Page 62 of Enduring Caine
“You don’t have to like it.” She pulled back, taking my face in both her hands. “You just have to accept it. You can’t say you love me while still rejecting this part of me.”
“I know.” A lump rose into my throat. Everything she was saying was true, but Ididhate it. “How do people do this every day?”
She shrugged. “You used to do something like this every day when you worked here, didn’t you?”
The lump grew. Again, she was right. I’d seen so much violence when I was here, but it never mattered like it did with her. It hadn’t occurred to me how my Zia Giulia dealt with Giovanni’s lifestyle. Cristian was part of it, but she was a bystander.
That was likely why she was in Paris.
“How much time to do we have left?”
She looked down at her watch. “We’re late. They’re probably already on their way.”
“No time for a quickie?”
“I love you,” she said through a suppressed chuckle. “But quick is not your specialty.”
“The only way to get better at something is to practice, you know.” I waggled my eyebrows, doing my best to appear like I was alright with all of this, but I couldn’t manage a full smirk. “I seem to recall being rather quick in a dance club bathroom once.”
She shook her head and left my side, planting her foot into the alcove and pointing to the ground next to it. “There’s a blind spot where we were standing. It’ll be most convincing if we’re still making out when the camera comes back on.”
I resumed my position. “Sounds like a perfect excuse.”
“Do you really need one?” She looked down at me, a softness in her eyes. There was a moment of staring and blinking, of not sharing her true feelings. She was no longer holding backI love you, so what was it now?
Once she was done, I helped her slide soundlessly into my arms. “I love you, bella.”
“I know.” Her fingers threaded into the hair at the nape of my neck, and she pulled my mouth to hers. Our lips parted together, tongues sweeping across each other. She moaned in the kiss, her other hand wrapping around my waist, running over my ass to pull me closer.
My cock hardened and the prospect of a quickie became more of a priority.
She smiled in the kiss, one of her hands dragging down the front of my pants. “When you say quick—”
“Hey!” said a man, surprisingly close.
We startled and I jumped back from her, both of us snapping our heads to see one of the guards I didn’t recognize, standing at the mouth of the cave.
I gestured to him, then to Samantha, giving him a clearYou’re interruptinglook.
“The—there’s a camera—a security—” he stammered.
“Camera?” I shot back, as though I didn’t know there was one in the cave.
He nodded and pointed above our heads. “We had to be sure nothing was going on.”
“Well, nothing’s going on now, is it?” I took Samantha’s hand in mine, hauling her past the guard and out of the cave, completing our ruse. “It’s only another day, bella. Then we’ll have some privacy.”
Chapter 27
Samantha
Dinnerthatnightwasamazing. Between Antonio and Henri, they’d drawn up a menu that fused Mediterranean and Middle Eastern perfectly. My belly was full and happy.
Henri arrived at the table side with his rolling cart laden with small desserts. Individual servings of opera cakes, tiramisu, stuffed dates, and baklava.
“How did you make all this in one day, Henri?” I asked.
He cleared our dinner plates and placed the dessert trays on the table. “Trade secret.”