Matias excused himself and walked across the room to where the microphone stood.
“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. I hope you’ve been enjoying the magnificent dinner that Chef Teresa and her assistants have prepared for us tonight.” He gestured to the side where an older woman and two younger ones stood in their kitchen uniforms and toques. The whole room erupted in polite clapping, and they nodded back in acknowledgment. “Tonight’s menu and wine carte were selected by me—” he paused for a moment—“under Chef Teresa’s careful supervision.” A smile softened his expression as the passengers chuckled. “Believe me, you don’t want me in charge of dinner.” More chuckles. “While you’re finishing your desserts and espressos, we’ll open the dance floor with Afonso Cortez at the piano.” He gestured with his arm and the pianist bowed to light applause. “As is tradition with Gold River Cruises, we’ll open the dance with the longest-married couple aboard: Mr. and Mrs. Smith from England, who recently celebrated their sixty-third anniversary.” The Smiths waved then rose from their seats and walked to the center of the marble floor.
After a few minutes, Matias walked over to Miss Rialto and led her by the hand to the center of the room.
They danced beautifully, the captain and the cruise director, synchronized and in tune with the music and each other as if they’d been doing it for years. Miss Rialto had the grace of a ballroom dancer in a long black dress, and Matias cut a dashing figure in his dress uniform. They looked perfect together.
Vanessa twisted the napkin on her lap between her fingers. Her neck warmed and something hard knotted her stomach. Maybe she could leave and feign a sudden sickness. It wouldn’t be a complete lie; she wasn’t feeling well. Even if she spent the rest of the evening in her cabin, it would be better than sitting and watching Matias dance with another woman who had an expression of complete bliss on her face.
Other couples joined the dance floor, and Matias and Miss Rialto traded dance partners with more passengers doing the same. When Vanessa looked around her table, she found it empty. The other couples had already joined the dance, while others sat down at the nearby tables again.
Vanessa placed the napkin on the table by her plate, then scooted her chair back closer to the shadowed wall. As she prepared to stand and leave, the Granthams returned.
Agnes took the neighboring chair. “Why aren’t you dancing?”
Vanessa shrugged. “I can’t dance.” She couldn’t even pretend.
Alan Grantham stood in front of her and extended his hand. Vanessa didn’t take it.
He took her fingers in his and tugged gently. “Come on, young lady. You won’t be sitting this one out.”
Agnes waved her hand in their direction. “You heard him. Go.”
Why had she bought a red dress? It screamed for attention, and that was the last thing she wanted right now. Vanessa walked beside Alan Grantham, reluctant to show her non-existent dance skills in front of the crew and passengers. They danced for a few minutes, and the instruction he’d given her earlier in the day came back to memory. Maybe she could fake it for a little while.
She didn’t have the time to get used to dancing with Mr. Grantham. A French gentleman cut in, and Vanessa danced with him for a few minutes, his dancing skills less sharp than Mr. Grantham’s. She spied the exit on the other side of the room, farther than what she needed at the moment.
“May I cut in?” Matias’s smooth voice sounded at her shoulder.
Before Vanessa could respond, she found herself expertly and swiftly transferred from the French man’s arms to Matias’s. His hand settled on her back, the other firmly cradling her hand and, as the music changed to a slower measure, Matias adjusted his pace to her faltering one.
“Miss Clark,” he said to her, a smile tinting his voice. “Are you enjoying yourself tonight?”
What could she say, with so many other couples around them, several of them openly staring at her and Matias?
“Yes, I am, Captain Romano,” she replied with a pleasant expression and a neutral smile, ordering her galloping heart to calm down and not betray her.
How could she want to leave and long to stay at the same time? It was maddening.
The physical proximity between them muddled her senses. She couldn’t think straight. His scent, his solid biceps beneath her hand, the warmth of his body against hers. Was this what dancing did to people? Every point of contact between her and Matias rushed her into hyper-sensitivity.
He leaned in. “This is not the way I wanted to dance with you.”
Vanessa hid a grimace. “I’m sorry. I know I can’t dance, not like Miss Rialto danced with you.” That sounded pettier than she’d meant.
Matias arched an eyebrow and looked at her. He opened his mouth as if to say something, then closed it again. His pace quickened and he led them into a wide turn, to the periphery of the dance floor, Vanessa struggling to keep up with him. Once there, he slowed again.
“It’s part of the protocol for the captain and the cruise director to follow the first dance.” His calm voice was matter-of-fact, as if reciting from the book of rules. “Miss Rialto has had dance training as part of her job.”
Maybe it was the protocol, but Miss Rialto had enjoyed it too much.
After another turn, Matias leaned in. “What I meant to say was that I wanted to dance with you without the other passengers around.”
Vanessa stopped and her eyes widened, unable to look away from Matias. She dropped her arms to the side and took a step back from him.
“We’ll have a ten-minute break,” the pianist said on the microphone. He brought the melody to a close, and the passengers clapped politely.
Matias joined the clapping for a moment. He stepped closer to her and guided her back to the table with a hand on her lower back, the warmth from his fingers radiating through the thin fabric sending a pleasant tingle up her spine.
“Thanks for the dance, Miss Clark.” He pulled out the chair for her and as Vanessa sat down, he bent and whispered in her ear. “Meet me at the bridge in one hour?”
Vanessa turned to look up at him, his eyes matching his tone, half hope and half uncertainty. So much like her own feelings.
An elderly passenger approached Matias and asked him a question. As the two walked away from the table, Matias looked over his shoulder at Vanessa. Before she had the presence of mind to nod back at him, another passenger took Matias’s attention.
Yes, she would meet him at the bridge. How could she not?
Matias hurried up the steps to the sun deck. Was Vanessa waiting for him at the prow behind the bridge?
He’d told her one hour, but he was late. He usually mingled with the passengers during the dance and afterward, and on some trips even ended up in the bar with a few of them after hours.
But tonight, when he actually wanted to leave the dance, he’d had to split his attention between passengers and problems on the lower deck.
The sun deck was empty. Not many passengers had the fortitude to climb the ladder after an evening of good eating and liberal drinking.
Matias sprinted the last few meters toward the bridge. He and Miguel had pulled down the blinds and locked the small room. They’d return in the early morning for the failsafe procedures before departure.
As he rounded the bridge past the window, his hope fell. Vanessa wasn’t there. Had she come at all, or had he missed her?
He leaned against the railing and his head dropped. He couldn’t catch a break. Not on this ill-fated trip.
“You’re late, Captain.”
Matias whirled around at the sound of her voice. “Vanessa.” He straightened, and his smile grew wider. “You came.”
She stepped forward from the shadow on the other side of the bridge and held up her fingers in a little wave. “I came.”
She lifted the hem of her dress. “Do you know how hard it is to climb up to the sun deck with these shoes?”
He walked to her. “I was counting on that.” He lifted a finger i
n front of his lips and lowered his voice. “Shh. Don’t tell anyone.” At her puzzled expression, he explained. “From experience, I know that not many passengers come up here after the banquet. But, just in case, I’ll help you on the way down so you don’t fall.” Another accident was the last thing he needed.
Her expression softened, and the corner of her mouth lifted. “Watch what you say, Captain. That sounds premeditated.”
Of course he’d planned to see her alone. If that was premeditation, then he’d confess to it. “Guilty.”
That elicited another smile from her. “Since you’re confessing, are you going to tell me why you asked me to meet you here?”
Matias bridged the distance between them until they stood in front of each other. “I really wanted to dance with you.” The breeze blew stray hairs in front of her, and Matias brushed them off, his fingers skimming across her shoulder.
“And the music?”
“In my pocket.” He reached into his coat pocket and withdrew his smartphone. With a few taps, Matias brought up the playlist he’d compiled earlier. He swiped the volume on high and propped the phone on the floor against the bridge’s outside wall. It was loud enough for them to hear it, but not so loud as to draw attention.
Then he turned up his palm toward her. “May I have this dance, Vanessa?”
She placed her hand in his. “As long as you don’t mind being stepped on.”
Matias brought her closer to him. “I don’t mind.” Not one little bit.
Vanessa took a breath, releasing it slowly, and he found himself doing the same. Was she as nervous as he was?
In her heels, their bodies fit comfortably at the same height, hip to hip, chest to chest. He gripped her fingers and pressed his cheek against hers. She smelled of ripe fruit and bright sun, like a summer day in the countryside. He inhaled, committing the scent to memory, willing his mind to remember the softness of her skin, the hushed brushing of her dress against his pants, the way his heart skipped in time with the beating of her pulse under his thumb. The sounds of the summer night and the flowing river mingled with the ballads playing on his phone and, for this moment alone, nothing else mattered.
“I’ve been meaning to tell you how amazing you look in that dress,” he said in a low voice.
Her pacing faltered for a moment, but she quickly recovered. “Thank you. Juliette forced me to buy it.”
“Who’s Juliette?”
“My roommate from college.”
“Please send my heartfelt thanks to Juliette. She has extremely good taste.”
Her expression bloomed into a smile. “You like it that much?”
“Only because you’re wearing it.”
As the music played on, she relaxed, and they grew more comfortable with each other. They stood together, shuffling more than dancing and not really paying attention to the tempo in each song. But he didn’t care. He had her in his arms, and that was all that mattered.
“This is nice,” he said. It was a lot more than nice, but even if he’d known any poetry to recite by heart, the words would have failed him. “If I had the magic to make a moment last forever, this would be it.”
Vanessa pulled back a little to look him in the eyes. “This very moment?”
He stopped and met her gaze. In the waning moonlight and the floodlights of the ship, her eyes had a subdued sparkle. But the question was there, and he replied to it the only way he knew how.
With a hand around her back and the other on the side of her face, Matias leaned in and brushed his lips against hers. Vanessa didn’t pull back. She grabbed on to his upper arms instead. When she parted her mouth in a soft sigh, Matias deepened the kiss.
This. This was the moment he wanted to keep.
*
Vanessa was dreaming. She was in a beautiful dream, and she didn’t want to wake up.
Matias kissed her softly at first, as if giving her time to withdraw. She didn’t, and the kiss became more insistent, more urgent, eased only by a row of short little kisses, allowing her to catch her breath in between each one before going back for seconds. He tasted of chocolate and coffee and the Portuguese dessert wine they’d served after dinner, and she wanted all the seconds she could have.
More and more and more.
Her head spun and her blood rushed as she wrapped her arms behind his neck to ground herself. Her shoes slipped, and Matias brought her up against him, erasing the last inch between them. He groaned in a short exhale, and Vanessa sighed, parting her lips, and when he deepened the kiss for the briefest of seconds, her knees buckled and she slipped from his grasp.
Matias stood firm and held on to her, or she would have surely fallen. Her cheeks flamed and her chest heaved. Was it the lack of air or the heat inside her that was making it hard to breathe? She closed her eyes, unsure of what feelings coursed through her.
She remained in his arms for a while longer, her pulse slowing and the heat cooling. Matias kept a hand on her back, stroking gently in small circles. He placed a soft kiss on her forehead and stepped back, his hands lingering from her forearms down to her hands in a long caress, until nothing else connected her to him but the tips of their fingers.
Vanessa opened her eyes, grateful for the semi-darkness in which to hide her emotions. Because if someone shone a bright light on them right now, Matias would see everything on her face.
“Vanessa.” His voice came out scratchy, and he cleared his throat. “I guess now we know which moment to keep.”
To keep and to hold forever. A moment to never forget.
She’d been kissed before. She’d even thought she’d had strong feelings for those other guys who’d kissed her. But the connection she felt to Matias went beyond any reasonable explanation she could give herself— a chemistry of the soul, the heart, the body. Never mind they’d known each other only since Monday. He’d turned her world upside down in merely six days.
She bent down and adjusted her shoes, then turned to the river where the darkness was a welcome refuge. What could she say to Matias that wouldn’t make her sound crazy?
He stopped at her side and took her hand in his. His sleeve brushed against her arm, and Vanessa glanced down at their entwined fingers. When she looked back up at him, he brought her hand to his lips and kissed it.
“Matias,” she started, all the words swirling in her head and none making it to her mouth.
A series of insistent beeps interrupted her from the floor and they both turned their attention to it. Matias retrieved his phone from where he’d propped it when they were dancing.
He swiped at the screen, and its light showed Matias’s features for a moment, his eyebrows scrunched in a frown. “I’m sorry. I need to take this.”
He didn’t walk away and didn’t turn his back. Instead, he reached for her hand and took it again.
Her heart jumped and she brought her free hand to her chest, as if it could calm the racing inside her. That sense of belonging returned to her, strong and undeniable.
Matias answered the phone. “Yes?”
A male voice replied to him. Matias listened and his expression tensed. “Right now? You’re sure? In the lounge?” After a short pause he added, “I know.”
He let go of her hand and turned off the screen, then slipped the phone in the pocket of his pants. For a moment, he said nothing.
“Do you need to go to the lounge?”
He nodded. “I do, but you need to come with me.”
Vanessa took a deep breath when they arrived at the entrance to the dining room. Matias placed a hand on her lower back, and she stepped forward. Past the tables and chairs, the lounge was bathed in soft light. The pianist had left, and ambient music played through the sound system instead. Behind the bar, a man in a white shirt stood sideways to them, shaking a small metal canister in his hands.
Matias had been cryptic, not telling her why she needed to come to the lounge with him. Dread filled the pit of her stomach. It was bad enough they’d left the sun deck with
out discussing the earth-shattering kiss they’d shared. Maybe it was for the best. She wouldn’t have known what to say.
In less than forty eight hours, the ship would dock in Porto and the uncertainty between them would only increase.
Why had she kissed the captain? That was one kiss she’d have a hard time forgetting.
Miguel approached Matias and took him aside. They exchanged a few words and then Miguel left.
“What’s going on, Matias?”
He tipped his head toward the bar. “Come on. We’ll talk over there.”
When they arrived, the barman turned around. “Hello, Vanessa.”
She gasped. “Grandfather?”
He poured the contents of the small canister inside a glass, his movements slow and measured.
Matias stepped aside, back straight. “Good evening, sir. Welcome aboard.”
Vanessa’s jaw went slack. “You knew? You knew he was here, and you didn’t tell me?”
Grandfather braced a hand on the bar in her direction. “Don’t blame Captain Romano, Vanessa. I wanted to come and I didn’t give anyone else much choice.”
She shook her head and took a step back. “I can’t do this. Not right now.”
Grandfather moved from around the bar. “I’m not staying, but I’d like a few minutes. Please.”
Vanessa stopped. She’d hid her clenched hands in the folds of her dress. Slowly, she released each finger, easing the tension from her body.
Grandfather reached for the glass and downed the amber liquid in one gulp. “Captain, I will need a word with you before I go.”
Matias nodded.
Grandfather hesitated. “Can we step out to the balcony? I promise I’ll be brief.”
Vanessa folded her arms around her waist and nodded. She followed him to the space just outside the lounge. He left the sliding door partially open and, through the tinted glass, Matias stared at them from a barstool. She moved to the railing, and Grandfather settled a few yards away.
For a man in his mid-sixties, he looked younger. His hair was gray at the temples but it suited him. He wore a pair of black pants and a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up. Nobody would ever guess that behind the simple outfit stood a powerful man.
Meet Me At Sunrise (Destined for Love: Europe) Page 11