Page 52 of One Bed

Bea scratched her cheek and wished she didn’t feel so jittery. How was she supposed to live with him, sleep with him, knowing that at some point – maybe even while he was staying in the cottage! –he was going to read her work? How was she supposed to act, relax, not ask him what he thought? And if he hated them, how would she react? She’d had bad reviews before, as every writer does, but it was different when you were looking at them on Goodreads, where you could skip the one- and two-star reviews.

But someone, other than Golly, critiquing her work to her face? That was a whole new level of torture. Gib squeezed her hand, and she looked up at him. Expensive sunglasses covered his eyes and his stubble glinted in the sun. He pulled his hand from hers to skim his thumb over her cheek. ‘Are you OK?’

She nodded and pushed her hair behind her ears. ‘Sure. Why?’

‘You seem far away, a little distracted.’

How was he able to read her so well, after so little time? ‘I’m fine.’

He didn’t say anything, just cupped her cheek in his big hand. After a few beats, he dropped his head to skim his mouth across hers. Bea wrapped his shirt around her fist, enjoying the slow, hot, sexy kiss. Then Gib pulled back but left his hand curled around her neck. ‘If we keep that up, we might be arrested for lewd behaviour.’

She smoothed his crumpled shirt and nodded. She expected him to suggest that they go back to the cottage, so she was surprised when he asked her to show him something of Oia she loved. ‘Like what?’ she asked, looking around.

He lifted one shoulder. ‘Anything. Your favourite ice cream, a store, something you enjoy.’

She thought for a moment, before asking him whether he was up for a bit of a walk. He patted his stomach. ‘Sure. I need to walk off that moussaka. I can’t get enough of it.’

He’d also eaten a starter of dolmades and finished withkaridopita, a pie-ish dessert of fresh, chopped walnuts in a syrupy base made of breadcrumbs. The guy could, as Bea discovered, eat. His food bill had to be enormous.

She looked down at his footwear. Luckily, he was, like her, wearing trainers with a decent tread. ‘OK, then I’ll show you one of my favourite places in Oia.’ She gestured to the caldera. ‘It’s way down there.’

‘Sounds good.’ He lifted his shopping bag containing the books. ‘Let me run this back to the car first. I’ll meet you back here in five minutes, OK?’

Gib seemed to know exactly where they were; a feat given the twisty, narrow alleys in the town. When he returned, she led him towards Oia Castle, which was little more than a ruin. They walked down the two-hundred-plus steps to Amoudi Port and Bea smiled when Gib stopped to take in the picturesque port with its seafood restaurants and colourful, bobbing wooden boats.

They wandered through restaurants spilling onto either side of the road and when they came out the other side, Bea told Gib to look back at what she thought was one of the best views on the island, Amoudi in the foreground and Oia at the top of the cliffs. Gib took a series of photos on his phone. ‘Oh, this is great, Bea.’

She grinned. ‘We’re not there yet.’

‘There’s more?’

‘Oh, yeah.’ She continued leading him down the path away from Amoudi Port and wasn’t surprised when he asked her whether the path was safe, as there seemed to be an abundance of warning signs about falling rocks.

‘I haven’t been taken out by a rock yet,’ she told him. They stood aside to let another couple pass them and then continued down the path. Ten minutes later, she stopped them at a tiny cove.

She gestured to the view of the caldera and pointed to the towns further along the edge of the crater. ‘That’s Fira, and Imerovigli is further along.’ She pointed to the small island in front of them. ‘On that island is the church of Agios Nikolaus, it’s a tiny chapel carved into the rock. It’s my favourite place on Santorini. You can lie on the rocks and there’s a high platform jutting out from the church you can jump from.’

He looked around and grinned. ‘Irememberthis place. My dad brought me here and I did that jump … must have been twenty or thirty times that summer.’

She could believe it and could easily imagine him diving or jumping from the platform. It was something Pip would do.

‘Have you done it?’ he asked, slinging an arm around her shoulder.

‘Lots of times, but when I was younger,’ she told him.

He pushed his sunglasses into his hair, and his grin made him look ten years younger. ‘Let’s do it,’ he suggested.

She shook her head, gesturing to her sundress. ‘I’m wearing very lacy, very revealing lingerie,’ she told him. ‘And the water is too cold for me, even for a quick swim.’

‘It’s not cold. And even if it was, cold water is good for you.’

Yeah, so was kale and she avoided that, too. Gib grabbed the back of his shirt to pull it off his back. He dropped it to the rocks and placed his wallet, phone and sunglasses on top of it. Bea watched as he toed off his socks and trainers and opened the button to his shorts, pulled down the zip and pushed them down his hips. He wore black briefs and that space between her legs heated as she took in his spectacular body. He dumped his clothes on top of his trainers and his mouth curved into a smile. ‘I’m gonna go be eleven again. Be back soon.’

With a quick kiss, he was in the sea. Bea sat down on a flat rock and pulled his sunglasses onto her face. Before long, Gib was on the islet and he disappeared, and she assumed he was inspecting the chapel. Ten minutes later, she heard a piercing whistle and looked up to see him on the platform. Laughing, she watched as he dived into the stunning blue water. He surfaced, shook his head and trod water for five minutes or so, looking up at far Oia above them.

Then he fast-crawled back to where she was sitting and hoisted himself onto her rock. She squealed when he rubbed his wet head against her chest and pushed him away. ‘Arrgh, that’s cold.’

‘But so worth it,’ Gib told her, grinning. ‘That was the most fun I’ve had in a year. In quite a few years.’

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