Page 37 of Too Hard to Resist

‘Yeah, she’s amazing. Andshefell in love with her colleague, Alejandro.’

‘Sì, I read the article and it was discussed in our meetings. They have relaxed the rules about staff dating since then. But dating guests is forbidden.’

Romeo’s gaze met mine and his eyes darkened. I swallowed hard, wondering if somehow he’d noticed me perving over his muscles or staring at him for too long and was trying to remind me that nothing was ever gonna happen.

I mean,doh. Of course it wasn’t.

I was with Edward. And even though me and Romeo seemed to be getting on better, I was sure that he still thought I was a stereotypical Brit who got pissed on planes and suffered from frequent bouts of verbal diarrhoea. So there was no way he’d be interested in me.

His warning message was received loud and clear though. I’d make sure that I stopped staring, but first I needed to reassure him that he didn’t have to worry about me getting the wrong idea.

‘I can imagine,’ I said quickly. ‘I mean, we come here to fall in love with our perfect match. Guests can’t go around fancying their Love Alchemists. That’d becrazy!’ My voice shot up several octaves, which definitely sounded suspect.

‘Exactly,’ he replied.

My eyes locked with his again and we both fell silent.

So much for not bloody staring at him.

‘Anyway,’ I broke the silence, then picked up some fridge magnets, ‘I should definitely get something for Stella and my parents and my nan. She loves a good fridge magnet. Which one do you think looks nice?’

‘Um.’ Romeo scanned the display. ‘How about that one?’

‘This one?’ I pointed at a colourful one.

‘No, the white one.’

‘This?’ I went to pick up the magnet on the left of the display, before realising that wasn’t the one he meant.

‘Let me…’

Romeo reached for the other magnet at the same time I did and our fingers brushed against each other’s, sending a jolt of electricity shooting through my veins.

He quickly jerked his hand back.

‘Sorry, I…’ I stuttered as I attempted to recover from the aftereffects. We’d only touched for a millisecond, but it might as well have been minutes. His skin was so soft and the brief sensation triggered some kind of reaction that caused every nerve ending in my body to spring to life.

‘I… yeah.’ I attempted to speak again even though my brain cells had turned to mush. ‘I think that’s nice. I’ll get a few. I should get something for Edward too. PoorEdward.’ I emphasised his name to remind my traitorous mind that he still existed. ‘He’s stuck at the hotel on his own, so the least I can do is bring him back a souvenir. And once I’ve bought this stuff, I should message him. See if he’s feeling any better.’

A fresh wave of shame washed over me. We’d been here over an hour and I’d barely given Edward a second thought.

I wouldn’t be surprised if when I checked my phone there was a text from the devil letting me know he’d reserved a special place in hell for me.

‘That is a nice gesture. I hope Edward will appreciate it,’ Romeo said, then ground his jaw. That was the second time he’d done that, which was strange. I still couldn’t understand why he’d be angry at someone for being sick.

Edward, on the other hand, would definitely be pissed off with me if he knew I’d been having inappropriate thoughts about Romeo.

But it was fine. In just over half an hour, we’d meet up with the other guests so I wouldn’t be alone with Romeo any more.

Then, after we’d had lunch, we’d head back to the hotel, I’d go and see Edward, who’d hopefully be feeling better and if he was, maybe we could go for a walk on the beach.

Yep. Good plan.

I might not have been proud of my thoughts since I’d arrived at this cute town, but from now on my mind would be purer than a bottle of holy water.

* * *

We’d just pulled up at reception. The rest of the time that we spent in Alberobello was great.

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