Page 21 of How Not to Mess with a Millionaire

“Thank you,” she whispered as she brushed past Dante. She paused, turned, and before she could think better of it, lifted herself up on tiptoe to kiss his cheek. His lightly stubbled skin was an intriguing combination of rough and smooth under her lips, and she wondered how it would feel a little lower. Like against her nipples or on the sensitive skin of her inner thighs.

She pulled back abruptly, heat creeping up her face like mercury rising in a thermometer. “I’m sorry. I don’t know why I did that.”

He rubbed a hand across his jaw, like he was relishing the feel of her kiss. Or wiping it away. “It was nothing. Probably how you thank all your partners in crime.”

“Crime?”

“Kidnapping. Or is it called pignapping?” A flash of amusement lit his eyes. So he was human after all. Knowing he could find the humor in this situation—seeing the little chink in his armor—made Zoe warm to him in a different way. A new kind of attractiveness, beyond the obvious physical.

“We’re not kidnapping him,” she insisted, relieved to have something to argue about other than that stupid, impulsive kiss. “We’re liberating him.”

“If you say so.” Dante eyed Houdini. “But I don’t care how grateful he is, I’m not kissing a pig. That’s where I draw the line.”

“Fair enough.”

Three sharp raps brought both their attention back to the immediate threat on the threshold. “Answer the door or I’m calling the police.”

“The police?” Zoe’s eyes widened. Whatever she thought would happen, it wasn’t that. She didn’t want to get Dante in any legal trouble.

He gave her a gentle push toward the stairs. “Go. I’ve got this.”

Her skin tingled where he’d touched her, her heavy sweatshirt providing zero protection from the strange, primal chemistry that buzzed between them. Her pheromones communicating with his and vice versa. Or something like that. What did she know about the science of sexual attraction? Not much, if her dismal dating record was anything to go by.

Houdini snuffled softly, and she scratched between his ears, quieting him. “I’m sorry for being so much trouble.”

“You have no idea,” Dante muttered, crossing to the door.

She started up the stairs, pausing at the top to take one last look at him. He turned at that same second, one hand on the doorknob, and their eyes met and locked, sending a zing of electricity straight to her core.

Yeah, she thought as she fled to the relative safety of her bedroom.I do.

…

If someone had told him a week ago he’d be purchasing a pig, he’d have told them they were crazy.

Yet there he was, closing the door on a now smiling Mr. Abruzzi, almost nine hundred euros poorer and the not-so-proud owner of one miniature pot-bellied piglet.

All for the sake of a woman he’d sworn to evict.

He blamed his no-account neighbor. When the piece of shit called Zoe aputtana, something inside Dante snapped. He might not know much about her—aside from their late-night opera chat, they hadn’t exactly been having any heart-to-heart discussions—but one thing he was certain of was that she was no whore. He had even come to the reluctant conclusion that she wasn’t conspiring with his grandmother to fix him up. She certainly wasn’t acting like someone trying to snare a rich husband, alternating between annoying him and avoiding him like the plague.

Maybe that was why his neighbor’s insult rankled, bringing out all of the old-world European chivalry his grandmother had drilled into him from the time he could talk.

Girls are people, too.

Manners matter. Be a gentleman.

You can be strong and sensitive, vita mia. They are not incompatible.

Dante rested his back against the door and groaned, his grandmother’s words echoing in his brain. He might as well wave the white flag and resign himself to three more weeks of frustration, sexual and otherwise. Zoe wasn’t budging, and neither was he.

What choice did he have? Forget Nicole and go back to Rome? Luca would never let him live down being bested by a woman. And Nonna would never forgive him for abandoning Zoe. His grandmother might only weigh a hundred and ten pounds soaking wet, but her tongue-lashings were legendary.

Bottom line: leaving wasn’t an option. He’d have to suck it up and make the best of cohabiting with a woman he couldn’t seem to keep from running through his mind. Usually naked.

And now he could add a pig to the mix. As if things couldn’t get more complicated.

He shoved off the doorframe and dragged his sorry self upstairs, heading for Zoe’s room to give her the good news that the coast was clear and her stupid swine was safe. Well, his stupid swine, technically, since he’d paid for the porker. Not that he had any intention of keeping him. He didn’t do romantic relationships, and he didn’t do pets. Both left his heart open and exposed to grief and loss, two things he wasn’t about to voluntarily subject himself to. Not again.