Understand, but I would still be disappointed, no matter how wrong it is to feel. How can she keep her focus on her work when I am here and losing my mind over her?
“Ummm,” she says, staring down into her wine.
“Grace,” I say to her. “You are my muse. I need you.”
Her face softens, her eyes growing wet. Her mouth opens and then closes again. She has a sip of wine, licks her lips. “Look … Claudio.”
And here it comes. The blow. What she was trying to tell me this morning but lost the nerve, perhaps feeling sorry for me because I was too honest about what I wanted, too open with my feelings.
She sighs and looks down at her hands. “I’m … I’m afraid.”
This is news to me. “Afraid?”
“Yes.” She swallows, eyes roaming the field. “I’m afraid that … I’ll lose focus. Not just with the book. That I’ll lose focus on myself. Last night…” She sucks in her lower lip and my dick twitches, dying to have another taste. “It meant something to me. And because it meant something, it changes everything.”
“Maybe it’s okay if everything changes. And I would never let you lose sight of yourself.”
“You don’t understand,” she snaps, then shrinks back. “Sorry. I’m sorry. It’s just … I don’t know myself. I’ve only just begun to discover who I am and what I want. And I’m afraid that … that I’ll throw it all away for you.”
“So that’s what you’re really afraid of? It’s not about Vanni, it’s not about Jana…”
She gives me a wry look. “Oh, it’s about them, too. I’m just afraid that … well, you always talk about how I need to discover myself. Unearth myself. What if I miss that opportunity because I’m with you.”
I lean in close to her, putting my hand on her leg. “But what if I help you?” I whisper. “What if this is something we do together?”
She frowns. “You want to fix me.”
“I want to help you.”
“By fucking me?”
I can’t help but grin. “You don’t think it counts?”
She scoffs and twists slightly away from me.
I give her leg a light squeeze. “I’m not going anywhere, Grace. All I ask from you is to let yourself go. Let yourself be free. You did that last night. Last night you lost yourself to me. It’s okay to surrender sometimes, let the current take you where it needs to.”
She runs her tongue over her teeth and slowly nods, her attention off in the distance. I know I’ve just come on too strong and I wish I could take my words back, but they’ve been said and now I have to deal with them.
Then she gets to her feet, and I realize how much I’ll have to deal with.
“Where are you going?” I ask her.
“I need to clear my head,” she says, walking away. She finishes her wine and tosses the cup over her shoulder. It bounces in the grass beside me.
I watch her for a moment, blindsided. It’s not like Grace to act like this, and the fact that I’m the reason is disconcerting.
I get up, march over to her, grab her by the arm and pull her around to face me.
“You can’t run from me,” I tell her, feeling emboldened. “You can’t run from your problems. Maybe you thought you could by coming here, but you have to face them head on and you are. You are changing before my eyes. But don’t pretend that I’m part of those problems. You’re not that good of a liar.”
“Let go of me,” she says, her pupils pinpricks, her words harsh.
I drop her arm, feeling lost in all of this.
“Grace,” I manage to say. “Let’s talk about it.”
“I don’t want to talk to you right now,” she says. “You’re making everything so much more complicated.”
I do the next best thing to talking.
I grab her face and I kiss her.
She presses her fist against my chest and I expect her to pound on me, like I’m King Kong and she’s some hapless maiden.
But then her mouth is opening against mine, a whimper escaping her lips and flooding through me, and her hand goes from a fist to being open and flat against my shirt. Her fingers grab hold of the fabric, and my tongue slides into her mouth, eager and ravenous.
I spin us around, still kissing her, still holding her, pressing her against the ancient wall. My hands drop to the hem of her dress,