Chapter 30 #2
He sighs out the breath he was holding, exhaustion emanating from him, his gaze still pleading with me even as I’ve said all I can say. “I’ll get them penned in quickly, but then I’m coming back.”
I nod again, forcefully enough that he takes me seriously. He turns and jogs toward the fencing where the cows have all gathered, clearly not wanting to get any closer to what’s happening.
I watch him for a minute, trying to breathe deeper, not sure if it’s hard because of the smoke or Nico’s words.
Memories of my restaurant’s fire surge forward, weighing me down, stilling me with a cold I shouldn’t be feeling amid all this heat.
But I know what it feels like to watch your dream burn in front of your eyes; I know how much it can take away.
For all Nico’s faced, he’s never had to worry about this being taken away from him.
He’s hitched his life to his work passion, the same way I have, and it’s devastating to be faced with watching it burn.
I’m shocked from my stillness by embers falling off the tree and rolling toward me, catching on the grass. I grimace and look to Nico in the distance, but thankfully he’s already leading the cows behind Gia’s fence. Seeing him spurs me to act.
I take the fire blanket and throw it on the fire, careful not to get too close.
I don’t want to break my word to Nico, but I’m also not going to let this get any worse on my watch.
There’s not a lot of wind, and while the dryness of the trees has created a lot of smoke, the fire’s not spreading as much as I would fear.
That one tree is still engulfed and the other two near it are also rapidly gaining.
But the trees are far enough apart that only falling branches have caught the other trees, so mostly I can keep the smaller fires on the ground from gaining.
But it’s not long before Nico’s back and we’re fighting the spread together.
The smoke makes everything hazy, and my limbs ache as we stamp out new fires as fast as we can.
Branches that have burned keep breaking off and crashing to the ground, singeing the grass and threatening to take more with them, but we act quickly each time.
Everything surrounding us feels flammable—apparently the oil that exists in the olives is also in the leaves and the bark, which means that whenever fire touches anything, it catches almost instantly.
The battle seems constant and never-ending.
Every time I get too close to a tree, I can see Nico wince.
He stops himself from saying anything—he knows in normal circumstances I wouldn’t take well to being treated like I’m somehow weaker—but his silent, pleading expression keeps me back, aching to not make him worry.
We’ve found a delicate dance without talking, containing, minimizing, and praying the fire truck comes as soon as possible.
When I hear the siren, it’s like the relief of the cavalry arriving right as the battle is starting to feel lost. I collapse to the ground, exhausted, spent, and coughing.
I’ve been somehow running on whatever fumes I could muster, but the truck’s arrival gives me permission to let myself stop.
Luce climbs into my lap, having spent the night running around at our heels and now taking his first opportunity for comfort.
Everything next happens in a blur. Men shout in Italian and a hose is brought up, spraying water and dousing the flames.
The fire has totally destroyed that one central tree, and three others are in varying states of destruction.
Even in the dark I can see all the patches of ground that have been singed, soft grass reduced to soot.
But eventually, silence overtakes the sounds of crackles and shouts.
There’s only darkness and the vestiges of all the smoke that hangs in the air.
Nico finishes talking to the firefighters and shakes their hands solemnly.
They walk back to their truck and pull out, and then everything is still again.
Nico stands wordlessly staring at the blackened tree at the center of the scene. I get up and go to him, wrapping my arms around his waist from behind.
At my touch, he turns and cups my face with his hands.
He breathes me in, looking at me longingly, his eyes so tired and sad that instinct takes over and I have to kiss him.
He lets out a gravelly sigh at the contact and pulls me closer, as though I’m a blanket on a cold day.
He presses his fingers carefully to my jaw, like he wants to hold me in place but I’m too delicate to manhandle.
It’s comfort, for both of us. I want so badly to take away the pain of this evening for him. I want to swathe him in bubble wrap and fix the world for him. I want to yell at him to stay away from fires and smoke and anything that could hurt him for one more second.
But then he goes deeper, his tongue sliding across mine.
One hand still cups my jaw, but the other is grabbing my hip, angling me toward him.
And somehow that closeness is like a lightning bolt to my center.
All the adrenaline that’s been coursing through me all night is awakened with his nearness, like my body is so happy to be present and alive and away from danger that his touch has intensified all my nerve endings.
We’ve shifted from comfort to hunger in an instant.
One of my legs has looped around him; I need more of my body to be touching his.
“Kit,” he groans, his hand leaving my jaw and tracing down my neck, digging into my collarbone like he’s hopeless in his attempts to be gentle but is still holding himself back.
But the sound of his voice makes it so I can’t hold myself back. I push him against one of the trees with a thud, our touches growing more desperate, his mouth firm on mine.
It’s automatic, the way I need him now, down into my veins.
The way my hands move from his chest down, unbuttoning his pants and mine and practically ripping them both on the way to the ground.
My mind is focused only on his body; on his hands; on how he’s nuzzled into my neck; on the way his hair falls in his face; on how I’m pulsing with need and desire and gratitude and how much I want him.
In one move he’s lifted me up, and I guide us together.
He turns us around so I’m against the tree now, and he pushes inside me, his words in my ear a string of expletives and sighs of relief.
He kisses me again, hard, like he wants every part of me, his grip tight on my thighs, his movements fast and wild.
When I gasp at the press of the tree into my back, he immediately moves one hand up to block it, pressing hard into me but shielding me from battering up against it again.
“I love you,” he whispers into my ear, the vulnerability of his words stark against the strength of his body holding up mine. “I’m not sorry I said it before. I can’t help it. I love you so much.”
There’s so much fragility in the rasp of his voice: pained, like he doesn’t want to hurt me by telling me the one thing we wordlessly agreed we’d never say. As though he would’ve broken if he didn’t get to explain what he said earlier.
But before I can respond, his kiss is a force again, like he can’t bear to see what I’d say back.
I’m so close to coming apart that I can’t fight him on it, so I try to tell him without words.
I tighten the grip of my legs around him, run my hands through his hair, and kiss him fervently, until I can’t think anymore.
Until the smell of smoke and the reality of me leaving is emptied from my mind through the sensation of his touch.
Until every inch of me is liquid concentrate, a firework of touch, and the only word I can say is his name.