It was apparent to the Italian woman, as it was becoming painfully clear to Colette, that Luca wasn’t coming.

She was starting to seriously worry that maybe he had indeed been in an accident, when her phone dinged with a text from a number she didn’t recognize.

Colette, I am so sorry. You were right: this was just a summer fling. I didn’t mean to get so entangled. I will treasure our time together.

She stared at the words, unable to believe what she was reading. It couldn’t be true.

Tears filled her eyes as she stabbed at the screen of the phone and called the number back. But there was no answer.

“Pick up,” she cried, panicked. “You owe me that much at least.”

She dialed the number over and over, but still he never answered. She was almost tempted to call Mama Elene, but she didn’t want to involve the older woman and make her uncomfortable. It would be embarrassing and humiliating, and hadn’t she already been humiliated enough? The man who’d told Colette he abhorred mobile communication had had the audacity—the absolute neck—to dump her by text.

Hurrying away down the shore, away from the restaurant and the pitying looks from the restaurant hostess, Colette lowered herself onto the wet sand, not caring that she was ruining her brand-new dress.

It didn’t matter. She’d bought it for a memorable romantic last night with Luca and he wasn’t coming.

She didn’t matter.

It was all a lie. Her and Luca’s time together, his romantic words, his adoring glances, gentle hands—all a ploy to make her fall into bed with him. He’d probably done the same thing to other gullible tourist girls a million times before.

She was such an idiot, falling for his honeyed words and his Italian charm. The ultimate cliché. And when she’d pushed him the other day, asked him outright about his feelings, instead of being honest there and then, he’d told her he’d show her.

And he had.

“You arse!” she spat now, wiping tears from her eyes. She’d fallen for him. Despite Annie’s words of caution.

Her first time away on a foreign holiday in the land of her dreams and she’d been taken in—made a complete fool of—by the dashing local.

Of course Luca had made her feel like she was the only one—that was how they did it, wasn’t it? Years of experience with idiot tourists just like her had taught these guys everything they needed to know. He’d doled out exactly what Colette needed to hear. He’d identified and zoomed in on her weak spots, her vulnerabilities, making her feel like he was the only one who’d ever really understood her, while all the while just trying to get into her pants.