On sight he had triggered something.
Those dark eyes seemed to see far beyond the rather brittle façade she wore.
She didn’t know how to be sexy, yet around him she was.
More than that—she wanted to be.
She added lipstick and wished she’d worn the neutral shoes.
Except Lydia felt far from neutral about tonight.
It was too much.
Far, far too much.
She would quickly change, Lydia decided.
But then there was a gentle rap on the door and she was informed that it was time to be seated.
‘I’ll just be a few moments,’ Lydia said, and dismissed the steward. But what she did not understand about private jets was the fact that there were not two hundred passengers to get strapped in.
‘Now.’ The steward smiled. ‘We’re about to come in to land.’
There was no chance to change and so, shy, reluctant, but trying not to show it, Lydia stepped out.
‘Sit down,’ Raul said.
He offered no compliment—really, he gave no reaction.
In fact he took out his phone and sent a text.
Oddly, it helped.
She had a moment to sit with her new self, away from his gaze, and Lydia looked out of the window and willed her breathing to calm.
Venice was always beautiful, and yet today it was even more so.
As they flew over on their final descent she rose out of the Adriatic in full midsummer splendour, and Lydia knew she would remember this moment for ever. The last time she had felt as if she were sitting alone, even though she had been surrounded by school friends.
Now, as the wheels hit the runway, Lydia came down to earth as her spirit soared high.
And as they stood to leave he told her.
‘You look amazing.’
‘Is it too much?’
‘Too much?’ Raul frowned. ‘It’s still summer.’
‘No, I meant...’ She wasn’t talking about the amount of skin on show, but she gave up trying to explain what she meant.
But Raul hadn’t been lost in translation—he had deliberately played vague.
He had heard Maurice’s reprimand yesterday morning and knew colour was not a feature in her life.
Till today.
And so he had played it down.
He had told her to sit, as if blonde beauties in sexy red dresses wearing red high heels regularly walked out of the bedroom of his plane.
Actually, they did.
But they had never had him reaching for his phone and calling in a favour from Silvio, a friend.
Raul had been toying with the idea all afternoon...wondering if it would be too much.
But then he had seen her. Stunning in red. Shy but brave. And if Lydia had let loose for tonight, then so too would he.
‘Where are we going?’ Lydia asked.
‘Just leave all that to me.’
Last time she’d been in Venice there had been strict itineraries and meeting points, but this time around there was no water taxi to board. Instead their luggage was loaded onto a waiting speedboat, and while Raul spoke with the driver Lydia took a seat and drank in the gorgeous view.
Then she became impatient to know more, because the island they were approaching looked familiar.
‘Tell me where we’re going.’
‘To Murano.’
‘Oh.’ Just for a second her smile faltered. Last time Lydia had been there she had felt so wretched.
‘Sometimes it is good to go back.’
‘You don’t, though,’ Lydia pointed out, because from everything she knew about Raul he did all he could not to revisit the past.
‘No, I don’t.’
She should leave it, Lydia knew, and for the moment she did.
There was barely a breeze as their boat sliced through the lagoon. Venice could never disappoint. Raul had been right. It heightened the emotions, and today Lydia’s happiness was turning to elation.
In a place of which she had only dark memories suddenly everything was bright, and so she looked over to him and offered a suggestion.
‘Maybe you should go back, Raul.’
He did not respond.
They docked in Murano, the Island of Bridges, and Raul took her hand to help Lydia off the boat. The same way as he had last night in Rome, he didn’t let her hand go.
And in a sea of shorts and summer tops and dresses Lydia was overdressed.
For once she cared not.
They walked past all the showrooms and turned down a small cobbled street. Away from the tourists there was space to slow down and just revel in the feel of the sun on her shoulders.
‘I know someone who has a studio here,’ Raul said.
He did not explain that often in the mornings Silvio was at Raul’s favourite café, and they would speak a little at times. And neither did he explain that he had taken Silvio up on a long-standing offer—‘If you ever want to bring a friend...’
Raul had never envisaged that he might.
Oh, he admired Silvio’s work—in fact his work had been one of the features that had drawn Raul to buy his home.
He had never thought he might bring someone, though, and yet she was so thrilled to be here, so lacking in being spoilt...
‘Silvio is a master glassmaker,’ Raul explained. ‘He comes from a long line of them. His work is commissioned years in advance and it’s exquisite. There will be no three-legged ponies to tempt you.’
And Lydia had never thought she could smile at that memory, yet she did today.
‘In fact there is nothing to buy—there is a waiting list so long that he could never complete it in his lifetime. People say that to see him work is to watch the sun being painted in the sky. All we have to do this evening is enjoy.’
‘You’ve never seen him work?’
‘No.’
But that changed today.
It was the great man himself who opened a large wooden door and let them in. The place was rather nondescript, with high ceilings and a stained cement floor, and in the middle was a large furnace.
Silvio wore filthy old jeans and a creased shirt and he was unshaven, yet there was an air of magnificence about him.
‘This is Lydia,’ Raul introduced her.
‘Welcome to Murano.’
‘She has been here before,’ Raul said. ‘Though the last time it was on a school trip.’
The old man smiled. ‘And did you bring home a souvenir?’
‘A vase.’ Lydia nodded. ‘It was for my mother.’
‘Did she like it?’
Lydia was about to give her usual smile and nod, but then she stood there remembering her mother’s air of disdain as she had opened the present.
‘She didn’t seem to appreciate it,’ Lydia admitted.
It had hurt a lot at the time.
All her savings and so much pain had gone into the purchase, and yet Valerie had turned up her nose.
But Silvio was looking out of the windows.
‘I had better get started. The light is getting low,’ he explained.
‘Too low to work?’ Lydia asked.
‘No, no...’ He smiled. ‘I do very few pieces in a fading light. They are my best, though. I will get some coffee.’
Silvio headed to a small kitchenette and Lydia wandered, her heels noisy on the concrete floor.
There was nothing to see, really, nor to indicate brilliance—nothing to pull her focus back from the past.
‘My mother hated that vase,’ Lydia told Raul as she wandered. ‘She ended up giving it to one of the staff as a gift.’ God, that had hurt at the time, but rather than bring down the mood Lydia shrugged. ‘At lea
st it went to practical use rather than gathering dust.’
The coffee Silvio had made was not for his guests, Lydia quickly found out. He returned and placed a huge mug on the floor beside a large glass of water, and then she and Raul had the privilege of watching him work.
Molten glass was stretched and shaped and, with a combination of the most basic of tools and impossible skill, a human form emerged.
And then another.
It was mesmerising to watch—as if the rather drab surroundings had turned into a cathedral. The sun streamed in from the westerly windows and caught the thick ribbons of glass. And Lydia watched the alchemy as somehow Silvio formed two bodies, and then limbs emerged.
It was like witnessing creation.
Over and over Silvio twisted and drew out tiny slivers of glass—spinning hair, eyes, and shaping a slender waist. It was erotic too, watching as Silvio formed breasts and then shaped the curve of a buttock.
Nothing was held back. The male form was made with nothing left to the imagination, and the heat in her cheeks had little to do with the furnace that Silvio used to fire his tools and keep the statue fluid.
It was sensual, creative and simply art at its best. Faces formed and pliable heads were carefully moved, and the kiss that emerged was open-mouthed and so erotic that Lydia found her own tongue running over her lips as she remembered the blistering kisses she and Raul had shared.
It was like tasting Raul all over again and feeling the weight of his mouth on hers.
Lydia fought not to step closer, because she didn’t want to get in the way or distract Silvio, yet every minuscule detail that he drew from the liquid glass deserved attention. She watched the male form place a hand on the female form’s buttock and flushed as if Raul had just touched her there.
Raul was trying not to touch her.
It was such an intimate piece, and personal too, for it felt as if the energy that hummed between them had somehow been tapped.
And then Silvio merged the couple, pulling the feminine thigh around the male loin, arching the neck backwards, and Lydia was aware of the sound of her own pulse whooshing in her ears.
The erotic beauty was more subtle now, the anatomical details conjoined for ever and captured in glass. And then Silvio rolled another layer of molten glass over them, covering the conjoined beauty with a silken glass sheet.
Yet they all knew what lay beneath.
‘Now my signature...’ Silvio said, and Lydia felt as if she had been snapped from a trance.
He seared his name into the base, and smoothed it till it was embedded, and then it was for Raul and Lydia to admire the finished piece.
‘I’ve never seen anything like it,’ Lydia admitted as she examined the statue.
How could glass be sexy? Yet this was a kiss, in solid form, and the intimate anatomical work that had seemed wasted when the forms had been merged was now revealed—she could see the density at the base of the woman’s spine that spoke of the man deep within her.
‘It’s an amazing piece,’ Raul said, and Lydia couldn’t believe that his voice sounded normal when she felt as if she had only just returned from being spirited away.
‘There are more...’ Silvio said, and he took them through to another area and showed them several other pieces.
As stunning as they all were, for Lydia they didn’t quite live up to the lovers’ statue. Perhaps it was because she had witnessed it being made, Lydia mused as they stepped back out into the street.
It was disorientating.
Lydia went to head left, but Raul took her hand and they went right and he led her back to the speedboat.
The driver had gone, on Raul’s instruction, and it was he who drove them to San Marco.
Raul took great pride in showing her around this most seductive of cities.
They wandered through ghostly back streets and over bridges.
‘It’s so wonderful to be here,’ Lydia said. ‘It was all so rushed last time, and it felt as if we were just ticking things off a list.’
‘And the obligatory gondola ride?’ Raul said, but her response surprised him.
‘No.’ Lydia shook her head. ‘Some of the girls did, but...’ She stopped.
‘But?’
‘Sitting on the bus with the teacher was bad enough. I think a gondola ride with her would have been worse somehow.’
She tried to keep it light, as Raul had managed to when they had been talking about her lonely school trip in Rome. She didn’t quite manage it, though.
Raul, who had been starting to think about their dinner reservation, steered her towards the canal.
‘Come on,’ he said. ‘You cannot do Venice without a gondola ride.’
Till this point Raul had, though.
Raul’s usual mode of transport was a speedboat.
But there was nothing like Venice at sunset from a gondola, as both found out together.
The low boat sliced gently through the water and the Grand Canal blushed pink as the sun dipped down. He looked over as she sighed, and saw Lydia smiling softly as she drank it all in.
‘You don’t take photos?’ Raul observed.
‘My phone’s flat,’ Lydia said, but then admitted more. ‘I’m not one for taking photos.’
‘Why not?’
He was ever-curious about her—something Raul had never really been before.
‘Because when it’s gone it’s gone,’ Lydia said. ‘Best to move on.’
The gondolier took them through the interior canals that were so atmospheric that silence was the best option.
It was cool on the water, and there were blankets they could put over their knees, but she accepted Raul’s jacket.
The silk was warm from him, and as she put it on he helped her. The only reason he had not kissed her before was because he’d thought it might prove impossible to stop.
But Raul was beyond common sense thinking now—and so was she.
He took her face in his hands and he looked at her mouth—the lipstick was long gone.
‘I want you,’ he told her.
‘And you know I want you.’
Lydia did.
His mouth told her just how much he wanted her. She watched his eyelids shutter, and then he tasted her. Lydia did the same. She felt the soft weight of him and her mouth opened just a little as they flirted with their tongues. There was tenderness, promise and building passion in every stroke and beat. Yet even as they kissed she cared for the view, and now and then opened her eyes just for a glimpse, because it was like spinning circles in a blazing sky.
His hand slipped inside the jacket. First just the pad of his thumb caressed her breast, and then—she had been right—the dress drew his attention down.
His hand was on her stomach, just lingering, and Lydia felt his warm palm through the fabric. Her breathing stilled and he felt the change and pulled her closer, to taste and feel more.
They sailed under ancient bridges and he kissed her knowingly. So attuned were they no one would guess they weren’t lovers yet.
There was just the sound of the gondolier’s paddle and the taste of passion.
She was on fire, and yet he made her shiver.
Soon Raul knew the gondolier would turn them around, for the canal ended soon. They were about to pass under the Bridge of Sighs and the bells of St Mark’s Campanile were tolling.
Which meant, according to legend, that if they kissed they would be granted eternal love and bliss.
Which Raul did not want.
But their mouths made a fever—a fever neither wanted to break—and anyway he didn’t believe in legends.
They pulled their mouths apart as the gondolier turned them around, but their foreheads were still touching.
Lydia was breathless and fl
ushed, and though Raul had made so many plans for her perfect Venetian night he could wait no more.
They should be stopping soon for champagne, and then a canalside dinner at his favourite restaurant. Except his hand was back between them, stroking her nipple through velvet, and her tongue was more knowing.
His best-laid plans were fading.
Lydia pulled her mouth back, but he kissed her cheek and moved his lips towards her ear, and his jaw was rough and delicious, and his hand on her breast had her suddenly desperate.
‘Raul...’ Lydia said.
Oh, she said his name so easily now.
And he knew her so much more, because there was a slight plea in her voice and it matched the way he felt.
He pulled back his own mouth, only enough to deliver the gondolier an instruction.
The sky was darker as they kissed through the night, and soon they were gliding back towards the Grand Canal, and now Raul wished for an engine and the speed of his own boat.
The gondolier came to a stop at a water door and said something. It took a moment for Lydia to register that they had stopped and so had the kiss. Realising that she was being spoken to, she looked around breathlessly, staring up at yet another palazzo and trying to take in her surroundings.
‘It’s beautiful!’ Lydia said, trying to be a good tourist while wishing they could get back to kissing.
Raul smiled at her attempt to be polite when she was throbbing between the legs.
‘It’s even more beautiful inside,’ Raul told her. ‘This is my home.’
Lydia almost wept in relief.
He got out first and took her by the hand, and then pushed open the dark door.
She entered his home an innocent.
Lydia would not be leaving it the same.
CHAPTER NINE
THROUGH THE ENTRANCE and into an internal elevator they went, but Lydia prayed there would be no fire in the night, for she did not take in her surroundings at all—their kisses were frantic and urgent now.
His body was hard against hers, and his hands were a little rough as Raul fought with himself not to hitch up her dress.
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