too long on my chest, on my legs, on my lips. And maybe I’m reading too much into it, but it’s like he wants more from me.
Like you’re the art he needs to unearth.
I swallow that feeling down and focus my attention back on my work. Today I’m outside in the covered veranda, a tall glass of mineral water beside me garnished with a slice of lemon from a tree on the property, effervescent fizz emanating into the air. Dinner will be ready soon, though I’ve told Claudio he shouldn’t have to cook for just the two of us, that I’ll easily be satisfied with some wine and bread.
Last night Emilio came over, which was nice and a bit of a reprieve from the strange tension that’s brewing between me and Claudio. But tonight, Claudio’s insisted on cooking again.
At least my book is coming along—when I’m not being distracted. I’ve only written two chapters but those two chapters are symbols of the biggest hump I had to get over.
Of course, tonight I’ve stalled again, but it’s on purpose. I think, when it comes down to it, I’m a method writer, and my heroine is facing her mother’s death. I know what to pull from, I know what to write. I know exactly what she’s going through. Except there’s a block inside me, a wall that refuses to let the bad feelings out. I need to access them, and I know I can if I push, but I’m afraid.
“Am I interrupting?”
Claudio’s voice pulls me from the page and I instinctively hit the save icon.
I twist in my seat to look at him.
This evening he’s dressed in cream-colored pants and a black dress shirt, untucked, his collar open, showing a slice of bronze skin. His chiseled face is taken over by scruffy beard, the dimple in his chin barely visible. He calls it his “frustrated artist” beard, so I guess I won’t see him clean-shaven until he’s broken through.
He looks good with the beard. More rugged, slightly wild. Sometimes I imagine what his face would feel like on my skin, the roughness tickling between my legs.
Stop that.
“I was just finishing up,” I tell him, quickly snapping my laptop shut. “Is it time for dinner already?”
He nods, jamming his hands in his pants pockets and rocking back on his heels, watching as I get up and grab my laptop, cradling it under my arm.
“Stop,” he says quietly.
I halt, halfway between him and the veranda. “What?”
He holds out his palms as if he’s framing me. “I wish I could paint this.”
I look behind me. The veranda’s ochre pillars seem to glow in the evening sun, pink oleander framing the corners.
“It is very pretty,” I comment as I look back to him.
“You are very pretty,” he says, his voice husky and low, and the compliment makes me feel as if I’ve become unanchored from the ground. “I wish I could paint you. Here. Just as you are.”
Damn.
I smile awkwardly. “I bet you could.”
Paint me like one of your French girls…
He shakes his head, his hands dropping to his sides. “No. I couldn’t. I don’t possess the talent. I don’t even think my father does. Besides, he would color you all wrong. He would capture your softness, but he wouldn’t do justice to the rest of your colors. You are too vivid, too real.”
I feel the heat creeping up onto my chest, my cheeks. The tension between us keeps winding and winding, and I don’t know how to be free of it. I don’t know what to say.
“You are very beautiful,” he adds, and my stomach flips again. “You know that.”
I want to laugh, but his eyes are burning with sincerity. “I don’t know what I know.”
“This makes you uncomfortable?”
I shrug, my eyes focusing on the tops of his shoes.
“Is it the compliment?” His shoes start to move as he walks toward me. Stops just a couple of feet away. “Or is it because I said it?”
“Because I don’t believe it,” I admit, looking up at him. Actually, it’s both. It’s all of it.
“How can you think that?”
“I don’t know,” I say. “I have a face like a lemon.” I grab my chin. “There’s too much of this.”
He bursts into laughter. “A lemon? Well, then you are lucky you are in Italy. We love lemons here.” He gestures with his head toward the villa. “Come on, we’ll have lemons with our dinner.”
He turns and starts walking, and it’s only then that I notice my legs are