactly explain—’anything.
‘I already said I don’t mind being your bucket-list item,’ he said with a faint smile. His palm slid up her spine.
She looked him square in the face, appreciating one last time that all she had to do to meet his eye was stand straight. ‘You’re right, though. It wasn’t just a fling and if things were different?—’
He shook his head. ‘You told me not to say that and I’m starting to see why. Just kiss me, Toni.’
Full of hesitation, she brought her face closer as he waited, closing his eyes until his golden lashes lay in contrast to his tanned cheeks. She knew the exact texture of his face under her fingertips – her lips – and the familiar pressure of his mouth on hers. But she didn’t know how to kiss him goodbye.
She managed a start, brushing her open lips over his. But she wanted more than half a cautious kiss and a moment later, more was what happened, as the fizz of adrenaline and the spark of desire collided. It was a travesty how good it felt to kiss this man, to have his fist tugging at her clothes and his fingers tangled in her hair. She comforted herself with the thought that she could never have resisted this.
She didn’t want to resist it now. It was Gabri who eased away, his forehead forming a labyrinth of creases.
‘You have to go, Toni. You’re the widow, remember? Not the main character – that’s what you said.’
She was starting to think shecouldbe the main character, but this film probably didn’t have a happy ending. Her story was too heavy for that. It was one of those awful ones where the final scene shows the protagonist staring out of the window and remembering all of the wonderful things that had happened with a twisted, bittersweet smile. She didn’t like those films.
‘I—’ She didn’t know what she was trying to say. ‘Thank you,’ she muttered instead.
‘Don’t thank me,’ he replied gruffly, gripping her chin briefly between his thumb and forefinger. ‘Send me a message when you get home.’
‘Will you reply?’
He hesitated for long enough that it pierced Toni’s skin. Finally, he said, ‘If you want me to,’ on a sigh.
‘I do,’ she said firmly.
‘“I do”,’ he repeated with a faint smile. ‘I’ve heard that somewhere before. Good luck, amore.’
He allowed himself half an hour. Setting a timer, he dragged a chair near the old wall, folded himself into it and propped his feet on the bricks with slow, purposeful movements. Then he let himself feel it all: in his chest, under his skin, in his veins.
Before she’d come and disrupted his existence, he’d been peaceful but so lonely. Whether he’d deluded himself or simply never noticed, he wasn’t sure, but he didn’t know how to pretend any more that he was completely content. She’d teased him and challenged him and woken him up.
He wondered if she knew how fierce she was – fierce enough to defend her broken heart.
It was an unpleasant realisation, that he was jealous of a dead man. At least for a week, he’d touched her heart, not that it solved anything. Her normal life was a far cry from his island existence and the overlap was just this one magical week.
Gabri was not Cillian’s father, nor did he want to be, even though the boy had unexpectedly grown on him – even though he could picture Cilli growing on him even more, given time, and he kind of missed him as well. He was a part of Toni, after all – a small, gangly, strong-willed part.
When the timer sounded, he fumbled to swipe a finger over the screen, tempted to nurse the misery a little longer. Obsessing over her, even if it hurt, was better than the emptiness of his house now she’d gone for good. With a flinch, he thought that was probably how she felt about her husband. She was sick of the ache of grief, but it was still better than a giant hole in her life.
It was one of those things you never got over, he suspected. She just got on with things, her life one big compromise, when he wished for her a gold-tinted existence with love and fulfilment. Preferably with him.
He shook himself to clear the tempting slide back into obsessive rumination. He couldn’t change the fact that she’d lost her husband and it was her prerogative if she didn’t want to rebuild her life differently.
Texting Rosa choked off his frustrated thoughts and gave him a nice distraction from the fact that Toni was probably on her way to the ferry by now. He couldn’t quite stop himself wondering what she’d told Cillian about where she’d been and whether he might have wanted to say goodbye himself.
It was best that he hadn’t, but Gabri wished he’d seen that face one more time.
Kissing Rosalba on both cheeks half an hour later, he took a seat at the beach bar at Marciana Marina. He didn’t remember a time when meeting Rosa was a pleasant distraction rather thana heart-twisting discomfort, but today seemed to be the day to admit something had changed.
‘Thanks for bringing this stuff to the island,’ he said, flipping through the contracts that had already been extensively checked by the people who actually ran the company these days. He was satisfied they would have done a good job, but for the first time in a long time, he was tempted to read it in more detail, find out what they were doing in his absence. ‘I’m sorry it’s inconvenient.’
She studied him quizzically. ‘It’s all right. Your mamma wanted me to check on you anyway.’
