“God, I wish.” I’d dreamed of traveling to the Mediterranean since I’d been able to spell it.
“Yeah?”
“It’s on my bucket list. Have you ever been?”
He barely shook his head. “My extended family always shames me for failing to visit them.”
“Why don’t you?”
He stared into his coffee, and I realized this must be a loaded question. “I see my uncle and yia yia periodically. Do you know how often I heard, ‘Oh, Basil, you never visit us. You live so faraway. I’ll be dead soon.’ My uncle has this hotel restaurant in Vouliagmeni, and they’re always nagging at me to go over and visit.”
“Seriously? Where’s that?”
“It’s near Athens. Can you imagine? My mom, who thinks Charlottesville is on another planet, wants me to move to Greece. Just like that.” He exhaled an adorable, long-suffering sigh.
I couldn’t believe he was scoffing at such an opportunity. “Take me!”
“You want to run away to Greece with me?”
“I’d jump on that invitation in a heartbeat.”
I was one glass of wine away from jumping onhim. He kept revealing these parts of himself that made me wonder where he’d been all my life. I wanted to touch him, to taste him again. “You’ve got something,” I lied, “right here.”
He leaned in as I reached over to run my thumb across his lower lip. His tongue darted out to assist, brushing me, and I just froze, looking at him. It was no great hardship to gaze upon Bas. My palm settled against his cheek, the smooth bronze skin roughened by day-old scruff. He had such complex eyes: gentle but fiery, dark but full of light. And the way they looked at me now, curiosity vying with desire, made me want to climb over the table and straddle him.
His hand wrapped around my wrist, and he turned into my hand, pressing those perfect lips against my palm. Such a small touch, but the butterflies it loosed traveled down my belly and fluttered between my thighs. I pulled my hand back, grabbed my wineglass, and downed the rest of my drink to smother them.
I expected him to reach over and try again. At the very least, he’d ask me what the hell was wrong with me, sending mixed signals.What do you want?The trouble was I didn’t know, and I’d just made things awkward.
But he didn’t do either of those things. As if nothing had happened, he said, “So how about it? Saturday morning, all four of us on the UVA Lawn.”
“For?”
“The picnic.”
Oh, right. Clever. He had no idea how much Elizabeth loved an excuse to hang out on the Lawn in the fall. “I don’t think she’ll go if Evan will be there. Things are kind of awkward between them right now.”
He raised his eyebrows. “So let’s not tell them.”
“What?” I leaned forward, like I hadn’t heard him right. “Are you suggesting we trick our friends into spending time together?”
He tilted his head. “Are you going to tell me you’ve never played a trick on anyone?”
I sort of loved that he’d come up with it. And yes, Elizabeth and I fucked with each other on the regular. Please see: the night we met these two guys. But I knew that, despite her protests to the contrary, she really liked Evan, and I didn’t want to make a bad situation worse. Or give him another chance to use her and throw her away.
“I can’t promise to produce her, but I’ll get a read on the situation and decide from there. Okay?”
He had that mischievous look that always reminded me of the first night we met. “I’m already preparing the menu.”
“Because of course you are.”
Chapter Six
Basil
Challenge: Picnic in the park
Evan didn’t bat an eye at my suggestion that we stuff a cooler with enough food to feed a family and have lunch al fresco on the Lawn. He’d been back a week and was up for visiting old haunts. He had no idea how true that was about to be.
