Chapter 15
COLE
“Let’s go find that focaccia place.”
It had been difficult to pull ourselves away from the scenic overlook, but so far the only thing we’d seen of Riomaggiore was a massive set of steps and a bar.
After gingerly navigating Juliette’s obvious frustration with me, I allowed myself a bit of slack.
I reminded myself that getting to know her, allowing for proper conversation, didn’t mean we needed to end up in bed together.
In fact, it couldn’t. I’d all but promised Parker to behave, and I would.
But I didn’t typically befriend women I was attracted to. This was new, and not necessarily comfortable, territory. But keeping my distance had only served to piss her off, and rightly so.
“For dinner?” I asked as we attempted to follow the signs into town.
“No, silly. Dinner isn’t for another few hours. We’re in Italy, remember. You can’t eat dinner at six o’clock.”
Silly. I was fairly certain no one in my life had ever called me that.
“My stomach would argue that point.”
“Which is why we should find the focaccia place. For an aperitivo.”
An aperitivo was a drink, but I didn’t correct her. Mason not so gently told me once I didn’t need to share every piece of knowledge that popped into my head. And he was right.
“I think the town is this way,” I said, not confident about the fact with the lack of signs, or foot traffic. Thankfully, we had gone the right way, but finding the restaurant was another story.
“She said it was just past the fountain.” Juliette nearly crashed into at least three people with a singular focus on the center of the small piazza. “Down the alley. Or whatever word she used for alley.”
“Vicolo,” I murmured. “That must be it.”
Walking past the tabaccheria, we found the place. Unfortunately, it was closed.
“What the heck?” Jules frowned. “Well, that sucks.”
From the looks of it, this was the smallest of the Cinque Terre towns, only a few side streets off a main piazza. From there, it looked either mostly residential in one direction with the sea to the other.
“Not much here,” I said. “Probably a slow time before dinner.”
“So you admit it’s not actually dinnertime yet here?” Jules’s tone was more competitive than I’d have expected.
“Are we keeping points?”
“Yes,” she said, matter of factly. “One point for Jules.”
“Juliette monella,” I shot back, to which she wrinkled her nose in an adorable way that had me looking away, pretending to assess the situation.
“Let’s go this way,” she offered, as if she’d been here a hundred times before.
Sure enough, not far from the piazza, what looked like a wine bar built into the side of the cliff with at least a hundred stairs down to it came into view.
“Are you kidding me? Look at that. It could be a postcard.”
“A living postcard,” I said as an older white-haired woman made her way to one of the tables. “Looks open. Should we give it a shot?”
Without answering, Juliette bounded toward the stone stairs like a kid in a candy shop. So quickly, in fact, she nearly stumbled down the first set of stairs. I caught her wrist, hauling her back to me, nearly falling myself in the process.
Her wrist was small, the entirety of it fitting easily around my hand.
“Careful,” I said, reluctant to let go. “That would be quite a tumble.”
The way she looked up at me made it feel like someone was sitting on my chest.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, Juliette’s eyes wide.
“I’m so damn klutzy.”
If she wasn’t so despondent, I’d have made a joke of it. Instead, I offered the truth. “Not klutzy. Eager. Excited. Full of life. They’re very different.”
For a second, she appeared shocked. But she recovered quickly, smiling as if she’d been given a Pulitzer prize.
And then didn’t she run down the stairs as if the entire incident hadn’t happened.
But the time I got to the counter where the white-haired woman and another equally grey-haired woman stood sentinel, Juliette had already ordered drinks.
“I got you a Sciacchetrà. It’s local. And complex, like you. They only have wine.”
It was hard not to smile at that. “We’ll take that too.
” I pointed to one of the small plates on the chalkboard menu behind the women.
“Per favore,” I remembered to add. If the last view was spectacular, this one blew the first out of the water.
Without the hillside or trees in the way, the only thing in front of us an unobstructed view of the Ligurian Sea, this one was unparalleled. Worth the extra steps.
“Salute,” I said, Juliette and I clinking glasses. At this point, she was going to turn into a limoncello spritz.
“Salute,” she said, meeting my gaze over our glasses.
Eyes locking, neither of us moved to drink. But just as quickly as it happened, the moment was over. I took a sip, trying not to think too hard on it. For a guy who enjoyed living in the moment and staying present, Juliette was making it nearly impossible.
Being with her was just too damn enjoyable.
“Buon appetito,” the white-haired woman said, her eyes too knowing.
“Grazie,” Jules quipped back.
My eyes darted to the anchovy like it was spawned from the same devil Juliette thought I came from.
“That’s gonna be a no for me,” I said, taking a pesto crostini instead. “At least this was invented not far from here. Just up the coast, in Genoa.”
“Anchovy?” she asked, just before also taking a bite of crostini, a bit of pesto remaining on her lower lip.
I looked back to the plate, picking up a piece of pecorino cheese.
“Yes. Anchovies. They were invented by the local fishermen.”
Juliette made a face at me.
“No,” I said after taking another bite. “Pesto. That’s why it’s so good here.”
“Good. This is like eating crack.”
She was too much. “You don’t eat crack, Juliette.”
“I know that.”
“Do you?” I teased. “Have you ever done drugs?”
“Does pot count?”
“Since it’s a drug, yes.”
She shrugged. “Then yes. You?”
“Yes, I have.”
She blinked. Waited. “Well? What kind?”
I’d forgotten to answer, lost in the way the waning sun caught a deep red hue in her black hair that I’d never noticed.
“Your cheeks are pink,” I said, noticing that too.
“It’s the alcohol. Happens sometimes.”
We both reached for a piece of salami at the same time. Our fingers brushed, and not noticing wasn’t an option.
I tried like hell anyway.
“Finocchiona,” I blurted like a school boy with his first crush. “It’s a type of fennel salami.”
“How do you know so much?” She popped the piece of meat into her mouth.
“I listen. Observe. And was graced with a good memory.”
“Oh man, you’re lucky. My memory’s crap.”
Juliette lifted her glass again, the rim brushing her lower lip as she watched me over the top of it. “Then you’ll have to remember things for both of us,” she said, voice low and teasing.
Something in my chest tightened.
“That’s dangerous,” I said.
“What is?” She set her glass down.
“Depending on me,” I said.
Her smile curved slowly, deliberately. “Who says I’m depending on you?”
Jesus.
I should have looked away. Should have said something neutral, but she licked a dot of pesto from her thumb, and every rational thought I possessed short-circuited.
A soft sound escaped from her. “God, that’s good.”
I tried not to imagine her in a different situation making that sound, saying that very phrase again.
“Careful, Cole,” she murmured, eyes locked on mine. “You’re staring.”
I wasn’t.
I was drowning.
She lifted her glass again, lips brushing the rim in a way that felt obscene for how simple it was.
And then—soft, wicked, knowing—she whispered, “Point for me.”