Page 31 of Marry Me in Rome

“You know why.”

“Maybe I don’t.” He took a step forward, forcing me to crane my neck to look up at him.

“Are you going to make me say it?” I snapped.

“Yes.” His head was somehow drawing nearer, closing the inches between us, but too slow. Agonizingly so.

“Well, I won’t.” My body leaned toward him on its own, rebelling against the orders from my brain. I meant to play it cool, but every cell in my body felt cemented in place.

Then I blinked. Our lips were inches apart now.

“Yes,” he whispered, and I felt the breath of his exhale against my skin. “You will.”

His lips crashed onto mine.

Somehow, impossibly, Matteo’s arms wrapped around my bare waist and pulled me in even tighter. My eyes had closed of their own accord and now my lips had detached themselvesfrom my mind, moving completely on their own as well. His lips tasted like sea salt and ocean breeze, his breath like mint.

Just when I thought he’d pull away and start running, his lips moved more slowly, deepening the kiss until I positively ached. His hands slid up my back and up my neck, sending pleasant shivers up and down my shaking spine until his fingers landed on my jaw, holding my head in place so he had full access to my helpless mouth. I had no power to escape, even if I wanted to. Did I?

Not a chance. I wanted nothing more than to stay here forever.

Here, on this beautiful island in a beautiful sea with this broken man who wore a hard mask. Here, a hundred miles from my sisters and a lifetime away from Mom and a world away from the father who’d broken my mother’s heart and rejected me.

I no longer felt alone.

Instead, I felt strangely whole. Which didn’t make sense because I barely knew this man, and after tonight . . .

Nope. I wouldn’t think about that right now. I couldn’t think about anything at this moment except how good his hands felt on my skin and how natural his lips felt on mine.

What felt like a decade later, our mouths separated, and he cradled my face in his hands.

“I didn’t say a thing,” I managed, trying to keep my legs from trembling so I didn’t collapse at his feet.

“Yes, you did. You said you were intensely attracted to me too.”

“I did, huh?”

“Clear as day.” He smoothed my hair, which his hands had been tangled in just a moment before. “I’m not sure what that means, though, considering you’re leaving tonight.”

“It means we have a lot to cram into one day,” I murmured, my eyes still half closed.

I’d never in my life been kissed like that. Not even close.

He placed a quick peck on my lips before giving me one of his famous lopsided smiles. “One day. We’re agreed, then.”

“You have my word. Not an hour longer.”

I couldn’t read this expression. Was that disappointment or relief? Just then, he looked up at the blue, cloudless sky and shielded his eyes. “Hot for this time of year.”

“It must be the sun,” I muttered, still very much under his spell. How Clara could experience being in his man’s arms and leave for someone else was beyond me.

“Only one thing to be done about that.” He glanced at the pool meaningfully.

He didn’t have to ask me twice. I grabbed his arm and yanked him toward the water, squealing. My momentum sent him stumbling forward, and then, with a joint yell, we leaped into the water together.

I didn’t goto school that day. School was a distant thought, a place I went tobefore.That word, before, now defined my life. The family that existed before my birthday and the family that existed after. Even then, nothing would ever be the same again.

When Dad had left, Mom went into her room to cry. Then she’d come out to clean up my birthday breakfast, which still sat out on the table, mostly untouched, and gone back into her room to cry again. Eventually she let herself into Alexis’s bedroom, clothes still strewn about and a soccer ball in the middle of the floor, and gently closed the door behind her. So much crying.

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