by L. M Anthony
Chapter Seventeen
I didn’t get a chance to ask Laura about why she was staring at me throughout the function. I was too caught up in our easy conversation during dinner to be concerned about it.
Then, of course, all thoughts about it fled my mind when we stopped in the park and Laura told me how much she wanted me.
I drove home as fast as I dared, hard and aching, wanting Laura so badly that I could barely think straight. Laura wasn’t touching me, her gaze on me as I drove, but I could still feel the heat from her body. I almost dropped my keys as we left the car, and Laura was on me in a moment, her hands flying over my shoulders and chest while my arms found her waist and settled on the curve of her hips.
I don’t remember how we got in the door or up the stairs. We found the closest bedroom door, which happened to be Laura’s room, and stumbled inside it, pressed close and touching each other like we wouldn’t get another moment together ever again. I felt light and happy underneath the arousal, and my heart sang to hear Laura’s laughter as we fell down on the mattress together. I pulled back and Laura smiled up at me, her amusement becoming something softer as she reached up to cup my cheeks in her hands.
“You look so happy,” she said, her eyes searching mine. “Are you really that happy with me? Is it possible for you to heal with me?”
The words were on my lips. Part of me wanted to tell her that I had fallen in love with her. But I held them back. It wasn’t the right moment, not with everything that was still unsaid. So I simply smiled and curled a piece of hair around my finger.
“Some days are harder than others,” I said. It was still hard to talk about the days that had hurt so much, but it was getting easier with every moment I spent with Laura. “After everything that’s happened, I’m not sure that hurt will ever completely go away. But I can still trust. And it gets easier to bear every day that I’m with you. The pain is still there, but you make it less potent.”
I caught a glimpse of Laura’s eyes filling with tears before she buried her face in my shoulder. I simply held her, feeling a little overwhelmed myself. It wasn’t the confession part of me burned to make. But it was close enough for now.
“I’m glad,” she murmured.
I felt her lips on my shoulder, reminding me of my burning need. Then she pulled back and looked up at me. All trace of tears were gone, and I couldn’t help but lean down and kiss her fiercely, our tongues tangling together as Laura arched up against me, trying to feel more of me. Her lips moved desperately against mine, and I wondered if the messages and feelings we were trying to send each other were the same.
But none of that mattered right now. What did matter was how much we wanted each other. I felt Laura fumbling with my belt, and then she unzipped my pants, pressing her palm against my already thick erection. I gasped at the feeling.
“Mio dio,” I groaned.
Laura moaned a little in response to the Italian. Her fingers paused on my zipper, and then she tugged it down even more urgently as I started pulling her dress up, her hips lifting to help me. Then she sat up, leaving my pants open, and we got the dress over her head before throwing it to the floor.
Then I pushed my pants down, toeing off my socks at the same time. Laura hooked her fingers in my shirt, leaning in close to me, before slowly starting to undo the buttons. Her fingers left fiery trails on my skin, and I trembled at the feeling.
“You tease,” I groaned.
The shirt slid down my shoulders as Laura grinned. Now we were both left only in our underwear. I reached around Laura, fiddling with the clasp of her bra while her fingers hooked in the hem of my boxers. I could feel her touch on my heated skin, and then she slid her hands over my hips as I popped the clasp, my boxers falling at the same time.
I reached down and felt the smooth silk of Laura’s panties. Her hips raised in anticipation, but I could see how wet the material was and, instead, I pressed my fingers to her vagina through the cloth. She gasped and bucked.
“God, please, Matteo,” she groaned.
I grinned.
“It’s my turn to tease,” I said.
I pushed her back to the bed and leaned down, my eyes on her perky breasts. They were perfectly round, and just the sight of them was inviting me to touch them. One hand was still between her legs, and the other hand gripped her hip. I closed my mouth gently over her left nipple, making her gasp sharply, and teased it with my tongue. Laura groaned and writhed beneath me, panting and crying out wordlessly, completely overwhelmed with the new feeling. It was enough to make me pull back.
“Is this alright?” I asked, hoping I hadn’t gone too far.
“Don’t stop!” she exclaimed, head thrown back.
Chuckling, I leaned back down to give her other breast the same attention. She groaned deeply in her throat, making me aware of just how uncomfortably hard I was.
It was that, more than anything, that made me pull back, struggling to control my own breathing. Beneath me, Laura was limp and overwhelmed, trying to catch her breath as her legs fell invitingly open.
There was no more teasing. We both needed each other badly. I pulled Laura’s panties off and she wrapped her legs around me, pulling me in close.
“Sei così bisognoso,” I murmured, looking over her.
Laura groaned. I loved her reaction to my home language. I couldn’t wait to hear Italian falling from her own lips. Would it arouse me as much as it aroused her? Pushing the thought from my mind, I got myself ready, lining my cock against her body. In response, she loosened her grip on me a little, and I gave her a moment before slowly pushing in.
Laura gasped and clutched the bed sheets beneath her, breathing deeply as I moved slowly into her. I forced myself to hold back, well aware that these sensations were still somewhat new for her. When I was fully seated in her, we paused. I would give Laura whatever time she needed to adjust but, surprisingly quickly, she thrust her hips up, making me groan at the unexpected movement.
“Move,” she panted.
I drew a deep breath and then slowly slid out, making sure to move slowly so as not to hurt Laura. But she clutched my shoulders, her nails digging into the skin.
“Harder,” she hissed at me. “Please.”
I didn’t know whether to give in, but the flush of heat that rushed through me at her words decided it, and my next thrust drove deep inside her. Laura threw her head back with a cry, and her grip on me became impossibly tight and almost painful. But I barely even noticed as I thrust into her body, her hips meeting mine. Heat built up around us, flaring into an inferno that slowly dragged us quicker and quicker to the approaching orgasm. I thrust a few more times as Laura cried out again, her movements clumsy and sloppy before her body finally tensed and trembled with another sharp exclamation.
Her body tightened around me, and I managed a few more thrusts before my orgasm was squeezed out of me too. Black washed momentarily across my vision at the force of it and, when it cleared, I slowly pulled out of Laura in order to collapse down beside her, panting. I looked over at Laura and managed a smile that she returned.
“All good?” I asked sleepily.
“Amazing,” she said, a repetition of the first time we’d had sex.
I smiled.
“Bed, I think,” I said. “And maybe, in the morning, you can tell me what you’ve been thinking about all day.”
Laura smiled at me as we scooted upward, heading for the covers.
“Sounds good,” she said with a yawn. “Sleep now, though.”
We curled up together beneath the covers of the bed. As we slowly drifted off to sleep, however, I couldn’t help the single dark thought that permeated the contentedness that had come over me.
Would this be the last time we spent the night together?
Chapter Eighteen
When I woke, I had managed to forget the darkness that had momentarily come over me. However, it came back all too soon when Laura sat up to check her phone and her face fell.
“Is there something wrong?” I asked with a frown, leaning over to look.
Biting her lip, Laura turned her phone to show me the screen. There was nothing on it other than her clock.
“Nothing…literally,” she said. “Normally there’s a message from Dina…but nothing today.”
Ah. Of course, I had noticed that Laura had gotten some messages from Dina, messages that she never responded to. I had been wondering, too, whether to bring up her best friend. With Laura departing Italy soon, it didn’t feel right to allow her to leave with regrets, as she surely would if she didn’t speak to Dina.
“Maybe she hasn’t gotten up yet,” I said.
Laura frowned. “Maybe,” she muttered. “It was pretty odd for her to send those messages so early. She isn’t normally a morning person.”
She sighed. She looked oddly lonely despite the fact that she was sitting here with me.
“Am I being selfish?” she asked, looking at me with beseeching eyes. “Expecting a message from her when she still doesn’t even know where we stand because I’m too much of a coward to call her and tell her that I’m not that angry anymore?”
For a moment, I wondered whether to lie to her. But I hadn’t done so yet, and I wasn’t about to start now. Besides, I thought Laura might need a little push on this one.
“A little,” I said bluntly, and she winced. “But I do understand. You’re not being cowardly. It’s natural to stress about making up with someone, especially if they’re important. You’ve built something up in your mind, even if isn’t completely the truth, which makes you hesitate.”
Laura looked down at her phone. Then she sighed.
“Yeah,” she said. “That definitely makes me feel like a coward. I should call her. I just don’t know what to say to her now.”
“I understand you feel hurt,” I said. “But isn’t Dina your best friend?”
“She is,” Laura agreed, nodding. “That hasn’t changed at all. I just needed to process what happened.”
“But you’ve processed,” I said. Laura glanced at me, listening closely. “You aren’t angry anymore. But if you leave things as they are, it’s going to be impossible to go back to the way things used to be. Dina probably misses you just as much and is equally unsure how to approach this.”
From the expression that crossed Laura’s face, I knew this hadn’t occurred to her at all. I reached out and touched her hand.
“I know things happened with Lorenzo, but is he worth losing your friendship with Dina?” I said, driving the final point home.
The horror that spread across her face said it all.
“God, no,” she said.
In many ways, Laura and I both knew that she had been a little unfair to Dina. Her friend had made a mistake and accidentally hurt Laura in the process, but that shouldn’t be enough to cause them to lose each other, and especially not over a bastard like Lorenzo.
“I’ll go have a shower,” I said with a smile. “You make your call.”
“Thank you,” Laura said earnestly, already looking for Dina’s number in her contacts. “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
I gathered my clothes and left. Her words, however, stung far more than I think she meant them to. As her door snapped closed behind me, I paused and closed my eyes.
I’d wanted Laura to leave Italy without any regrets. I only hoped that our relationship didn’t become one as well.
***
Laura was in an incredibly good mood when she returned from meeting Dina. I had been a bit worried about her going back to that house, of course, though mostly because of Lorenzo.
“It sounds like you had a good day,” I said as she chattered. I had been working when she bounced in, looking pleased, but I didn’t mind the interruption. “You and Dina are okay now?”
“She apologized, and I apologized, too,” Laura said, beaming. “Maybe if I had stayed to talk to her about it all, it wouldn’t have gotten so messed up. And it was stupid of me to be angry in the first place, anyway. Lorenzo wasn’t my boyfriend, and I didn’t even like him. I just wanted to…”
She trailed off and flushed. I knew what she was about to say, but I politely ignored her confessing that she had wanted to sleep with another man.
Though…
“Was he there?” I asked as casually as I could.
I was relieved when she wrinkled her nose.
“Yeah,” she said. “He even tried to flirt with me again.” She paused, thinking. Then she smiled at me. “But I didn’t feel anything at all for him.”
My heart rose. I didn’t realize just how worried I had been about losing Laura to Lorenzo because of lust until she wiped away those fears. It was gratifying to hear that her feelings for me trumped whatever she had felt for Lorenzo.
“Great,” I said, ducking my head to hide my smile. From her giggle, I knew she had seen it anyway. “I’m glad you had a good day. Are you interested in going out to dinner tonight?”
Laura’s face lit up at the prospect. “Where?’ she asked eagerly.
“I’ve made reservations at the Osteria degli Spiriti,” I explained. “It’s a Michelin star restaurant, so it’s high class. Is that alright?”
“That’s fine,” Laura said, grinning. “I better start getting ready!”
She whirled away before I could say anything more. I shook my head fondly and returned to my work. I was looking forward to our date tonight, but it was also hard not to wonder if this would be the last time we would get to go on a date.
After all, Laura would leave in three days.
***
The Osteria degli Spirit was one of my favorite restaurants in Lecce. With its high stone ceiling, beige curtains and earth coloring, it usually felt down-to-earth and cozy. Laura, dressed nicely in a green cocktail dress that she had brought from America, was looking around in amazement, her eyes darting everywhere as she tried to take it all in. She barely even noticed as I gave my name to the waiter and led her to our table.
“This place is beautiful,” Laura said in awe.
“It is,” I agreed, pleased that she was happy. “I enjoy coming here.”
Laura smiled at me.“Thank you for bringing me here,” she said. “We should definitely come here again one day!”
I felt a pang. I didn’t want to think about the future right now. The time was fast approaching when we would both have to make a decision. I already knew what I wanted; even if Laura returned to America, I wanted us to find some way to stay together.
But what did Laura want? I didn’t doubt that she liked me. The way she looked at me sometimes made me wonder if her feelings for me had begun running just as deeply as my feelings for her. Yet, she still hadn’t told me that she would be leaving soon. She hadn’t mentioned her departure at all despite it coming up so quickly.
Now would be a good time to talk about it. We could discuss what we both wanted, and what we could do about it. I couldn’t bring myself to say anything, however. Part of me was frightened that she would tell me she wanted to break up because she didn’t want to be in a long distance relationship.
No, I wouldn’t say anything yet. We only had three more days together. I wouldn’t ruin these last moments I could spend with her.
“Are you alright?” Laura asked. “You look like you’re thinking pretty deeply about something.”
“I’m fine,” I assured her. “I was just thinking about a persistent problem. It’s not something to talk about now,” I added when she opened her mouth. “Tonight, it’s about us.”
Laura closed her mouth and smiled. A waiter approached and poured two glasses of champagne for us.
“Are you ready to order?” he asked politely in Italian.
“Not yet,” I said with a smile. “Thank you.”
“I recognized some of that,” Laura said, lighting up. “Did he… ask what we wanted?”
“He asked if we were ready to order,” I corrected with a laugh. “But close. I told him we weren’t ready yet. It looks
like your lessons with Chiara are coming along nicely. How is she doing with English?”
“She’s picking it up quicker than I am Italian.” Laura grinned. “I guess, because she’s heard you speak English before, she knows more than she thought.”
“I do speak to a lot of my associates in English as it’s a common language most of us share,” I said with a nod. “She also does have a basic understanding of the language, too, which would have helped. On the other hand, you didn’t have anywhere to start. You had to start learning everything from scratch.”
“Well, she’s learning quickly, and I’m picking things up, too,” Laura said.
I wondered what the two of them would do once Laura left. They had become fast friends over the course of the last two weeks. Would they exchange numbers or email addresses in order to keep in contact and continue their lessons?
If Laura could keep in contact with Chiara, surely it wouldn’t be hard to keep in contact with me, too? I pushed the thought away, reminding myself that a long distance relationship with a boyfriend was a lot different to a long distance relationship with a friend.
“I’m glad the two of you became friends,” I said.
“Chiara is great,” Laura said, smiling. “She’s got so many dreams, and she’s always so happy and kind. I’d like to introduce her to Dina; I think the two of them would get along.”
I thought about what I knew of Dina and laughed. She and Chiara were fairly similar and would probably become even quicker friends than Chiara and Laura had. It was almost amusing to realize that Laura had made friends with two women who were so alike.
“Maybe we can arrange it soon,” I said.
Something flashed across Laura’s vision. Was she, too, remembering how little time was left?
“Sounds good,” she said after a moment.
Talking about the future was painful. Despite all my efforts, I just couldn’t escape the knowledge of what was approaching. Even being here with Laura reminded me that it would be some time, if ever, before I could take her here again.
I wanted to get down on bended knee and beg Laura to stay here with me. But that would be selfish of me. She had a home and a family back in America. Asking her to move countries for me would be a bit much.