Page 122 of The Middle-Aged Virgin (The Middle-Aged Virgin 1)

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Twenty-nine messages!

And that was just on WhatsApp. That included five from Mum, three from Harrison, plus eleven in the Roxy and Bella group chat.

I should really have kept in touch to let them know that I was okay, as it was unlike me to be off the radar for more than a few hours, never mind multiple days. But being in this blissful bubble with Lorenzo was so addictive, and I just wasn’t ready to go back to reality yet.

I sat up in bed, took a sip of water from the glass Lorenzo had just bought me and launched my emails on my iPhone.

Oh, Christ—more messages. They must be worried.

I tabbed to contacts and called Harrison.

‘Hey. Are you okay?’ he asked, sounding concerned.

‘I’m fine, Harrison,’ I replied calmly. ‘No need to worry. I just won’t be coming into the office today. I can see there’s about a zillion messages from Mum, Roxy and Bella. Could you do me a favour and just message them and let them know I’m okay and I’ll be in touch tomorrow or later in the week to explain?’

‘Sure, no problem,’ he replied. ‘We’ll take care of things here. See you tomorrow.’

Did I mention how much I love my brother? So calming. No stress. He’d handle things. That was all I wanted to hear. If I’d called Mum, she would have kept me on the phone for hours, quizzing me. Likewise for the frienmittee. Again, I knew it was because they cared, but I just needed this time. For once, I wanted to disconnect.

I switched my phone off again, put it back in my handbag by the side of the bed, and then lay back down.

Lorenzo was now in the bathroom. He said he’d take a shower and then make me breakfast. I wasn’t ready to get up. I was cream-crackered after multiple marathon sessions with him again yesterday.

After our heart-to-heart, we’d slept for most of the afternoon, but then had spent much of the night rolling around the flat. We’d started on the bed, then against the wall, on the sofa, in the kitchen, then back on the bed. I had no idea how many times we had gone at it. All I knew was that generous stash of condoms I’d packed had long gone. The man was insatiable. And to be honest, I’d never thought I had such a large appetite either. I could see now that it was all about compatibility and having that connection.

I couldn’t explain it. With him, everything felt so natural. Like breathing. With Charlie, I had to think about what I was doing, how I was feeling, and psych myself up to get in the zone. And everything was so predictable.

With Lorenzo, the only thing that was predictable was that I was going to enjoy every second and scream my head off with ecstasy. Each time was somehow different.Differentin an amazing way. The attraction was magnetic. I had no idea how he did it, but he sent me so far out of my mind that I couldn’t even think straight. It was like, when he touched me, nothing else in the world existed. I just lost myself and all sense and reason evaporated. I went into a trance and lost all my inhibitions. It was like being transported to another world.

As he whipped up another orgasmic feast, Lorenzo swung his hips and danced around the kitchen to the special playlist he’d created for us, with songs from the artists we both loved vibrating through the room. This time I asked for something less Italian. Pancakes and an egg white omelette with spinach, mushrooms and tomato. He explained that Italians weren’t big on breakfast. It was all about coffee, but nonetheless, he said he would always be happy to cook whatever I wanted. Gourmet meals on tap (and all served by a hot, naked chef, I might add)? For a foodie like me, this was an absolute dream.

We slept for a few more hours, and we had another nice long talk about more topics than I could remember. We spoke about our childhoods, my fortieth birthday party plans for next year and his hopes to open a small restaurant of his own one day, and debated everything from Brexit to the salaries of footballers and if they could be justified when compared to that of nurses, and even body hair…

After our first intimate encounter together, where I had been paranoid about my overgrown bush, Pubegate with Vincenzo, and my discussions with Roxy and Bella, I was interested in his views on the matter.

‘So tell me, Lorenzo…’ I’d asked casually. ‘What do you think about women having hair down here?’ I’d said as I took his hand and rubbed it slowly between my legs.

‘Mmmm,’ he’d said as he kissed my neck and continued caressing me. ‘It is up to the woman. I would not tell you how to cut the hair on your head, so why should I tell you what you should do with the hair on your body? It is not important. To me, if a woman is comfortable with herself, with her body, then she is confident. And it is confidence that is attractive.’

Couldn’t have put it better myself. I adored this man.

I liked that our time together wasn’t all about the sex. True, most of the time we couldn’t keep our hands off each other, but I genuinely felt like it was much more than that. He stimulated my mind as well as my body.

As well as taking an interest in me, my work and life in general, he’d also told me more about his family. He had one brother. Younger. I think he said thirty-two? He lived in Singapore, which is why Lorenzo had gone to work out there for a while. He adored his mother. The relationship wasn’t as strong with his father, but they still got on. He enjoyed his job but sometimes found the hours difficult, particularly as it made it challenging to maintain a relationship with someone outside of the hospitality industry. But there was nothing else he’d rather do. It was his passion, so he did what he had to.

He lived in a two-bedroom house in a small town just outside of Florence. His grandmother used to own it, but when she passed, she left it to him and his brother. And as his brother was living abroad, he stayed there on his own.

He loved dogs but couldn’t keep one because he was often away. Like most men, in his spare time, Lorenzo enjoyed watching football and having a drink with his friends.

Lorenzo seemed very relaxed and open to talking. I really felt like I was getting to know him. And the more I learnt, the stronger my feelings began to grow. I was starting to fall for him. Hard.

Finally home.It was a challenge at work today as I wassotired. I should have just packed up and left at lunchtime, but as I’d taken a lot of time off last week to recover from my late-night sessions with Lorenzo, plus been with him all day yesterday, I wanted to at least attempt to get something done. Plus, if I’d stayed at home, I could have had one of those obsessive relapses, where I’d start thinking about him every second. Or staring incessantly at the photos I’d taken of him sleeping (no, itwasn’tweird—he was always taking candid shots of me, I liked taking pictures, and he lookedbeautiful, so it would have been criminal if I didn’t document something that divine on my phone).

I lay back on my bed. I couldn’t put it off any longer. I had to read these messages. And start replying.

Roxy’s and Bella’s chats were concerned ‘Where are you?’ and ‘Are you okay?’ texts, which then escalated to‘WTF, Soph? Why are you ignoring us? CALL ME’(clearly from Roxy rather than Bella). Same sort of messages from Mum (minus the swearing, of course).

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