Page 35 of The Moon & His Tides
“I don’t care what anyone thinks,” she stated mulishly, and then, when I maintained steady eye contact with her, the line of her shoulders softened. “Unless they matter to me.”
“That’s fair. I want people to enjoy my work, but I don’t care much about what people think of me as a person beyond my family. They mean everything to me.”
“Families don’t often survive this,” she warned me, as though she was a sixty-year-old veteran of cinema and not a girl on the cusp of womanhood. “Fame and success and Hollywood.”
“If you love something, you fight for it.”
“But it comes down to the question of which you love more, fame or family? Sometimes, it’s too much to fight for both.”
She watched me shrug a little helplessly with those intense purple-blue eyes and brought her arms up to hug herself as though she was only just now noticing the cold. After a moment, she let out a soft, dramatic sigh Scarlett O’Hara would have been proud of and collapsed in on herself like a ribbon, falling seamlessly to the tiles beside the pool. Lying on her back, she trailed a hand in the water and looked up at the sky.
“You can hardly see the stars in London,” she murmured. The words practically ached with homesickness.
I slipped back into the water to warm up, still unwilling to go to bed even though exhaustion tugged at my lids. Resting the back of my head on the lip of the pool, I looked up at the same sky, my gaze automatically finding the moon.
“When I miss home, I think about my loved ones looking up at the moon. It makes me feel better to know wherever we are in the world, we’re under the same sky.”
For the first time that night, Linnea looked over at me like I was someone worthy of looking at. Like I was beautiful.
“I like that,” she whispered before looking up at the stars again. “Under the same sky.”
We stayed like that for a long time, staring up at the dark night littered with dim stars and the fat swell of the moon. It was peaceful in a way that settled my restless spirit, and when I finally dragged myself to bed, I fell into a deep sleep the moment my head hit the pillow.
10
SEBASTIAN
“Are you ready to go, darling?” Savannah asked me the moment I walked into their beautiful, light-filled kitchen the following morning.
She stood at the counter drinking coffee from a dainty cup and saucer with a gold rim while she looked over her tablet. The drinking and lateness of the night before had absolutely no bearing on her beauty. Her skin was unblemished and glowing as though she’d pulled down the moonbeams and swallowed them whole. In a pink tweed skirt suit that was no doubt designer and high heels, she looked ready to meet withVogue.
I blinked at her a little owlishly.
She sighed, but a little smile played at the edges of her pink-painted mouth. “Late night?”
I grunted because, yes, it had been, and the guest house contained no coffee.
Her laughter roused me from my stupor. “I saw you in the pool with Miranda’s unfortunate-looking daughter before I went to sleep.”
“She’s a kid,” I corrected with a frown because that was ungenerous of her. “I’m sure she’ll grow into herself. There are many ways for a woman to be beautiful, and very few of them have anything to do with her looks.”
Something softened slightly in her face as she looked at me that made something soften within me too. “I’m surprised I didn’t tire you out.”
I was too tired to flirt well, but I managed a crooked grin as I stepped close to take the coffee from her slim fingers and swallow it all down in one gulp. Finished, I kissed her fragrant cheek. “You riled me up and left me wanting, and you know it.”
The sound she made was practically a purr of satisfaction. “I know nothing of the sort, I’m sure.”
“Mmm,” I hummed as I noticed the fancy Italian espresso machine on the counter and set about making a fresh cup without asking for permission. “Do you want another?”
“Well, seeing as you stole mine, yes, I would.”
“It was for your own good really,” I teased. “If I’m driving precious cargo, I need to be alert.”
Her coyness fell away like a veil, and a genuine little “O” of sweet shock formed between her lips. Unable to give up my mission for coffee, I sacrificed one hand to tug her closer and tuck her into my side. As I tamped the coffee, I pressed another kiss to her hair.
“Don’t act so surprised,duchessa mia,” I murmured. “You must know how precious you are already. It can’t take a poor Italian driver to make you see sense.”
But to my surprise, she shivered a little at my words and pushed just a little bit closer into the curve of my arm. “Not everyone can be as kind to themselves as I’m coming to find you are to yourself.”
