“Oh, yes, if you can call it that. The thing is so tiny I thought for a minute it was a hair tie.”
A corner of his mouth twitched. “You don’t mean it.”
“It looks more like something a pole dancer might wear.”
“A pole dancer.”
“You aren’t going to pretend you don’t know what that is?”
“No, no. I was just having trouble with the image.” This was true, though it was a vision of Dana dancing for him alone that derailed his brain for an instant.
“Just think of a barely-there bikini that leaves nothing whatever to the imagination, particularly in the rear.”
She was going to kill him with this image. If he didn’t lighten it somehow, he would embarrass them both with his reaction. “I’m not sure I can visualize this,” he said knotting his brow for maximum effect. “Perhaps you could model it for me.”
“In. Your. Dreams.”
“But it has a matching cover-up, yes?”
“You did order it, I knew it!”
His answer was a shrug. Why deny the obvious?
“Well, if you think I’m frolicking in the sea in three tiny triangles held together with dental floss, you are mistaken.
“But no one will be around to see.”
“You will be there.”
Yes, he would. He would indeed, though he was suddenly disinclined to have any other man witness this spectacle. Tommaso, for instance, who was so intrigued by their American guest he found excuses to serve her, or the gardeners who had appeared on the terrace to sweep and water plants more often in the past twenty-four hours than in the whole previous month.
Modesty could actually be an endearing trait, he discovered in some surprise. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out his cell phone. “You would prefer a maillot, I believe. What color?”
“Put that thing away,” she said in exasperation, batting it out of reach of his poised finger. “Didn’t you tell me there are extra suits in the pool house? Surely there’s something that will do.”
Practicality in a woman also had its appeal.
The sea was perfect; calm, extravagantly blue, with sunlight glinting on its surface like a sprinkling of diamond dust. Andrea carried their beach equipment under one arm while giving Dana his hand as they descended the stone steps cut into the hillside below the terrace. It was just as well he had a good grip on her, as she stumbled twice, being more interested in watching the sea than looking where she was going.
“No one is anywhere around, I promise,” he said as he handed her around a rock outcropping that made the path slant even as it concealed the cove from the house.
She gave him a smiling, upward glance. “Oh, I believe you. It’s just that it’s so beautiful here, so close to how I imagined an Italian seaside would be.”
It was so unlike the usual crowded beach that he blinked but did not bother to correct her. “I am sorry it hasn’t been a better holiday for you. Perhaps an extension can be arranged.”
“I doubt it,” she said with a small shake of her head.
“You must return soon then. If you like, I can—”
“I’m sure you could. But it’s okay, really, it is. I’ll rejoin my friends soon, and everything will be fine.”
She was looking forward to getting off the island, getting away to enjoy Positano as planned. Andrea could hardly blame her, but he didn’t have to like it.
Nor did he care for the extra reminder that her time here was limited. The sooner the business with Rico was cleared away, the sooner he would have to let her go. That was unless he could arrange matters so she would have to stay.
The cove was a stretch of cream-colored sand that backed onto a low cliff and was enclosed by arm-like ramparts of rock on either side. The waves that washed into it were clear, gentle and rhythmic. They whispered onto the sand and lapped over and around the outcroppings of rock that dotted the shoreline, forming small hollows that trapped sand, bits of shells and small sea creatures. Andrea stood for a moment with his fists on his hips, watching, listening.
Nothing moved except a few gulls and a freighter far out to sea, a square, slow-moving ship small with distance. There was no sound except the wind and waves. They were alone, their privacy complete.
He spread a blanket over the sand. Dana settled onto it on her knees, setting out the sunglasses, sunscreen, and chilled drinks and snacks from the beach bag. While she was busy with that, he erected a large beach umbrella for shade.
The maillot she’d chosen from the pool house collection was black with a honey-colored diagonal slash across the front. If she’d expected an Italian-made suit to be utilitarian, however, she had miscalculated. The slash emphasized her narrow waist, while the neckline and back plunged to breath-taking depths and the leg openings reached dazzling heights. She might have been less covered in the bikini, Andrea saw with pleasure from his height above her, but she could hardly have been more provocative.
Sea-bathing was going to be one of his better ideas. He was sure of it.
~ ~ ~
Dana felt as if she could sit and look at the Mediterranean for hours. Just breathing the air that swept toward her, knowing it blew from exotic places like Sicily and Corsica and Africa, was reward enough, but to do it in such quiet privacy was priceless. She could feel the tension seep from her neck and shoulders, sense the kinks in her brain unwinding.
It was unlikely she would have enjoyed this kind of peace in Positano with Caryn and Suzanne. It seemed disloyal to her friends to think such a thing, but it was true. Even if they could have found a beach as protected as this one, Suzanne would have chattered about everything under the sun while playing heavy metal at top volume. Caryn would have insisted on moving the blanket at least three times already, in search of the perfect sand, perfect spot to get the perfect tan. The pair of them was great fun, and she loved them, but couldn’t call them restful companions.
Andrea was different. Though alert for anything that might disturb this beach idyll, he had an enviable air of being at ease within himself, and completely present in the pleasure of the moment. Better than that, he didn’t hover, but had the consideration to take himself off for a swim after a time, allowing her to bask in the sun without an audience. She could see his dark head and strong shoulders as he powered through the waves with effortless ease, looking as at home in the water as on the land.
He was heading out to sea, or so it seemed. Already, he was beyond the rocky arms of the enclosure. Was he only testing his limit, or could he be seeking open water to make certain no intruders were lurking on this side of the island?
His head vanished beneath a wave. When it did not immediately reappear, Dana got to her feet, shading her eyes as she focused on the distant waves. A hollow feeling settled in her chest when she still couldn’t see him. She moved off the blanket, took a step closer to the water.
Oh, there he was, swimming in the opposite direction but parallel to the shoreline. He must have dived and then changed directions.
He was still drawing away from her. His head was no more than a black dot now, one that came and went with the wave action. Keeping it in view as best she could, Dana walked toward the water.
The quiet surge of the sea around her feet was cool and inviting. There was no heavy surf like that of the Florida panhandle where her family had always gone on family vacations. The water here was more seductive, enticing her so she waded out until it reached above her ankles, her knees, and then her thighs.
A moment later, she struck out, swimming toward where she had last seen Andrea. It felt so good, that buoyant gliding through the water, the flow of it around her, over her, under her. The lift of the salt water was different from the pool at the gym where she worked out after work. Swimming had been her exercise of choice since the days of competing with her high school swim team. For long minutes it almost felt as if she could swim forever.
It wouldn’t do. She didn’t know the coast, had no idea of its tides or rip currents
. Besides, it wasn’t too smart to put too much distance between her and the cove; she had passed out of its enclosing arms moments ago.
Turning to her back, she floated a few seconds to rest and get her bearings. Then she reversed her direction, heading back toward the cove.
“You are okay?”
She hadn’t heard Andrea’s approach, yet there he was beside her. She controlled a start, even as she breathed deep on her forward stroke. “I’m fine.”
“Excellent. I’m glad you came into the water. I thought perhaps you would sunbathe only.”
Darn a man who could talk and swim as if it were nothing, and that after swimming halfway to the mainland before coming back to join her. She was in fair shape, but he definitely had more stamina. “Now you know why I wanted a maillot.”
“I will change the bandage on your shoulder when we have dried off.”
“Good.” She couldn’t fault his attentiveness as a host anyway.
He seemed to take the hint at that short answer, for he didn’t speak again. Neither did he outdistance her though she was well aware it would have been easy for him. He matched his pace to hers with deliberate restraint, swimming shoulder to shoulder through the blue, blue waters toward the crescent cove that waited for them.
The water turned shallow. Dana pushed to her feet with Andrea at her side.
Her foot came down on a bit of a broken shell. Before it could cut into her, she shifted her weight, but then staggered a little as a shallow wave caught her off balance.
Instantly, he steadied her with an arm about her waist. Then he swooped to place his other arm behind her knees. Lifting her against his chest, he strode with her toward the beach.
“I can walk,” she protested. “I just stepped on something.”
“You may be tired. I’m not.”
“You’re a show-off.”
She might not have sounded so peevish, except she was too aware of the corded muscles of his arms that held her, his bare chest against her, and the thinness of the wet fabric that prevented the rub of his bare skin against hers. Also of the shivery excitement these things touched off inside her.
He grinned down at her. “This could be, I will admit it.”
Dear heaven, but he was something to look at with his green eyes reflecting light from the sea, his lashes in black spikes, teeth flashing white in the sun-burnished olive of his face and dark hair curling onto his forehead, dripping water that ran down the straight line of his nose.
Dana felt something turn over deep inside her with recognition that was almost like pain. And she realized with conscious irony that if she had to be abducted, she was lucky the man responsible was Andrea Tonello.
Back on the blanket once more, they pulled bottled water from the beach bag and chased the salt water taste from their mouths. Then her ever-considerate host set his bottle aside and eased closer, reaching to peel away the wet bandage from her shoulder, apparently intent on replacing it with a new one.
The touch of his fingers sent such tingles radiating through her nerve endings that Dana rushed into speech. “I shouldn’t have gone into the water, I expect. I wasn’t thinking, actually forgot about the scratches.”
“It doesn’t matter,” he answered as he worked. “Salt water has a healing effect. This was discovered long ago by sailors who saw wounds got well sooner while they were at sea.”
“You’re just trying to make me feel better.”
“Would I do that?”
“If you thought it would help.” She sent him a glance over her shoulder.
“And is it?”
The warm vein of humor in his voice did strange things inside her. “Maybe. Anyway, you’re just full of information, aren’t you?”
“As well as BS?” he asked with astringency as he peeled open a new bandage package that he took from the endless depths of the beach bag.
“I never said that.”
“Not precisely, but it’s what you meant.”
Maybe she had, at that. She wondered if her comment had actually bothered him, or if he was only reminding her of how she had judged him before. “Well, you only have yourself to blame.”
“Yes.”
He smoothed over the bandage edges to make sure they stuck, but didn’t kiss it to make it well this time. It seemed the salt water was going to have to do the trick all by itself.
Not that she was disappointed, or so Dana told herself. Certainly not.
Picking up the wet bandage and pieces of wrapper, Andrea tucked them into her hand. “If you will put that in the trash bag and hand me the sunscreen, I’ll put it on for you.” He reached to reset the beach umbrella, angling it so she was more fully protected by its shade as he spoke over his shoulder. “You’ve had enough sun for one day, I think.”
He was right, she knew. She was aware of a slight warning sting on the tops of her shoulders, could almost feel the freckles popping out beneath. Groping in the beach bag, she found the sunscreen tube and handed it to him. She turned her back, braced herself and waited.
His touch was firm and sure, with no hesitation in it at all. He smoothed the cream lightly over one shoulder and then across to the other before spreading it down her back. The depth he could reach was a reminder of the low cut of her suit. It left her some mystery back there, she knew, but not a lot.
His movements slowed, stopped. His voice sounded strained as he spoke. “You have a tattoo.”
“No!” she said in pretended amazement.
“Most of it is covered so I can’t quite see the design. May I?”
This was a little like asking if he could look at her backside, though the inked drawing was actually in the small of her back. Putting a hand behind her, she lowered the dip of the suit to expose what she thought was most of the design. At least that way she could control how much of her he could see.
“A boy on a dolphin.” The words were soft, almost contemplative.
“Actually, a girl on a dolphin,” she corrected. “If you look close enough, you’ll see she has breasts and long hair.”
“I do see. And it means—what?” He eased her hand aside and pulled the edge of the suit back up. A second later, he began to spread sunscreen again.
“I was on the swim team at school, for one thing. More than that, our family used to go to the beach every summer. I loved the sea when I first saw it, love it still.”
“Yet you live in Atlanta, which is landlocked, I believe.”
“We don’t always get to choose where we live.”
“Have you never thought of moving?”
She gave a soft laugh. “Many times, really. One year we rented a beach house that had a plaque on the wall that said it all.”
“Yes?”
Keeping her voice light, almost whimsical, she quoted:
“Of all the things that life can bring,
I ask for only three:
bread for my need, books to read,
and a house beside the sea.”
“Ah, certo. Then you must have this house,” he said with assurance.
“If only it was that easy!”
He touched her shoulder, turning her to face him. The expression in his eyes was serious as they met hers. “But it is easy, truly, if this is your desire.”
She wanted to believe him. She really did, especially in that moment.
Though her ambition in the past had never reached further than a condo beside the gulf where she had spent her summers, she suddenly longed to live beside the Mediterranean in a villa with thick stone walls where white curtains billowed in the sea breeze and the air was scented with brine and herbs. She wanted to watch the sun rise and set over the water from a 360-degree view, to hear the gulls cry and watch the distant water traffic passing by.
But she didn’t want to live there alone. She wanted someone to talk to and laugh with and sleep close to at night, wrapped in loving, protective arms.
How stupid was that?
“Has no one ever told you this before?�
�� he asked. “Did they never say that you must follow your heart to whatever makes you happy?”
She gave a small shake of her head. Her parents and her brothers loved her and wanted her near them. That meant in Atlanta. To them, the beach was a place to go and play but leave behind when they’d had enough sand and sun.
They thought life was supposed to be settled, with small ambitions and no dreams of things beyond reach. They could never understand, as Andrea had in an instant, the silent longings of the heart for something different, something permanent and beautiful within the sound of sea waves.
They hadn’t understood at all why she had opted for a vacation on the Amalfi Coast when there was a perfectly good sugar-white sand coast only a few hours away.
Andrea eased forward to sit beside her with one knee drawn up and his wrist resting upon it while the sunscreen tube hung forgotten from his fingers.
“How is it you became a policewoman? Was this also something you desired?”
“It was, or at least I thought it was.” She looked down, noticed a loose thread on the blanket where she was sitting and began to roll it in her fingers to prevent raveling. “My dad was a cop who worked his way up to detective, one of my brothers was on a fast track to join him, and the other was with the state police. It was the job I’d heard about all my life.”
“You enjoy what you do, now you have joined them?”
“At times, when I can make a difference. I like being able to keep a drunk driver off the road or stay with someone injured in a wreck until the EMTs arrive, particularly a child or an older person.”
He inclined his head in understanding. “And do you want to be a detective, too?
“I suppose. It has its appeal, solving the puzzle, finding justice for victims.”
“That doesn’t sound especially dedicated. Do you never think of doing anything different, of having a home and a family?”
“Sometimes, not that it matters.” She lifted her head to meet his gaze head-on. “Can we talk of something else? This can’t be interesting to you.”
“But it is of great interest. I would like to know everything about you.”
He sounded sincere, but that could come from nothing but boredom. At least it gave her an excuse to exercise her own curiosity. “Fine, but I get to ask you something for every question I answer.”
The Amalfitano's Bold Abduction (The Italian Billionaires Collection) Page 10