“Should I cover up? Get changed?”

She points at my bare midriff, and I wrap myself in a towel, just to be safe. Then I glance around, searching for an Italian speaker.

“What’s up?” Conor asks, when I manage to catch his eyes. He’s still in his shorts and white tee, and jogs up to me, separating from the rest of the guys, who are busy drawing lines in the sandier part of the shore.

“Um, Lucrezia has been wagging her finger very insistently at me and…is my suit too revealing?”

I pull my towel open. Conor glances down at my bikini, a reflex, and freezes, like a wild animal caught in the light would, and—

It’s like it hadn’t occurred to him. That there would be a body inside the swimsuit. My body. His stare is heavy and blatant and profoundly still. It lasts a hiccup of a moment. Then a seagull screeches over our heads, and he rips his eyes away.

Blood rushes to my cheeks. “I have another. A one-piece. I can go get it, if she…”

“That’s not…Let me find out,” he says, husky, before asking Lucrezia about the problema. He listens for a few moments. Turns with a small smile. “Lucrezia is very worried about you.”

“Is it because I am a…harlot?”

“Did you just use the word ‘harlot’?”

“I was going to say ‘whore,’ but it didn’t sound churchy enough.”

“This has nothing to do with churchiness. Or with your suit.”

“What, then?”

“If you go swimming in the ocean within two hours of eating you are going to drop dead.” Lucrezia adds something else, and he translates, “All your blood will be in your stomach, digesting. There will be none left in your limbs, and you will sink like a stone.”

I scratch my temple. “Tell her that doesn’t sound right.”

Conor snorts. “I will not do such a thing.”

“It’s a thoroughly debunked myth.”

“The science hasn’t reached Italy, clearly. And I am not going to contradict Lucrezia, Maya. About anything, ever.”

I edge forward, glaring at him. “Aww. You scawed? Of the cute middle-aged lady?”

“I am, and not too proud to admit it.”

“Thank her for her concern, but I’ll be fine. I’m a good swimmer.”

Another quick exchange in Italian, that culminates in: “She reminds you that this area has lots of unexpected currents. And she wants me to keep an eye on you and rescue you when you inevitably begin drowning.”

I look her in the eye. “Sadly, Lucrezia, Conor is much more likely to hold my head underwater than to—Ouch.” He’s pinching the back of my arm so tight, I’m going to have bruises. “This hardly disproves my point,” I hiss through gritted teeth.

“But it proves mine.”

“Which is?”

“That you should be quiet. And do as Lucrezia says.”

“But I want to—”

With an arm around my shoulder, he pulls me into him. Tells Lucrezia something that sounds disturbingly like a promise, and then turns us both toward the makeshift field where the others are idling with a ball. Our feet slip through the sand, his heat pressed into my bare flank, and the scent of pine and sunblock fills my nose. His forearm hangs down my collarbone, right above the swell of my breast.