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Strangely, though, he found himself half holding his breath, as if waiting to hear her argue that point. Almost as though he wanted her to. “I know,” she agreed, softly, then tilted her face to his. “I hate you.” But she was smiling at him, showing that she didn’t feel that way, and his gut rolled with something sharp and intense. “Don’t you forget it.”

He pressed a kiss to her forehead. “The feeling’s mutual.”

“So what?” she said, after a few more moments of silence.

Salvatore was uncharacteristically hesitant. But the longer he thought about it, the longer he knew that the only option was to stick with their original plan. They had to end this when they’d agreed. “We give this thing two more weeks,” he said, quietly. “But we stop pretending it’s just sex.” Panic slipped a little inside of his chest. Because he’d spent ten years of his life backing away from anything approaching emotion, but here he was, opening himself up to the possibility of hurting Emilia. The one person he couldn’t bear to wound. Or maybe they’d already crossed that line? She’d looked hurt tonight. Hurt and upset, because she’d seen him talking to another woman. “What if we go away for a while?” He suggested, the idea forming rapidly, but taking complete hold.

She glanced up at him. “Go away where?”

“I have a yacht in a port just north of Athens. Let’s go there and just float around for a few days.”

“God, that sounds good,” she admitted, but slowly, shaking her head. “But the whole Moricosian thing…”

“The Med is closer to Moricosia than America, you’ll be on the same time zone. And you can work from the yacht.” Vitally, there’d be no outside influences. No other women, no reminders of their families. Just them, and the time and space to explore each other fully.

“But my team is here?—,”

“Remember Covid?” He reminded her. “You can work with your team remotely for a few days, surely?”

She massaged her lower lip with her teeth, so his insides fired to life. He wanted to drag that lip into his mouth, to kiss her until neither of them could think straight. He caught her face with both hands and held her steady for his inspection. “We have two weeks, Emilia. Come away with me a while. Let’s make the most of this.”

Her eyes were awash with emotions he didn’t comprehend. He could practically hear the gears of her brain turning as she thought about that. “Two nights,” she murmured. “And then I have to get back to reality.”

“Deal.”

11

FIVE DAYS LATER, EMILIA had vague recollections of them having agreed to spend two days on this boat. But that agreement felt like something that had happened a long time ago, to two totally different people.

Everything about New York was a thousand miles away now. Her family, her life, her work. They’d spent almost a week bobbing around the waters off the coast of Greece. Salvatore had a skeleton crew on board, who’d seen to their essential needs like food, but had otherwise stayed completely out of sight, so Emilia had almost begun to feel as though she and Salvatore were the only two people on earth.

And against the backdrop of that fantasy, it was easy to pretend this could actually go on forever. Because the thing Emilia had started to grapple with was just how much she liked being around this man. How much she enjoyed talking to him, hearing his thoughts on just about any subject. And how much she enjoyed being drawn to talk about her thoughts. Emilia had never been backwards in coming forwards, but with two strong, dominant—and sometimes arrogant—Valentino brothers to contend with, there had been times when her opinions had beenovershadowed by theirs. When she’d found it hard to stand up and say what she was thinking. Salvatore, despite his own alpha traits, seemed to want to dig into every part of her, to understand her opinions on just about everything.

It was flattering, and completely intoxicating, so she’d spent the past five days in a buzzy fog that had nothing to do with alcohol, and everything to do with the man at her side.

“You coming?” He called, from down below, only his head visible in the water. She looked around, as if half expecting someone to be there watching, seeing her perform what would most definitely be an ungraceful dive into the sparkling sea.

“You promise it’s warm?”

He gestured above them, to the sun, high in the sky. “As a bath.”

She threw one last, longing glance at the spa just behind her, on the expansive deck of his yacht—which was more like a five star hotel on water—then refocused on Salvatore. The last thought she had before pushing herself off the edge of the boat and pointing her arms above her head to form a dive posture was that she would follow him just about anywhere he asked her to.

The water was cold, at first, hitting her like a shockwave when she broke the surface. But even before she could break through, his hands were around her waist, warm and strong, pulling her against him, lifting her out. Like he couldn’t wait a second longer to touch her. Despite the fact she was underwater to her shoulders, Emilia could have sworn little fires had been lit beneath her skin.

She could have sworn her whole body was aflame.

One of his hands moved to brush her hair back from her brow, and then, treading water for both of them, he kissed her, so she tasted the salty Mediterranean and felt an explosion of euphoria, another hit of that drugging, intoxicating sensation.Bliss. Surrender. Acceptance. This was just exactly where she wanted to be—and who she wanted to be with.

That same feeling wrapped around her later that night, after they’d shared a seafood platter on the deck as the sun set, then a spa, and finally, as they lay on a daybed beneath the stars, the gently lapping water rocking them in a way Emilia might have found soporific if it weren’t for the fact that being in close proximity to Salvatore made her whole body alert with need.

Two days had stretched so easily into three, then four, and now on the fifth day, Emilia had no inclination or interest in returning to Manhattan. They hadn’t talked about that. They hadn’t talked about the fact they’d need to go back, at some point. By Emilia’s reckoning, they had another week before their agreed upon end point.

It was like a black hole in her mind, a thing she didn’t like to think of, because of how it unsettled the breezy, intoxicating feeling she’d been relishing all week.

She didn’t think about his past, either. Nor even allow herself to wonder, more than a few times, if he’d brought other women here. It mattered, but at the same time, it didn’t. Because this was different, just like he’d said. She knew Salvatore hadn’t ever pursued a woman like he’d pursued her. Whatever else this was, she knew that to be fact.

“It’s so peaceful out here,” she murmured, head on his chest, as his fingers drew invisible patterns along her back. “It reminds me a little of home.”