One Summer in Sicily by Nancy Barone

Author:Nancy Barone [Barone, Nancy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781803284521
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

13

Falling Into You

‘Hurry and park that thing away or we’ll miss the bus,’ I said. ‘This bastard driver always speeds up whenever someone begs him to stop.’

He chuckled. ‘That bastard is my cousin Piero.’

‘Oops. Well, he still does it on purpose.’

‘Maybe you don’t shout loud enough.’

‘Me? Believe me, I can shout loud.’

‘Then why don’t you?’

‘What?’

‘I’ve never heard you raise your voice. You’re so quiet and delicate.’

Delicate, me? Had we met?

‘Come on,’ he whispered, patting the back of his Vespa and my eyes widened in horror. ‘Oh, no, you’re not getting me on that thing again.’

‘You didn’t seem to mind the last time you were glued to me.’ He grinned and I stopped.

‘You see? That’s exactly what I hate about you.’

But the guy was undeterred and flashed me his trademark grin. ‘Don’t pretend you don’t remember.’

I might have been drunk, but I remembered perfectly well the warmth of his chest, the clean smell of his skin. And how I wanted to lick him from head to toe. I eyed him, balancing himself on those two very slim wheels. No way I was going anywhere with him.

‘Promise we won’t crash?’

He opened his arms wide and I wondered what sort of woman wouldn’t want to dive in between them. ‘With my precious passenger? Never. I’ll be very careful. I promise.’

To prove his point, and also because he saw the iffy look on my face, he took hold of my forearm to steady me as I gingerly swung one leg over the seat behind him, half expecting to fall over the minute I sat down, the feeling of someone else balancing for me very foreign.

‘Ow! Seat hot, hot, hot!’ I gasped and jumped straight off, almost taking the Vespa with me, but he had a firm grip on both. He threw his head back with a laugh.

‘Here, put this under you,’ he suggested, volunteering his towel and I soon found myself sitting solidly behind him again, my arms now around his slender waist (hoo boy) as he slowly took off.

‘How am I doing?’ he asked. ‘Slow enough?’

I nodded. ‘Good, thanks.’

And gradually – very gradually – he picked up a little speed, just enough so elderly pedestrians on Zimmer frames weren’t walking faster than us, and wound our way through the streets of Lipari town center, not giving a hoot about what people thought.

And soon I was enjoying it, finally getting a different, accelerated version of all my travels on foot throughout this island, exhilarated by the wind in my hair, the whirr of colors and fragrances of the eateries reaching us as we passed, but I was not hungry in the least. At least not for food. There you go again, you dirty mind. What did you think I was talking about? This time I was hungry for life.

With his strong body warming the insides of my thighs and me laughing my head off for absolutely no reason (other than too much oxygen going to my brain all of a sudden) Mattia laughed along,

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