“Less work than cutting and carving new ones.”
“I guess, but what made them give up on what they had?” She found a spot where overarching trees framed the water and a view of their yacht. She paused to admire it. “It looks as though they had everything they could want right here.”
“Is that a rhetorical question or something more profoundly related to our situation?”
She cocked her head. “I suppose that is the nature of our conflict, isn’t it? Where to live. Whether we have anything worth salvaging.” She sent him a cheeky grin. “I’d love to say I’m clever enough to talk in metaphor, but I’m really not.”
“There it is,” he said with a tone of relieved discovery exactly as if he’d found something he’d spent months hunting for.
“What?”
“Your smile.” His big hands cupped her face. “You haven’t smiled at me since London.”
“Have I been that sour? I didn’t mean to be.”
“I know.” His thumb skimmed a light caress across her mouth. “And that’s why we haven’t talked about where we’ll live or any other heavy topics. We do, though.” His thumb traced her lips again, this time slower, bringing her nerve endings alive.
“We do what?” she asked dumbly, leaving her mouth parted against the pad of his thumb.
“Have something worth salvaging.”
She shook her head, unsure, as he continued to cradle her face. He lowered his head and let his mouth brush hers, redoubling the tingle in her lips. Gently—very, very gently—he stole one kiss, then another. Kisses that were light and lovely and sweet. Tears pressed behind her eyes.
They hadn’t made love since London. He hadn’t made a move and she had been convinced that if she did, he would read it as acquiescence to fully resuming their relationship.
“I want to believe we do,” she said as he drew back. “But I’m afraid.”
“Don’t be afraid of me,” he commanded. Maybe it was a plea. “Never be afraid of me.”
Something deeply emotional lifted her hand to cradle his cheek. Her hand flexed subtly, inviting him to return.
This kiss was not so chaste. She tasted the hunger in him and it fed her own.
She moved her hand to the back of his head and returned the kiss, moaning with a mix of pleasure and happiness as he drew her up against him. She wore a bikini and sarong; he was in board shorts. They had nothing else between them except a layer of sunscreen and a dwindling sense of decorum.
He lifted his head and glanced to the handful of sheep in the distance, the trees providing a shady bower, the yacht barely visible through the leaves, bobbing on the water.
“Are you sure you want to do this here?” He was rueful as he looked at her with tender indulgence, and she saw something more serious behind his gaze.
She understood what she would be signaling in resuming intimacy with him, but the very fact they had come this far—able to read each other’s thoughts—made the moment too precious to turn her back on.
She stepped away and untied her sarong, then let the filmy cotton of abstract patterns drift down to form a thin bed on the grassy sand next to the low wall.
He sank down with her, kissed and covered her. Drew her along the path of passion with a sensitivity she hadn’t felt from him before. It was beautiful. Cleansing and healing. The way they came together was ancient, there against rocks carved hundreds of years before by hands as strong as his own. It was renewal in the same way Mother Nature had begun to reclaim the space with wildflowers and blades of grass stealing into the cracks in the stones.
It was exulting, making love with the clouded heavens above, the pagan gods witnessing their earthly act.
It was enduring and eternal and left them in glorious, sated ruin.
They made love again that night and at breakfast Scarlett was still blissed out when Javiero said, “I’ve made arrangements for our return to Madrid. I’d like to set a wedding date as soon as possible once we’re there.”
Scarlett supposed this was what she got for letting him make all the decisions while they’d been aboard the yacht. It had been enormously freeing to let him tell her when to eat and when to swim. Now it was time to start thinking for herself again.
Her doctor had warned her that the medication wasn’t an overnight cure-all, but sleeping and eating properly felt like one. It went a long way to clearing her head and lifting the cloud of despair that had weighed on her. Whether Locke sensed her relaxation or was simply growing out of his colic, she didn’t know. He was sleeping for longer stretches and smiling more. She was beginning to feel as though she might be a pretty good mother after all.
That didn’t mean she was confident in becoming Javiero’s wife.
“It won’t be the way it was, Scarlett.” He read her like his spy thriller now. “Mother has used this week wisely. Her things have gone into storage. She’s leaving for New York in the morning and will stay with friends until her new suite at Casa del Cielo is finished. She’ll come back for the wedding, of course.”
Scarlett’s engagement ring had come with her from Niko’s villa, but she’d asked the steward to put it in the safe while they were in and out of the sea a dozen times a day. Now Javiero held it out to her.
She tucked her hands in her lap and looked out to where the mainland was growing larger as they neared Athens. Real life was closing in.
“Why can’t we go back to the way things were,” she pleaded softly. “Talk about marriage later, when we’re sure.”
He waited a beat before he pocketed
