“Alex.” His voice softened. “That’s very generous, but I don’t want you touching your money. I’m lucky enough to have a lot of financial flexibility, and the only reason to have money in the first place is to spend it on people you love.”

She blushed, overwhelmed by the simple truth of his statement.

“Well,” she continued, “I still want to help.”

“You’re being extremely helpful by taking care of Paul, and helping him feel normal. If you hadn’t taken him back to your room that night, he probably would have gone through with the wedding. I want you to just focus on being his friend. I’ve got everything else.”

“I think it was your letter that made him call off the wedding, to be honest.” She realized only after she said it that he might not like the idea of his intimate words being read by anyone else. “I’m sorry—he picked it up, and I didn’t realize what it was until he started reading it.”

“Alex.” He smiled, popping an olive into his mouth. “I don’t say anything to you that I’m not okay with Paul hearing in full detail.”

“I’m usually very discreet,” she laughed.

“Are you?” he raised an eyebrow. “There’s an entire hotel in Corfu that knows my name—or at least, everyone on the third floor does.”

She blushed, pulling up a cocktail napkin to hide her face. “Oh, god, I’m sorry. I guess I was just excited.”

“No.” He reached for her arm, pulling it back down to the table and meeting her eyes. “I loved it.”

“I loved it, too,” she agreed, her body becoming heavy again with that lovely, familiar desire. “I’ve never been that way before.”

The truth was, there were so many things she was feeling for the first time. And she sensed, more in her body than her mind, that life would forever be a series of ecstatic, beautiful firsts now that they finally belonged to each other. They could relax, and focus on other things, because this big, absorbing problem was finally solved.

“Oh, unrelated,” she said, remembering her life back home. “I don’t think I can come to New York next weekend.”

“Hot date?”

“Shut up.” She playfully shoved his shoulder. “No, there’s a rally in Lancaster I want to go to, and I already told the team I would drive.”

“Lancaster it is, then.”

“Oh, god, you do not have to do that—it’s probably not going to be very interesting for you.”

“Seeing you at work, buying unregulated dairy products from the Amish, meeting Clara and Nate? I don’t know if I could design a better weekend, frankly.” He grinned, sipping his drink.

“Isn’t that kind of short notice?”