Page 124 of Love Among the Ruins
CHAPTERTHIRTY-THREE
DOMINIC
Eleni was going to go skinny dipping in the pool?
The wild and wicked thought clung to Dominic like a leech as he quickly got out of his tux and into sweatpants.
He felt guilty as soon as he’d found her sitting alone by the pool eating dinner by herself. He should have asked her to come with him to the pre-wedding cocktail party. She tried to make out it didn’t matter, but he could see that he’d hurt her, and that had been the last thing on his mind.
He’d spent most of the day talking about business, first over lunch, then over drinks later. Demi had been thrilled to see him and had introduced him to her fiancé before inviting him to the cocktail party.
Knowing that Eleni had landed, he hadn’t planned on staying too late but unfortunately, the soon-to-be-married couple had insisted he stay a bit longer.
So he had.
In a way, it helped him to keep his distance from Eleni. It was why he hadn’t replied to her text messages. As much as it had pained him, he’d forced himself to ignore them because he didn’t want to get sucked up in an exchange which might turn flirty.
That would be dangerous, and he couldn’t afford for that to happen now.
But she had plans to go skinny dipping.
He recoiled, burned by a sense of shame for holding the image her words had drawn for him.
Even now his sixth sense told him to go back to his room, but his legs moved towards Eleni. He poured himself a glass of whiskey on the way out to the pool where Eleni had cleared the table and was sitting in her shorts and tank top.
God help him this weekend.
A muscle twitched along his jaw. He was so used to having women throw themselves at him, that this was a new and unfamiliar feeling, wanting the one woman who didn’t want him.
“Let’s discuss.” He sat down, next to her this time, and noted that she moved her chair away a few inches.
Keep your shit together, Dominic.
“Okay.” Eleni steepled her fingers together. “Let’s do this. How did we meet?”
“Why don’t we just say what really happened?” Telling the truth was always the best option. It avoided the need for inventing the hundred and one white lies which usually followed a big lie.
“You mean when I poured juice all over you at the taverna?”
He laughed at the memory, and so did she. “It’s a good story,” she insisted.
He agreed. “Itisa good story.”
“It’s the type of story people would want to tell their children, or grandchildren.” She blinked rapidly a few times, as if she’d made a mistake; had said too much and wanted to walk it back. “If this wasn’t a fake dating situation.”
“But it did happen in real life,” he remarked, rather soberly.
“You know what I mean.” She waved a hand between them. “If this were real.”
He wished it could be real. Everything about her, about being with her.
“But it’s not.” Her left shoulder lifted. He hated that she could so easily dismiss it. That she wasn’t wrapped up in the angst which consumed him every time he thought about her.
“Fine. We’ll say we met at the taverna.” He tapped his fingers on the table.
“What if people find it strange that I work for you?”
“What if they do?”
