I’d feel so at home in a Swiss gift shop.

“Should I ask you again if you are on drugs?” he says once we’re alone in the foyer.

“Honestly, I could really use a downer right now.”

He scowls. “What happened?”

“I need your help. Eli asked me to take care of Tiny today, but I can’t do that.”

“Why?”

I close my eyes. “Because I have no idea where he is.”

Chapter 29

“You have to tell him,” Conor orders after twenty minutes of additional searching for a dog who weighs more than I do and has the coat of a thousand alpacas. A dog who’s so big and bad at hiding, he cannot be on the premises.

Fuck.

“He wandered off somewhere,” Conor continues. The heat today is thick and suffocating. Painfully humid. We’re in the lemon grove, and he’s staring at me in that severe way of his, chin tilted in. I nearly shiver. “Maybe the eruption noises scared him. Let’s ask Eli—”

“No.”

“He’s not going to be angry at you, Maya. He’s the one who let Tiny out of his room assuming he’d come to yours, and never made sure he got there.” When he sees me bite my lip, his gaze softens. He runs a hand over my curls, pushing them back from my forehead. Have I combed my hair today? “I’ll take care of this. I don’t want you to feel bad when it’s Eli’s fault.”

“Give me one more hour.”

Conor sighs, arm dropping back to his side. “For all we know, he’s frolicking in highway traffic.”

“He wouldn’t. Tiny is not stupid.”

“Tiny is a dog.”

“Like I said—”

“I’ve seen him chase his own tail, eat his own barf, and growl at his own reflection. All in a span of ten minutes.”

“Okay, fine. His brain is pea-sized and we love him for it. But Rue has started to believe in curses, and she doesn’t have a wedding dress.”

Conor’s eyes flick down to my chest. “Maybe she can borrow your shirt?”

Shit. I’m still wearing the tripod. “And Eli’s busy trying to save his wedding from a volcanic eruption. The whole thing is falling apart. So I’d rather exhaust all avenues before I tell them that their dog, whom they love more than they love me, is missing.”

“They don’t love him more than—”

“It’s fine. I love him more than them, too. Hey, maybe they can help?” I point at the three bored-looking boys currently smoking cigarettes in the back of the villa. The grandsons, who must be on a break from being hounded by Lucrezia. “They’re always around. They may have seen him?”

Conor isn’t optimistic, but he indulges me. “Hi,” I say when we approach them.

The oldest, who must be around my age, glances at my legs and forgets to look away until Conor says something that has him muttering a low, “Scusa.”

They chat in Italian for a bit. Conor asks about a cane who’s molto grande (I’ll never order another latte without hearing his voice) and all the boys shake their heads. But right as my heart sinks into my stomach, Leg Boy takes out his phone to make a call. He then relays it to Conor, pointing in the direction of the beach.