Soldier, Hero...Husband?

by Cara Colter

  No, what made the moment beautiful was her joy. What made the moment astounding was the serious expression gone from her face and the sorrow completely erased from her eyes. No matter what the danger to himself, Connor was glad he had given her this moment.

  “I think that’s probably enough for today,” he said gruffly. “We’ll start some basic arm work tomorrow, moving toward a front crawl. And we’ll do work on your legs with a kickboard. By the end of the week, you’ll be swimming across this pool by yourself.”

  “Really?”

  “You are a complete natural.”

  “I am?” she asked, so pleased.

  “Absolutely.”

  “What an amazing afternoon.” She cocked her head at him. “What do the American teenagers say? Awesome!”

  She was standing facing him. She leaned a bit closer. He had plenty of time to move away from her. But somehow he didn’t, frozen to the spot, like a deer in headlights, not able to back away from where awesome could take them.

  She stood on tippy toes. Her body, slippery and lithe, came in contact with his in a far different way than it had when he was using his arms to buoy her up in the water. She kissed him, a tiny brushing of their lips.

  He, of all people, knew how little time it took to change everything. A millisecond. The time for a bullet to find its way from rifle to target, the time for tires to crunch across the trigger device on an explosive, the time for a school to go from rooms of laughing children to completely engulfed in flames. He, of all people, knew how quickly everything could change.

  But maybe he hadn’t known this: as quickly as you could be sucked into darkness and everything could shatter around you, just as quickly you could be thrust toward the light, propelled into a world that promised love was stronger.

  Love? He felt furious with himself, and not too happy with Isabella, either. But then she was backed away from him, still laughing, that delightful, carefree, water-over-rocks laughter, as if she had no awareness at all how badly she had just disrupted his well-ordered world.

  “Thank you, Connor. I can’t wait for tomorrow.”

  And then she walked away from him, through the water, by herself, the woman she had been an hour ago—clinging to the handrail and then to him—gone forever.

  Isabella got out of the pool without the benefit of the stairs. She put her hands on the deck and levered herself out, wiggling her bottom at him in the process. And then, free of the pool, she gathered up that voluminous caftan but didn’t put it on. She scampered across the deck to the cabana, not once looking back.

  Thank goodness she did not look back. Because she would have seen him, still standing in the water, stunned by the power of that one tiny little brush of lips. To change everything.

  The man he had been an hour ago might have been gone forever, too. Because the thing about a kiss like that? It opened a door. It opened a door that was pretty darned difficult to wrestle shut again once it had been opened. It changed everything in subtle ways.

  Connor sucked in a deep breath. He said a word under his breath that he would never say in Isabella’s presence. He dived under the surface of the water. His momentum carried him to one end of the pool. Though there was hardly room to get going, he began to do furious laps, butterfly stroke.

  But by the time Isabella emerged from the cabana, he was aware that swimming had not defused what he was feeling. Even that most challenging stroke did not begin to burn off the fire that brush of her lips against his had stoked within him.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  ISABELLA CONTEMPLATED THE fact that she had kissed Connor Benson. Really, as far as kisses went, it had been nothing. A peck. A thank-you.

  But even in Italy, where people were passionate, a thank-you kiss might normally be placed on the cheek, not the lips.

  Connor’s lips looked so firm. And yet, giving under the pressure of hers, they had felt soft and pliable. His lips had tasted of something, but she wasn’t sure what. It had been pure, like holding out your tongue to catch raindrops.

  Heaven. That’s what they had tasted of. The problem was, after tasting something like that, a person could spend her life in pursuit of it. It had really been a foolish thing to do, reckless, especially with them living under her roof together.

  But in that moment, after the lesson, she had just felt so bold, so ready to do just as he suggested, to ride the wave of discovery instead of fighting it. It had been wonderful tackling the water, doing something she had always been afraid of. It had made her feel free in a way she never had before.

  From the moment she had chosen that bathing suit over the far more conservative ones available, even with the limited selection in Monte Calanetti at this time of year, Isabella had felt she was saying yes to life.

  The swimming lesson itself had made her feel so alive and so bold and as if the world and this day were plump with possibilities instead of just one day following the next, safe and routine.

  Isabella came out of the cabana and saw that Connor was swimming like a man possessed. The stroke he was using was amazing, his powerful arms and shoulders lifting his torso and propelling him out of the water as if he had been shot out of a cannon.

  He noticed her, she was not sure how, and he stopped and stood up. He folded his arms over the lines of his chest. Her awareness of him rippled through her like a current that could sweep her away.

  “I forgot to tell you, I found another place to stay,” he said.

  She knew instantly he was lying. He hadn’t found another place to stay. He had tasted the reckless danger, too, as soon as her lips had touched his, and decided to find different accommodations.

  He was acknowledging something was going on between them. Something more powerful than he could control. And even though he had told her to ride the wave of discovery, he was not prepared to do that himself.

  She held her breath. Was he going to cancel swimming?

  “I’ll see you tomorrow. And I’ll pay you for your place for the agreed dates.” he said. He dived back under the water before she could let him know she was not going to help him assuage his guilt by allowing him to pay her for a room he wasn’t going to occupy.

  Isabella had never really felt this before: an acute awareness of her feminine power.

  She walked home by herself, aware that the buoyancy of the water seemed to have infused her. Even though Connor had said he was moving out, her steps were light, and she felt as if she was walking on air.

  She got home to discover a parcel had been delivered. It was one of the bathing suits she had ordered online, from Milan. She was pleased it had been delivered so quickly, that overnight delivery had meant just that.

  And she was even more pleased when she opened the parcel and slipped the fabric from the tissue paper. So tiny! How could it possibly have cost so much money? Still, she hugged the scraps of fabric to her and went to try the new suit on. It was no more a swimsuit than the lime-green bikini today had been.

  But she had given herself permission, with that first bold choice of a bathing suit, to start exploring a different side of herself. More feminine. More sexy. Deeply alive within her own body. Deeply appreciative of herself as a woman, and of the power that came with acknowledging this new side of herself.

  Isabella was choosing the bathing suits of a woman who wanted a man to be very aware she was a woman. Not to just tease him, but to let him know he was not going to be able to shunt her aside so easily, just because he’d switched from a date to swimming lessons.

  She thought of the way Connor had been swimming when she left Nico’s garden area—like a man possessed, or at the very least, like a man trying to clear his head—and allowed herself the satisfied chuckle of someone who had succeeded beyond their wildest dreams.

  Still, when she heard him come in later, pack his bags and leave, she avoid
ed him. Already her house felt empty without him. If she went and saw him, she was not at all certain she could trust herself not to beg him to stay.

  She would not beg him to stay, but she was not above making him sorry he had left.

  The next day at the pool, she wore the same oversize caftan out onto the deck. Connor was in the pool tossing a blue flutter board into the air and catching it, pretending he’d barely registered her arrival.

  But when she dropped the caftan, he registered her arrival—he missed his catch on the kickboard.

  If it was possible, her new bathing suit, black and shiny, was even skimpier than the one she had worn yesterday. She really took her time getting into the water, savoring the scowl on his face.

  When she reached the bottom stair, he shoved the kickboard at her and snapped some instructions.

  “Aren’t you even going to say hello?” she asked, petulant.

  “Hello,” he snapped.

  “Your new accommodations must not be very nice.”

  “What would make you say that?”

  “You seem like you haven’t slept well or something. You have grumpy lines.” She touched the sides of her own mouth to show him where. He stared at her mouth. His grumpy lines deepened.

  “We’re going to work on your kick today.” And so they did. There was a lot less touching this second day of instruction. It was shameful how disappointed she was by that. He announced the session was over from the opposite end of the pool. Isabella was fairly certain this was to discourage thank-you kisses.

  Though, even without the kiss, his swimming seemed even more furious when she left than it had the day before.

  The third day, another bathing suit had arrived. It was not a bikini. It was a leopard-patterned one-piece with a plunging neckline and the legs cut very high. It was so racy—and not the competitive swimming kind of racy—that Isabella actually debated not wearing it at all.

  But she was so glad she had when they sat side by side on the pool deck, legs dangling in the water for lesson number three. His mouth set in a grim line, Connor demonstrated the arm movements for the front crawl. Really? Him showing off his arm muscles like that was no more fair than her showing off in her bikini!

  They ended the lesson in the water. With him at her side she managed to swim across the width of the shallow end of the pool, once on her back and then once on her front.

  The only reason he touched her at all was because she swallowed some water and came up choking. He slammed her on the back a few times before ordering her back to work.

  When she emerged from the cabana, she noticed that Connor was churning up enough water to create a tidal wave.

  The fourth day, not wanting it to be too obvious she was enjoying driving him crazy, she put the lime-green bikini from the first day back on. He got her into the deep end. He taught her to tread water, arms doing huge swooping circles, legs bicycling.

  “You don’t work hard at it,” he warned her. “You relax. It’s something you should be able to do for a long, long time.”

  And then he made her do it for half an hour, treading water right beside her without ever touching her. Once again, when she left he was covering the pool in length-eating strokes.

  The fifth day, she arrived at the pool in her newest bathing suit. It was too bad he’d left her house and she’d refused his money. It would have helped her afford all these suits.

  This one was a simple black one-piece, a tank style. The most suitable for swimming, it made the light come on in his eyes just as the others had done.

  “Today,” he announced, “we’ll do a quick review of everything we have learned, and then we’re done.”

  Done. Isabella thought of that. No more seeing him every day, unless she caught glimpses of him in the village, going about his business. Her life would be as empty as her house.

  And then the wedding would come and go, and he would be gone from Monte Calanetti for good. Forever.

  She got in the water and stood at the bottom of the stairs.

  “Don’t stand there gripping the rail like that,” he snapped. “You’ve come farther than that.”

  The tone! As bossy as if she was some green recruit he had authority over. A beach ball, rolling around on the deck, pushed by the wind, plopped in the water beside her. On an impulse, she picked it up and hurled it at his head.

  He caught it easily and squinted at her. For a moment she thought he was going to ignore her protest of his high-handed ways. But then he tossed the ball high in the air and spiked it at her. She swiveled out of the way with a little squeal. The ball missed her, and then she grabbed it. She threw. He dived under the water.

  Connor resurfaced and grabbed the ball. He threw it hard. She, who a week ago had been afraid to get her face wet, ducked under the water. She came up and grabbed the ball. He was swimming away from her. She waded in after him, threw the ball when he stopped. It bounced off his head.

  “Ha-ha, one for me,” she cried.

  He grabbed the ball and tossed it. It hit her arm. “Even. One for me, too.” He swam right up to her, his powerful strokes bringing him to her in a breath. He grabbed the ball and let her have it from close range. “Two for me.”

  “Oh!”

  Just like that, all the tension that had been building between them for a week dissolved into laughter. They were playing. The last lesson was forgotten, and they were like children chasing each other around the pool, shrieking and laughing and calling taunts at each other.

  And then she missed a throw and the ball bounced onto the deck. Neither of them bothered to get it, and now they were just playing tag without the ball between them. The air filled with their hoots of laughter. She tagged him with a shove and swam away. He came after her hard and splashed her, then tagged her and was off. She knew she couldn’t possibly catch him, and so he was letting her shove him and splash him.

  An hour went by. They were breathless, the air shimmering with their awareness of each other.

  Reluctant for it ever to end, Isabella finally gave in first and hauled herself up on the deck and lay there on her tummy, panting, exhausted. A shadow passed over her. He was standing above her.

  Isabella was aware she was holding her breath. He had moved out of her house to avoid her. But then, after a moment, he lowered himself to the deck, on his stomach, right beside her. He wasn’t touching her, but he was so close she could feel a wave of warmth coming off the outer part of his arm.

  He closed his eyes, and she unabashedly studied him. She could see how the water was beading on his skin, droplets tangled in his eyelashes, sunlight turning them to diamonds. She could see the smooth perfection of his skin, the lines of his muscles, the swimmer’s broadness of his shoulders and back.

  She had never, ever been more aware of another human being than she was of Connor, lying beside her. She sighed with something that sounded very much like surrender, and closed her eyes.

  * * *

  Lying there on the pool deck beside Isabella, Connor felt as if the whole world came to a standstill. When danger was near, he always felt this—his senses heightened until they were almost painful. And he felt it again right now, as he had never felt it before.

  He could feel the gentle Tuscan sun on his back and the heat rising up through the pool deck and warming every cell of his skin. He could hear the birds singing, but more, he could separate their songs, so he could hear each one individually. She sighed—a contented sound like a kitten’s mew—and he could feel the puff of air from that sigh touch his lips, as life-altering as her kiss had been.

  He could smell the flowers that bloomed in abundance around the pool, the faint tang of chlorine and most of all Isabella. The spicy scent had been washed away and replaced by an aroma that was dizzying in its feminine purity.

  He had only one sense left to exp
lore. He opened his eyes and gazed at Isabella stretched out on the pool deck. Her hair hung thick and wet and luxurious down the narrowness of her back. Her black bathing suit clung to her like a second skin, caressing the curve of her back and the swell of her firm buttock. Her skin was as flawless as porcelain. The roundness of her cheek was pressed into the deck, and her lashes were so thick and long they cast a faint shadow there. Her lips had not a hint of lipstick on them, and yet they naturally called to him, full and plump and sensuous.

  As if she sensed him studying her, she opened her eyes. He unabashedly threw himself into the color of them—it felt as if he was swimming in cool pools of sun-filtered greens and golds and browns.

  A few days ago, he had gone to the chapel at the palazzo. It had been strictly work. If he was a bad guy, where would he hide? What were the weak places both in the chapel and around it? He’d taken some pictures and made some notes of the exterior and then moved inside.

  Logan Cascini, the project manager for the whole restoration, had come up to him. Connor had been touching base with Logan on and off since he arrived, and there was an affinity between the two men.

  “You have to see what has complicated my life today,” Logan had said wryly.

  “That’s gotta be a woman,” Connor had muttered.

  “That sounds like the voice of experience,” Logan said, raising a quizzical eyebrow.

  “Show me your complication,” Connor said, not following Logan’s implied invitation to elaborate.

  “This is the final wall we’re working on. We’re just pulling off that old wood paneling.”

  Connor followed Logan over to a side wall of the church. The workmen were absolutely silent, their normal chatter gone.

  As they uncovered it, Connor, who considered himself no kind of art lover, had stood there, frozen by the beauty of what he was seeing revealed.

  “It’s a fresco,” Logan supplied, “probably centuries old, and probably by one of the lesser Renaissance painters.”

  “I’ve never seen anything so beautiful,” Connor said when he could find his voice. The fresco was the Madonna and child. The expression on the Madonna’s face was so infused with love that Connor could feel an uncomfortable emotion closing his throat.