Heaven and Hell (Heaven and Hell #1)(68)
I was walking in, pulling my purse off my shoulder when I noticed and looked back at him.
“Come here, Kia,” he ordered gently.
I threw my bag on a chair and walked to him, head tilted in confusion.
When I made it to him, his arms slid loosely around me, he tipped his chin down and he said quietly, “I’ve been pushin’ and today, I see I pushed too hard. I’m gonna give you some space tonight. You get up, call me and I’ll meet you for breakfast before we go.”
I stared up at him.
He bent his neck and kissed my nose.
My nose.
“Sleep well and have good dreams,” he whispered, gave me a light squeeze, let me go, turned, opened and walked through the door.
I stood there while he did all that except, when the door started closing, I caught it, moved into it, leaned into the hall then asked Sam’s departing back, “You’re leaving?”
He stopped, turned and looked at me.
“You need space,” he informed me.
“Don’t tell me what I need, Sam. Only I know what I need.”
He held my eyes.
I leaned further forward, stretched out an arm and grabbed his hand.
That was all I had to do.
In half of one of his long strides, he was at me, crowding me and I was back through the door. Then he bent and, with a small, surprised cry, I was over his shoulder. The door clicked shut and in five strides Sam tossed me on the bed.
Then he followed me down.
* * * * *
Eight hours and forty-five minutes later…
Sam and I walked into the dining room together holding hands and, when his eyes caught sight of us, dropped to our hands then back to my face, I didn’t have to speak Italian to translate the maitre d’s look of pure, unadulterated glee.
Chapter Eleven
That Means Somethin’ to Me
Five days later…
It was mid-morning and I was at the pool waiting for Sam to finish working out so I could make the big move from the pool to the beach.
This was the way our days were rolling out: up (make love), breakfast, I would go to the pool, Sam would go to the hotel gym to work out or take to the streets for a run. Then Sam would shower, come and get me (this was an added or alternate making love time slot) and go with me to the beach. In the afternoon, we’d find food and since Sam would be d-o-n-e, done with lying around at the beach, I’d shower, we would jump in the Jeep he rented and explore.
On our first day there, I learned Sam was not a lying around on the beach man, he was an action man. Although I was a lying around on the beach gal, it was cool he was an action man because exploring was fun. It was also cool that, even though he was an action man, he gave me my time by the pool and beach and he did it without complaint.
It was a nice compromise, something I’d never experienced before in my life. With Cooter I did the compromising, I didn’t know what it was like to have a fair dose of what I wanted before I gave in to what someone else wanted.
It felt good.
And, with Sam, giving in wasn’t giving in, as such. Giving in led to some great times.
For instance, we found a tiny, awesome fishing village set in a spectacular bay while we were exploring. We got there late afternoon and stayed there well into the evening because the open taverna where we had dinner had a band that was killer, Greek music, lots of clapping and, in the end, dancing, though, Sam didn’t dance, but an old guy pulled me up and I had a blast.
We also found the cave where Zeus was born after driving up a hair-raising mountain road that was totally worth it once we climbed further up the mountain on foot and then climbed down to Zeus’s birthplace.
We also found another beach, which was the best seeing as it had absolutely nothing built around it at all, you had to trek to it and it was pure and beautiful and so relaxing, regardless of the fact that we were not the only ones there, even Sam was happy to hang.
And the best part of Sam winding down and hanging was that a lot of the time he did it, he did it lying on his side next to me in the sand, elbow in the towel, head in his hand, chest on display, talking to me quietly. Or he’d roll to his back, pull me up on his chest and run his fingers through my hair while we talked quietly. Or he’d get to his feet, pull me to mine, guide me to the sea and we’d drift around, my legs around Sam’s hips, my arms around his shoulders, his hands at my ass, him treading water or floating and we’d again talk quietly.
After our explorations, except when we stayed at the fishing village, we went back, found dinner then wandered to an open air taverna, had drinks then we wandered back to the hotel and had a different kind of fun that wasn’t relaxing until after its culmination.
In other words, Lake Como wasn’t heaven.
Crete was.
It was perfect.
No dramas. No rushing out of restaurants like the fraught heroine in a romantic comedy. Just sun, beautiful vistas, relaxing beaches, exploration, being together and discovering each other.
The only thing that marred this was, without a variety of things to pull our attention away from each other, such as grieving friends, new acquaintances and the aforementioned crises, it was beginning to unsettle me that Sam couldn’t relax.
It was definitely part Sam being an action man and not content to wile away the hours doing pretty much nothing.
But it was more.
He seemed aware and alert all the time, like he was when we had our first dinner together. He was into me, giving me his attention, listening to me, talking to me but even as he did this, he scanned, he observed, both our surroundings and mostly the people in them.