A Place in the Sun(35)

Katerina and I walked up the stairs to the train station to meet the group and I was taken aback when I saw the rest of the group standing there on the landing. There was Massimo and Paolo standing with a guy they introduced as Matteo. He was one of Massimo’s friends from La Spezia and he’d taken the train into the village to spend the day with us. I offered up a hello and tried to give him a bit of attention, but I was focused on the other half of the group, the side that included Gianluca and other girls.

I’d invited Chiara early on, anxious to spend some time with her outside the hotel’s front lobby. Now, I wasn’t sure it had been the best idea, especially since she’d taken the liberty of inviting a friend: a tall, lean Italian girl with enough confidence to outshine everyone within a hundred-mile radius.

She had amazing black hair, curled and full of body as she tossed her head back and laughed at something Gianluca said. The bloke was a lot of things, but he wasn’t really a laugh. She was overdoing it.

Chiara turned to wave at me and it caught Gianluca’s attention.

He turned over his shoulder, caught sight of me, and grinned. My heart did this little sputter thing and I thought for a second it’d stopped altogether.

“I was worried you were going to bail on us,” he said, breaking off from the girls to come say hello. I’d been with him just that morning, but then I’d gone around to Katerina’s shop so I could help her pick out a bikini.

I tilted my head toward Katerina. “Blame her. There was this lady in the shop who was lingering for ages as we tried to close up.”

“She didn’t even buy anything in the end! God, I hate customers like that.”

Massimo tossed an arm around her and tugged her into his side. “Just call me next time. I’ll buy any dress in the place if it means you can close up and come to the beach.”

“Okay, but you have to wear it,” she laughed.

Chiara and her friend came over to join the group and they introduced themselves to everyone. Her friend was called Adrianna and when she turned to smile at me, I realized I’d been giving her too much credit. She was pretty, of course she was, but the things I found exotic and exciting about her were the same things that made me exotic and exciting to Italian men. Everyone had something to offer and when I reached out to shake her hand, I did so with a genuine smile on my face. The day I got intimidated by another woman would be the day I was no longer Georgie Archibald.

She fired off something in Italian that I didn’t understand. Gianluca leaned over to tell me she was joking about the train taking forever. I smiled up at him and then the crackly speakers announced a warning to stand back from the tracks.

“Everyone got their beach supplies?” I asked, adjusting the thin sarong over my shoulder.

Gianluca tapped my bulging straw bag. “It looks like you’ve got enough for an army,” he teased.

“I like to be prepared.”

“Is there extra sun cream in there for me?”

“I told you I didn’t have much! You can’t steal it all.”

He grinned. “I’ll bring you more tomorrow.”

Katerina cut in after clearing her throat. “You two working on the weekends now?”

“Georgie insists on it.”

Adrianna smirked. “I can think of something much better to do on Saturday mornings.”

Gianluca leaned in close to my ear and whispered, “She’s talking about sex…”

I narrowed my eyes. “Yeah, I got that, you fool.”

He grinned wider and by then the queue for the train had gone down enough that we could hop on. I slid into a seat beside Katerina.

“Have you been keeping something from me?”

I leaned down in my bag for my sunglasses. “What do you mean?”

“It’s just the way you two are acting. The flirting, it almost seems like…”

“We’re friends?” I cut her off with a laugh. “I promise it’s nothing. I mean, he was the one to suggest this trip so I could meet a few of Massimo’s mates.”

“So then why aren’t you talking to Paolo and Matteo?”

“I will! We’ve only just gotten on the train. Once we get to the beach, I’ll make a real effort to get to know them.”

Her narrowed gaze told me she didn’t believe what I was saying, but I shrugged off her concern and turned toward the window. The sea whipped past as we cut in and out of the cliffs. Waves crashed against the rocky shore, promising relief from the stuffy train car.

A part of me knew Katerina was right. I needed to give Paolo and Matteo a chance. I hadn’t even really paid attention to Matteo when he’d first introduced himself on the platform. I decided to rectify that, and as we each finished renting our chairs and umbrellas on Monterosso’s beach, I made sure to place my things right beside Matteo’s. He smiled over at me before he reached up to tug off his shirt. He had an intricate, colorful tattoo that wrapped around his right shoulder. His light brown hair fell over his forehead and his accent was thick and charming as he asked if I’d been to Monterosso before.

“A ton. I come over to swim a few times a week.”

“It shows,” he said, dragging his gaze down my body. I still had my sarong covering my bikini, but I might as well have been naked from the way he took me in. It was a bit much, but at least it was good to know all my swimming hadn’t been in vain.