that the fact that he hadn’t kissed me yet was both a surprise and an enormous disappointment.
Yes, yes, I know. I came on vacation swearing off all men and hadn’t wanted a fling. Or any drama. And definitely no freaking romance.
But that was before I had found myself shipwrecked on Nikos Charisteas’ private island.
And it turned out that finding that island—and finding the man that lived there—had changed my mind about romance. For one thing, I hadn’t even thought about Bryan or what he’d done to me for days. In fact, I’d completely forgotten about my job and all the things I’d been running from when I first came here. All I’d been able to think about were Nikos’ sparkling eyes, his dry wit, and the deep, deep waters that ran under the surface of that tanned, beautiful man.
And now I found myself quite suddenly only a day away from the replacement boat being delivered, and with a very difficult decision to make. I didn’t want to leave. I didn’t want to go back to that lonely hotel on the mainland. I didn’t particularly want to go back to Texas, or the US at all.
Most of all, I didn’t want to sail away from Nikos himself.
But he hadn’t asked me to stay. And I certainly couldn’t just invite myself for something like that. My parents had raised me with better manners.
I was, therefore, at an impasse when I walked into the kitchen on The Last Day Before the Boat Arrived and found Nikos already sitting at the table, a cup of coffee in one hand and a book in the other.
He looked up at me and tipped his head. “You’re getting tan,” he said, as if that was something we’d been specifically working on.
I snorted. “Hard not to, with all the time we’ve been spending in the sun.”
“And what do you want to do today?” he asked, putting the book down.
I almost told him that he didn’t have to worry about it. After all, I’d been taking up all of his time this week, and surely he had other things he needed to do. But then I realized two things: one, he didn’t seem like he minded; and two, the thought of doing anything without him felt… empty.
And so I said instead, “The mainland. I think I’m finally ready to see some of it. And I’m guessing you could give me a personal tour. You did offer, after all.”
There was a beat as he considered this, and I thought I knew exactly what he was thinking: that I’d absolutely not wanted to do it before, and that me wanting to go to the mainland might mean that I was ready to leave his mystical, magical island.
Neither of which was true.
I slid forward, sat down across from him, and reached out to thread my fingers through his—something that had become increasingly common over the last couple of days.
“But I’m only willing to go if you’re going to come with me and show me around,” I said, making my eyes as big as they would go. “After all, you promised me all the perks of a Greek vacation if I stayed on your island. And I can’t think of anyone I’d rather tour Athens with than you.”
I saw his eyes flit from my eyes to my lips, and his own lips part. I saw him take in a breath—and I saw the relief flood his face at the idea that I wasn’t getting ready to leave his island entirely. Or without him.
And that right there confirmed the answer to the question I’d been asking myself for days. He didn’t want me to leave. He just hadn’t quite invited me to stay. Maybe he was still trying to figure out how to do it. Maybe he was just waiting until he was sure I’d say yes.
Maybe he was waiting for me to ask.
I thought in that moment that he was going to kiss me. I was sure he was going to lean forward, shove his book out of the way, and seal his mouth to mine. Finally. I also felt as though we’d been building up to that very thing for days.
I bit my lip, waiting… and then watched him shut down again. I watched him pull everything back into himself and put that mask on once more, as if he couldn’t quite trust himself to allow his emotions out into the open.
And I wondered once again what exactly had happened to him