Page 20 of My Super Sexy Spy
Then we got to the bridge, which was old and stunning and took my breath away. I made Ted take a picture of me, then we found a fellow tourist to take a picture of us together.
I stared at the picture on my phone and thought he had a really nice smile. This would totally work for the book because we both looked…happy.
Finally, as the day crept into later afternoon, we realized we needed enough strength to find our way to where the water shuttle was going to pick us up to take us to the hotel.
“Past the juggler, left at the wall with the crying faces and right at the mime. Then we follow that through three piazzas, one scary alley and we’re back to the water shuttle. I think.” I’d taken over navigation when Ted finally gave up with the map.
“Did you just hear yourself right now?” Ted said, chuckling.
“What? We have to figure this out or we’ll be lost in Venice forever!”
He laughed but trusted my directions. After almost another hour of walking we finally made it to the dock where the shuttle was due to arrive in twenty minutes.
“Wait here,” Ted said.
I stretched out on the bench I was sitting on. “Trust me, I’m not moving. I don’t think I could take another step.”
My legs were literally throbbing. Hours of nothing but walking. It had been years since I’d walked so much in one day. But it had been totally worth it. Venice was unlike any place I’d ever seen before. There was no research that could have recreated this experience. No Google Map image that would have smelled and tasted like Venice.
All this time I’d been perpetuating a fraud on my readers. Giving them words and ideas they wanted to believe about places around the world.
What I hadn’t been giving them was the actual world.
That was going to have to change.
And spending the day with Ted had made it that much more fun. Someone who was seeing the amazing, the ridiculous and the breathtaking right alongside me. In my blog, I was the Lover, but now I could see how traveling was really meant to be done with people you could share the experiences with.
He came back holding two glasses of white wine.
“Turns out I do believe in God,” I told him as he sat next to me. “Because I prayed for this and you brought it to me!”
He laughed and handed me the glass. “Figured you were about as spent as I was.”
“Most def.” I took a sip and sighed. “I think today might have been my most perfect day.”
He nudged my shoulder. “Not going to lie. For someone so flat chested you’re pretty good company.”
“Swear to God if I didn’t need this glass of wine, I would chuck it in your face right now.”
He laughed again and I joined him. When we were done, he took our glasses back to the outside bar where he’d gotten them, and the water shuttle pulled up exactly on time.
It was strange, but as we split up to head to our rooms—I desperately needed a shower and a nap—it felt wrong. Like all of a sudden, something was missing. We didn’t make plans for dinner. The truth was I was too exhausted to think about food. I figured a shower, a quick nap then maybe I would head to the hotel bar to see if Mr. Dangerous was there.
I could have a drink, get a snack. If Ted showed up, then he showed up. As long as he didn’t cock block me, it could even be a more perfect end to a perfect day.
5
Later That Night
Hotel Bar
Beth
And he was here.Not that I’d been waiting for him. Exactly.
“You have a very lovely name, Beth.”
I smiled at Mr. Dangerous, who was sitting next to me. He’d been in the bar when I got here and didn’t waste any time buying me a drink as soon as I sat down. Even though it had been my plan to approach him.
