Page 55 of Ciao, Amore

VOLCANO

DANI

Dani had already been upfor an hour. The ping of her phone had woken her from the best sleep she’d had since leaving New York. As she reached for the phone, she spied the small notebook on the bedside table with a pencil next to it. Nico’s, except this one didn’t have her name on it. Quickly, she leaned over and sneaked a peek inside. It looked like lines of poetry and random pretty words. The last entry read simply “Hopes / Dreams.”

Nico wrote poetry? She should have known. He had that kind of soul that seemed to be in search of truth and beauty in the world despite his self-professed status as a cynical asshole.

She put the notepad where she’d found it and picked up her phone. It was a message from Terri, with a short video of Kiki hesitantly walking into her dad’s arms. There was a lot of applause and cheering, and the baby looked so proud of herself.

Dani texted back: “Congrats to my little walker! Love her so much. Kisses from Auntie.”

Miraculously, Nico was still passed out beside her; for once, he’d missed a morning workout. Maybe he didn’t have the energy for one after she’d drained him a couple of times until dawn. Snuggling in, she wiped away silly tears and watched his face. So peaceful. Beautiful. This was definitely a view a woman could get used to if she wasn’t careful. If she lost all her senses and let herself fall.

Nope. This wasn’t why she came to Italy. Not for this. Not for him.

As if aware of her thoughts about him, Nico stirred, then stretched and came fully awake. That sleepy, heavy-lidded grin melted a hole in the crystal armor encasing her heart and stole inside. But when he saw her eyes were wet, he sobered and touched her face, wiping the tears.

“What’s wrong,amore?”

“Terri sent me this.” Dani showed him the short video, which he watched with a soft smile.

“What a great moment. She’s precious,” he said. His eyes shifted back to her face, searching. “Miss them?”

Suddenly inarticulate from the tears thickening her throat, she nodded silently.

“Aw. Come here, sweetheart.” Nico pulled her down into his arms, and she nestled there, soaking in his comfort, and let herself go wonderfully boneless as he rubbed her back, then stroked her frizzy curls. “You could go home. I’m sure your company would let you get your position back there if you asked. And if you did stay in New York, I’d stay there too. Wherever you want to go, Dani, I’m on board that flight.”

The quiet suggestion stopped her heart with its loveliness, its magnitude.

“I’m going to Milan,” she said, wiping her own face. “I’m not changing my plans before I’ve even tried to see if I can do it.”

“Alright, then, I’m staying too. I’ll say yes to Nonno." When her head shot up to stare at him, he palmed the side of her face, looking into her eyes, not allowing her to look away. “Daniela, I—"

“Yo, Nico. You guys up yet? Gonna be late.Andiamo, Nicodemo.”

“Shutup, Tommy,” Nico turned and shouted. “Fuck it. That’s it. I’m gonna kill him.”

Nico jumped out of bed, pulled on his boxers, and went to fling the door open. Once in the hallway, he shut the door behind him to start cursing at Tommy. A chorus of giggling kids drowned him out.

“Barbarians at the gate.Roma victa,” Dani murmured.

Dani got up to go out to the garden. Saved by the bell. While Nico raged at his brother for the interruption and the kids screamed, she breathed deeply of the salt-tinged morning air and calmed her racing heart. Call her a cowardly lion, but she’d been afraid to hear what Nico might say next, what he might offer, or what he would demand.

She slapped her cheeks and berated herself with a smile. Something was really wrong with her. A year ago, this would have been exactly what she’d wanted, but not like this; not because they were so hot for each other physically that it was about to stomp all over common sense. Sex chemicals were one helluva drug. Changing her entire life plan on his whims—no matter how good it felt to be with him in this short yet wonderful time—would be foolish. He’d be done with this the first time she gave him a lackluster orgasm.

Go ahead, keep telling yourself that,said a quiet, unbidden voice in her head.

By the time he returned, saying, “Sorry about them, again. But we should get ready for Pompeii,” she’d already resolved once again to ignore the heavy shit and chose to enjoy him and the day ahead.

“Awesome. Want to hit that shower together?”

Without hesitating, he obliged. And the thorough tongue bath he treated her nipples and her pussy to while they were in there was the best way she’d ever been washed up. After that, when she was on her knees with the shower spraying water on her head and his cum flooding her mouth, he growled her name, hand tight in her hair. It was the sweetest sound she’d ever heard.

Maybe she was already too far gone.

The drive to Pompeii took about half an hour. As usual, Nico held Dani’s hand all the way through the ruined city as he told her about the fateful day of the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. It was a story most kids learned in school in the States, but seeing the ancient walls, houses, and shops—some of which were well-intact—brought on a chill as she walked through them.

“It’s so much bigger than I was imagining,” she said as they walked down what had been a public road with stores on either side. “I don’t know why it always sounded like some tiny fishing village.”

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