“Fuck,” he hisses from above, lips pressed hotly against my temple. For a moment, his grip is a vise-tight, splitting, bruising cage. “Fuck.”

I breathe through the heat. Ground myself as I climb back down. Okay. So, maybe, I thought I knew what good orgasms felt like, and I’m now discovering that I was wrong. It’s fine. I can work on it. We can work on it.

A minute later, Conor lowers me on his bed. I’m worried that he might leave me here, alone, but he lies next to me. Gathers me in his arms. His eyes are full of something that’s too much like alarm. I hope that the flush on my cheekbones and the smile on my face will tip him off that I’m…pretty great, actually.

“Hi,” I say, squirming up to his body. I can feel his heartbeat under my hand, thumping through my skin. He wants me. It’s not just evident from the ridge in his pants. It comes off him in waves.

His hand cups my face, thumb caressing my lower lip back and forth. “You’re a fucking menace,” he mutters, making me smile.

“Yup. I am.” I want more. I want so much more. My fingers travel down the warm muscles of his chest. Meet the waist of his sweats. It’s a simple matter of sliding my palm inside and—

“No.” He traps my wrist. Doesn’t shoo my hand away, but neither does he let me proceed.

“Why?” I frown. “Why can’t I touch you?”

“Because I say so.” He must see how little his reasoning convinces me, because he adds, “Because I’m an old man, and if I blow my load now, I’ll be out of commission for the next five business days.”

I laugh. “So?”

“So…give me a minute. Just rest, okay?”

“ ’Kay.” I burrow into his chest, hiking a leg over his. “But afterward…?”

“Afterward,” he says, tone inscrutable, and I don’t look up to scan his eyes for clues on how to interpret it, and…Well. That’s my mistake.

It takes me less than a minute to fall asleep. When I wake up, the sun is high in the sky, and Conor Harkness is gone.

Chapter 20

Present day

Taormina, Italy

Eli’s purpose in life appears to be keeping Rue happy, rested, and well fed, so I’m not surprised when his activity of choice for the night is a pasta-making lesson. The class is held at a traditional restaurant downtown, because, “No amount of coin or banknotes will convince Lucrezia to let anyone inside her kitchen, and I respect that,” Tamryn said.

It’s been a long day, not just because of the near-drowning. The heat beat us down. The salt and the sand and the sweat drained us. The offer to join the class is extended to everyone, but Minami and Sul decide to stay in with a beach-drunk Kaede, Tamryn says something about work calls, Paul has a project meeting that he really cannot miss, and Axel…Who knows where Axel is?